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| FBC Media's PR Chief/ Executive Programme Editor Alan Friedman |
Sarawak Report has received
a copy of the actual letter and contract sent by FBC Media Chairman,
Alan Friedman, to Chief Minister Taib Mahmud, outlining
their illegal PR campaign.
The
total cost for FBC’s ‘Global Strategic Communications Proposal’ came to $5
million in the first year alone in a campaign designed to last at least 3
years.
Sources
close to BN have told us that the project was first outlined verbally in
meetings between Alan Friedman and the Chief Minister, after the FBC Media
Chairman was invited to Kuching at the start of the year.
Separate divisions?
In a recent statement issued
through lawyers to the UK’s Independent
Newspaper FBC
Media have attempted to defend their PR activities,
claiming that the ’commercial division’ and ‘production
division’ of the company “are and always have been quite
separate and distinct”.
However,
we can show that Alan Friedman, who was clearly masterminding the
multi-million dollar PR deal, also doubled up as the Executive
Editor of the company’s flagship World Business programme, produced weekly
for CNBC.
 |
| 'Happy Penan' who has found a town job featured by World Business |
Shortly after the Taib contract was
delivered, a major item about Sarawak duly appeared on World
Business, raising questions about how separate those divisions are actually
kept!
Indeed,
the World Business item, called Deforestation in Sarawak, can only be
described as falling far beneath the normal standards of objective
reporting.
The show,
which provided extensive justification for the Chief Minister,
featured a line up of employees and political allies as if they were
objective commentators, and even allowed him to suggest that 80% of
Sarawak’s jungle has remained untouched!
To
add insult to injury, a ‘happy Penan tribesman’ was also featured talking
about how he had benefitted from ‘progress’. However, there was
no mention of the years of desperate blockades which have been mounted by
his own people against Taib’s corrupt logging, or of the protests by numerous
other native groups, who have been shoved out of their lands to make way for
logging, dams and oil palm with no compensation or opportunity to profit.
 |
| Separate divisions? - Alan Friedman acted as Interviewer and Executive Editor of World Business, as well as the company's negotiator with clients like Taib Mahmud. |
In February, BBC World’s One Square
Mile, also produced by FBC Media, had again given the impression that Taib
was doing the best possible for the indigenous forest people. Once
again the Executive Producer of the Programme was none other than Alan
Friedman!
The reporter,
Rian Maelzer, avoided discussing the problems caused by land grabs
and corruption, claiming instead that:
“For the past 40 years, the Malaysian
government has practised an affirmative-action policy aimed at raising the
living standards of indigenous groups”
Thus,
despite the international condemnation of Taib Mahmud by environmentalists and
human rights organisations, viewers of CNBC and BBC would have been left
with the impression that Taib Mahmud was a benign governor, beloved of his
people.
 |
| “Separate and distinct”? – Sales and Output were headed by the same person for FBC in Sarawak – Alan Friedman. |
The
BBC has now gone public with a statement acknowledging that it had been misled
by Alan Friedman and FBC Media.
The broadcaster has
confirmed that it has suspended all programming commissioned by the
company pending a thorough enquiry. Yesterday in news items and on its website the
corporation announced:
“FBC
has admitted to the BBC that it has worked for the Malaysian government. That
information was not disclosed to the BBC as we believe it should have been when
the BBC contracted programming from FBC.
“Given this, the BBC has
decided to transmit no more programming from FBC while it reviews its
relationship with the company.”http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-14556988
 |
| No mention of the rest of the Penan people, still trying to protect their lands and left with no benefit from the millions made out of logging their territories |
CNBC has likewise suspended
FBC Media programmes in
the wake of our reports. We have, of
course, further revealed that FBC has publicly stated that its
arrangement with the global US-based broadcaster was that it would provide the
programmes for free and raise its money from ‘sponsorship’. If this claim
by FBC Media in its own Annual Report is true, then CNBC has serious
questions to answer to regulators, such as Ofcom in the UK and the Federal
Communications Commission in the USA.
Given these developments and the fact that
the Malaysian Insider news blog has now reported that the Malaysian
government has severed its contract with FBC Media, Sarawak Report would
like to ask on behalf of Sarawak’s taxpayers whether Taib Mahmud has also
severed his own contract (see below)?
What we can do for $5 million – Friedman’s grovelling letter to
Taib Mahmud on January 20th
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| We have been sent a scanned copy of the letter sent to Taib Mahmud. Insiders have confided that the main aim of the media campaign was to attack and discredit Sarawak Report |
The text of the letter in full says:
“Dear Pehin Sri,
It was a great honour and a personal pleasure to meet you in
Kuching last week.
I am grateful for the generous amount of time you devoted to
our meeting and for the talk we had about how we can assist you promote your
important achievements in bringing Sarawak steadily toward your goal of fully
developed nation status, and to assist in countering false and negative
perceptions that have been spread at home and abroad.
In the attached Proposal we have tried to capture the key elements
of our discussion, and to provide our advice on the strategy and deliverables
we believe can achieve a truly impactful result, both in the first 90-day
phase, and during the rest of the year.
We hope that 2011 can be the start of a long-term relationship,
and generally this kind of work is reinforced and maintained over a three-year
period, but we do wish to prove ourselves first, show our strength, our loyalty
and our passion. We wish to be tested first, and so what you will find
would cover only the period of 12 months beginning February 1, 2011.
There is much to do, but we sincerely believe we have the tools
and international experience to make a genuine and visible difference for you
and for the people of Sarawak.
You will find an Executive Summary in the first two pages of the
document that describes the main elements of the campaign, which would aim to
illustrate to the most prestige international television, online, and print
media platforms in a convincing and editorially credible manner your own
leadership, the way you have transformed Sarawak, the benefits for the people
of Sarawak, and your commitment to further growth, progress and sustainable
development.
