China deals new blow to Hong Kong’s free press as tycoon Ma buys South China Morning Post

Special to WorldTribune.com

The South China Morning Post may recover financially, but is likely to ramp up its pro-Beijing tilt and slide further from press freedom after the venerable newspaper was bought out by Internet tycoon Jack Ma, analysts said.

Established in 1903, the paper was praised by international readers for its perspective on China and Hong Kong, including detailed reporting on events from the Mao era to the 1997 handover of Hong Kong and Beijing’s transformation to an economic juggernaut.

Jack Ma. /AP/Susan Walsh
Jack Ma. /AP/Susan Walsh

China watchers say that the Post under Ma’s ownership will likely continue its pro-Beijing shift that began under previous owner Robert Kuok, a Malaysian billionaire.

“For all readers of the South China Morning Post the paper has become progressively pro-Beijing, I think this trend will continue,” said Dr. Willy Lam of the Chinese University of Hong Kong’s Center for China Studies who also serves on WorldTribune‘s Editorial Board.

A Beijing correspondent until the Tiananmen Square incident in 1989, Dr. Lam was the South China Post’s China editor during the handover of Hong Kong by Britain to China in 1997. He writes the weekly ‘Inside China’ report for Geostrategy-Direct

“Ma has very close ties with the government so I’m sure he doesn’t want any so-called embarrassing or offensive articles to appear in the Morning Post after he has taken over,” Lam said. “He… has been a major beneficiary of the Chinese system, so it is logical to expect… that he would not want any criticism of the system.”

Lam’s departure from the newspaper in 2000 was regarded as one of the early warning signals of the impact Beijing’s sovereignty would have on basic freedoms in Hong Kong. It prompted a letter of protest at the time to the newspaper from the Hong Kong Foreign Correspondents’ Club’s Freedom of the Press Committee.

Kuok, who is heavily invested in China, bought the Post from media tycoon Rupert Murdoch in 1993.

“I was kicked out because Robert Kuok was very unhappy with what he considered to be (my) excessively critical view on Chinese politics,” said Lam, who added that Hong Kong-based media companies are being influenced by their shareholders in China who are set on Beijing extending its authority over the semi-autonomous city.

“For the past several years, they have gradually but relentlessly boosted control over Hong Kong media,” he said. “(Ma) has to walk a fine line, if either the Post or any other major media becomes a propaganda sheet then its value is lost.”

Media analyst To Yiu-ming said sale of the paper to Ma is a loss for Hong Kong.

“I think it’s lost a channel for expression of liberal news. We’ve lost a platform for professional journalists to honor their duties,” said To, an assistant professor at Hong Kong Baptist University’s journalism school. “It’s also a loss for (the) Hong Kong people.”

The Post suffered financially due to an industry-wide loss of advertising revenue and what was seen as its poor transition to the digital age.

“I think it’s a smart move for Jack Ma,” said financial analyst Jackson Wong. “He has tons of cash and he knows how to run a business in China very well.”

Ma founded Alibaba in 1999 and it it has become China’s biggest e-commerce company.

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