Soros man on Mkini board

PETALING JAYA: The George Soros-linked Media Development Loan Fund (MDLF) chief executive officer Harlan M. Mandel is one of three directors of Mkini Dotcom that runs Malaysiakini while several Opposition figures are among its 50 shareholders.

Mandel, who is based in Brooklyn, New York, was appointed as a director in July last year, according to the Mkini Dotcom profile.

The MDLF has been funding Malaysiakini operations for over a decade.

Subang MP R. Sivarasa, who is PKR's vice-president, admits that he is a shareholder.

Sivarasa said he paid RM5,000 for 5,000 units of shares when he was invited to contribute towards the setting up of the Internet news portal 13 years ago.

“It was for a worthy cause. And I still own that 5,000 shares out of Mkini's 4.5 million issued shares,” he said in an interview.

Sivarasa, another shareholder Bruno Gentil Pereira, and director Premesh Chandran are also activists linked to Suaram.

Other shareholders include the Selangor Mentri Besar's press secretary Arfa'eza Aziz.

Malaysiakini and Suaram have come under the spotlight following reports claiming they were among several organisations that were receiving foreign funding.

The two main contributors are the American-based National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and the George Soros-linked Open Society Institute (OSI), which have been financing groups supporting its objectives around the world.

OSI is linked to MDLF which in turn claims to be a mission- driven investment fund for independent news outlets in countries with a history of media oppression.

MDLF holds 1.316 million units of shares in Mkini, while Premesh and another director Steven Gan own 1.385 million and 1.328 million shares respectively.

Premesh had said MDLF owned about 29% of the company shares while its co-founders and staff owned the rest.

Despite these and other revelations, Premesh maintained that the portal maintained its editorial independence but several bloggers questioned how he could claim so since there are several Opposition personalities listed as shareholders.

According to its financial report that can be obtained from the Companies Commission of Malaysia for the year ended Dec 31, 2011, Mkini recorded a drop in revenue from RM1.85mil in 2010 to RM1.63mil last year.

However, its “other income” increased from RM3.26mil in 2010 to RM3.7mil last year.

Its operating and administrative expenses was RM5.1mil.

According to Mkini.blogspot. com, it received grants from the Dutch Embassy in Malaysia, Canadian International Development Agency, NED, OSI, International Centre for Journalists, Free Voice, and Friedrich Naumann Foundation, apart from MDLF and South-East Asian Press Alliance (Seapa).