In the first 90 days we will use television reporting and an
interview with yourself, plus press tours and online sites and special blogging
that should provide a blanket of positive messaging about you and Sarawak to
the Western media.
We would during the same period work between February and April to
bounce back into the local press in Sarawak this international recognition,
this bringing positive results as well for the people of Sarawak to see.
In the second phase of our work, from May through the start of
next year, we would work both on the positive messages and to counter negative
perceptions and falsehoods that have been spread unfairly about environmental
matters ranging from the Bakun Dam to timber, mining and palm oil. We
would also counter false allegations about corruption.
In the same period we would also work to develop greater
international investor interest in the economy of Sarawak, with particular
focus on the Gulf emirates and Middle East, China and India.
Sir, I sincerely hope you will be pleased with our International
Strategic Communications Proposal, and I promise you my own personal commitment
to lead this effort and to be at your service. With your blessing, we can
make a difference, and begin the work on February 1st.
Thank you very much for your consideration, and I hope to see you
in February to begin our work and bring my top team to Kuching to interview you
and to begin broadcasting to elite audiences in 100 countries the real story,
the positive story, about your leadership of Sarawak.
Yours sincerely
Alan Friedman, Chairman & Founder, FBC Media”
 |
| The FBC treatment - Alan Friedman was not only the top sales guy and the Executive Editor - he did some of the big interviews himself! |
The
Global Strategic Communications Proposal:
Sarawak Report can also now
exclusively reveal a copy of the full proposal with costs that
accompanied Friedman’s letter to Taib Mahmud. Entitled“International
Strategic Communications Campaign by FBC for Sarawak, February 2011-January
2012″, it provides a full budget breakdown for its
services, many of which are highly questionable.
The
document is priced in Euros, but translates into a total of USD$5 million
– around RM 15 million a year.
Friedman
is offering blogging campaigns and TV programme slots, as well as strange
purchasing of airline programming. Since Taib only travels in a
taxpayer-funded private jet, he perhaps does not realise that there are
hundreds of video items that you can view on airlines, so the
roughly million dollar price tag for this service alone is unlikely
to provide value for money!
In
fact, auditors might like to investigate why FBC are charging at all for
airline slots? Because, according to Spafax, who manage airline
programming, it is the airlines who purchase the shows rather than taking
payment!
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| Page 1 - Blogging, TV slots on BBC, CNBC or CNA... |
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| Page 2 - Total cost USD $5 million (RM 15 million) |
Forums
The
international Forum circuit is another area of PR where FBC have clearly
utilised their media activities to showcase clients like Taib
Mahmud. Five such events are suggested in the above proposal to
Taib. They include the World Economic Forum, which is the
highly reputed Swiss organisation that meets annually in Davos.
CNN
anchor, John Defterios, is a World Economic Forum ‘Media Leader’,
according to his personal CV. Yet, until the end of July FBC
Media’s website also said:
“Defterios….. serves as President of the group. In this
capacity he oversees FBC’s factual programming and media services work” [FBC
Website, July 25th 2011]
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| CNN's John Defterios (also President of FBC Media) at the World Economic Forum |
Defterios has long been President of FBC
Media and is a Director and Shareholder of the parent company FBC Group.
He also acted as a Managing Editor of the World
Business programme for CNBC, according to a recent version of the
company’s website.
The
CNN anchor has also acted as Chairman of the Business Week European Leadership
Forum, which featured a spokesman from Malaysia’s Iskandar project in
2009, another client of FBC Media.
Likewise,
Defterios has been linked to a number of other forums including the Malaysia
sponsored World Islamic Economic Forum and the Global Agenda Council of the
Middle East.
These
events regularly featured in FBC Media programmes and individuals who are FBC
Media clients have regularly attended these forums and appeared on those
programmes. One client is Malaysia, however our sources have
also told us that Indonesia and Kazakhstan are further clients and that
the leaders of these countries have indeed been heavily promoted in CNBC’s
Davos coverage and in other media outlets by Alan Friedman.
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| Wow! The top event at Davos this year, according to Friedman |
It
was not just Indonesia who got the top billing from FBC at Davos. The
Kazakh Premier, Karim Massimov, also got a major plug.
 |
| Friedman and Massimov - client relationship? |
He was interviewed this year at Davos by none other
than FBC Media’s John Defterios in his role as anchorman for CNN. CNN,
however has dismissed any potential impropriety in the provenance of its
programming owing to its relationship with Defterios and FBC Media. This
is because CNN claims Defterios left FBC Media in March.
Sarawak Report disputes the
relevance of this claim and we also dispute the evidence that Defterios
left FBC Media before journalists began to enquire about the subject in
late July and the company removed its original website, which can be viewed here.
 |
| John Defterios interviews Khazakh Premiere Karim Massimov at Davos this year for CNN! |
Sarawak
Report has already investigated the vicious blogging campaigns that are clearly
linked to this proposal – see our Dirty Tricks section.
Both Anwar Ibrahim and Sarawak Report have been singled out for sustained
attacks by specially commissioned websites organised by the US blogger and
founder of Rogue Strategic Services, Josh Trevino.
We have established clear links between FBC
Media and Josh Trevino, who have both attended Malaysian government
sponsored events together.
 |
| Texas blogger in gallon hat - Trevino |
Given
that Taib’s plan for wowing the world’s media with his highly expensive Global
Strategic Communications plan has now been well and truly brought out into the
open, we ask once again if the Chief Minister could please confirm whether he
plans to save his poverty-stricken people some of their money and cancel his
contract with FBC Media?
Source : Sarawak Report
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