PETALING JAYA: When it comes to breaking news, The Star is always ahead.
Former regional editor Choi Tuck Wo, a 31-year-old reporter based in Penang during Ops Lalang, recalls hearing people say that press conferences won’t start until The Star (reporter) arrives.
“We were outspoken and it’s because we have ‘garang’ (fierce) editors who pushed us hard,” he recalled.
On Oct 28, 1987, The Star, alongside Chinese daily Sin Chew Jit Poh and Malay weekly Watan, were suspended in an operation code-named Ops Lalang – which then Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri (later Tun) Mohd Hanif Omar said was to “maintain public order”.
Then Star Publications general manager Koh Beng Huat, 77, who received the suspension notice from a Home Ministry official at the newspaper’s headquarters, shared one important lesson – “in times of uncertainty, a level head must prevail”.
Following a prolonged period of racial tension and political unrest, a total of 106 people comprising mainly politicians, academics and social activists, had been rounded up under the now abolished Internal Security Act by November that year.
Consumers Association of Penang legal advisor Meenakshi Raman, who was among those detained, said Malaysians have a responsibility to speak up for what is right and just and act in the public interest.
SM Rajah, 82, who was The Star’s senior manager for human resources and administration, recalled how many, like librarian A. Malex Yahaya who worked as a labourer at Selayang market for RM10 a day, got part-time jobs to survive.
After 149 days, The Star hit the streets again.
On March 26, 1988, the paper published a riveting “We’re Back” cover.
Remarkably, when publication resumed, Rajah said 97% of The Star’s 800-strong workforce returned – a testament of their commitment to the newspaper.
To spread the word that The Star was back, A. Malex and his colleagues went around Petaling Jaya by bus, with copies of the newspaper.
Rajah said the company paid back every sen of the salary that had been reduced to 20% during the suspension, with staff receiving additional bonuses that year.
