Unspun

Unspun loves Malaysia. Unspun dislikes the politics but loves and is very proud of the food and the place that Unspun grew up in, and have many fond memories of.

When people think of going there for a visit Unspun’s full of enthusiastic recommendations of where to go and see. So when Unspun’s colleague Nila managed to finagle a stint as the hostess in a travel program for a local TV station and they had been invited by The Malaysian Tourism Board to visit my homeland, Unspun was buzzed.

Here lies an opportunity for Malaysia to showcase its many attractions that Unspun’s Indonesian friends can see. So Unspun filled her up to the brim with places she could visit and things she could do that would make good television for the Indonesian viewers.

She went, and when she returned Unspun was malu as a Malaysian. Not because she didn’t think that Malaysia wasn’t beautiful. On the contrary, she thought it was a great place with great people and food but she was totally flabbergasted with the half past six arrangements made by the Malaysian Tourism Board. There were many things that did not go well with her trip but essentially it seemed to rest on the fact that the officers who arranged the trip did not understand the needs of TV journalists.

So when she returned to Jakarta she blogged about her frustrations of trying to cover Malaysia. Unspun encouraged her to do so because her experience was valuable feedback to the Malaysian Tourism Board on what they can improve when inviting journalists in the future. The posting was picked up by S.K Thew in Malaysia and Unspun has been told that it’s caught the attention of the Malaysian Tourism Board.

So what is the reaction of the Malaysian Tourism Board?

Instead of treating it as a signal that their boys on the ground may not have been on the ball, and thanking Nila for blowing the whistle, the Board instead is using its clout to intimidate the TV station, saying that if such matters occur they would not be able to invite the station for any more such junkets.

The TV station would probably buckle because they would pander to a potential advertiser and dispenser of junkets. But it won’t leave a good taste in the mouths of the journalists. Bullying never does.

But by doing so the Board has also shirked its responsibility for its actions. The issue here is whether a MTB minion screwed up in their arrangements for the press to cover Malaysia; not whether the journalist is right to blog about it.

But the actions of the Board in Jakarta now seems to be working on the premise that the TV station is to be rapped for allowing a someone who works on them to blow the whistle on MTB incompetence.

To be fair to the Malaysian Tourism Board, however, Unspun is unable to determine if it’s the local MTB guys trying to sweep things under the carpet to cover up their own failings or whether this line of thinking goes up all the way to the top of the MTB. If the former, MTB HQ should be grateful to Nila for helping them to discover a major problem in their organization; if the latter, Unspun pities the taxpayers in Malaysia.

So how should the Malaysian Tourism Board have reacted to postings such as Nila’s that are critical of its performance?

They could, for starters, take the fine example set by Khazanah Holdings vis a vis a posting in Rocky’ Bru by pointing out that what was asserted was not true (if indeed it wasn’t) and explained why they thought it was such. Unspun is sure that Nila, being a responsible blogger, would have posted the comment together with her response. The world would then know that MTB is a responsive organization and takes service issues seriously.

If, however, what Nila posted earlier was true, then Unspun would think that the Malaysian Tourism Board owes her an apology and an obligation to make things right for her and her crew. They should also call off the local bullies as they could do some long term damage to Malaysia’s relationship with the Indonesian media.

As humans, we all screw up now and then. That’s OK if we take responsibility for our actions, acknowledge our mistakes and move on. But if we live in denial then we are bound to make things worse.

This year is Visit Malaysia Year and Unspun would be happy to see lots of tourists visiting the good old homeland in spite of heavy competition from its neighbors Thailand and Singapore.

But if Malaysian petty bureaucrats are allowed to behave like preman then don’t forget that this is a globalized and flat world. Our competitors will learn from our mistakes and woo the journalists instead. There is no shortage of tourism board willing to give journalists junkets, and to take care of them very well, in exchange for some coverage.