The National Union of Journalists (NUJ) has come under fire over its lack of leadership in taking on the Home Ministry which has suspended news weekly The Heat.

"This is a fellow media brother being bullied and you (NUJ) as the parent body, where are you?" said Free Malaysia Today chief reporter G Vinod (right), a speaker at a gathering of journalists, editors and supporters last night to show solidarity for the publication.

NUJ was absent from the forum entitled: 'Free The Media: Dare to Defy' organised by Gerakan Media Marah (Movement of Angry Media), a loose coalition of media persons and activists, many from the online media, formed after the The Heat's suspension.

Veteran journalists Kee Thuan Chye, who was among the audience, lamented the lack of action of media personnel from the mainstream media in defending their own peers.

"Why is the NUJ not spearheading the fight for media freedom?...

"How are we going to mobilise our colleagues from the mainstream press to take up this fight if we don't have the support of NUJ," Kee (right) said.

Addressing this later, forum moderator Zakiah Koya, an editor with FZ.com, said NUJ was invited to the event but was unable to make it.

"We did invite NUJ but its top leaders were all on leave but to be fair they did issue a statement opposing the action against The Heat," she said.

Present among the some 200-strong crowd at the Kuala Lumpur-Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall were several journalists and editors from The Heat. The audience were mostly clad in red as a sign of protest.

Also there to show support were Bar Council president Christopher Leong and Padang Serai MP N Surendran.

'Media owners not keen on press freedom'

Another speaker, The Malaysian Insider assistant news editor V Anbalagan (left) conceded that NUJ faced difficulties in finding a balance in fighting for press freedom and negotiating salaries for its members.

Anbalagan, a former NUJ general-secretary, related his experience on trying to get leading media outlets to pledge to fair reporting but his pleas fell on deaf ears.

"We handed a memorandum (on fair reporting) to NSTP (New Straits Times Press) and The Star and they said we will be very fair.

"Come the general election, you know what happened, and it was back to square one.

"Some reporters even took a stand to say if their stories are slanted they will refuse a byline but some editors began intimidating the junior journalists," he said.

Anbalagan added that NUJ, mostly comprising mainstream media journalists, should not be blamed as it was hard to struggle for the cause, especially in face of mainstream media owners’ refusal to lend support.

However, in the meantime, Anbalagan urged all online media outfits to come together in forming an organisation to take up The Heat's cause and fight for media freedom.

The forum also targeted the Printing Presses and Publications Act 1984 (PPPA), which was the source of the media's woes and the law used for The Heat's suspension.

Centre for Independent Journalism executive director Masjalizah Hamzah (left) pointed out despite the amendment of the law under Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak's "democratic reforms" initiative, the recent action has proven it to be merely cosmetic.

"One year later (after the amendment), the amended law has not made things better, nothing has changed and it is now  used against The Heat," she said.

She added that even other printed media were also being pressured to toe the line with the PPPA.

Among the other speakers were political cartoonist Nor Afendi Ramli (popularly known as Ronasina), Reporters Without Borders representative Hata Wahari and Malaysiakini editor-in-chief Steven Gan.

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