With reference to Wan Sou Hai's 'The grievance procedure' (Aug 23), first of all, I was not reacting to the article he referred to ('Resolve issues with Mahathir directly, PM's aide tells Chinese leaders', Aug 21). I was referring to 'Consult us first: PM's aides tell Chinese dailies' (Aug 20).

I do not object to any 'grievance procedure'. But the establishment of the grievance procedure should not in any way prevent the media from reporting what the citizen's life entails. Let it be positive or negative. Let it be caused by nature, human or governmental policy. As any event that impacts our lives is newsworthy to Malaysians.

If anything the media should be encouraged to report all the important events of our lives and that should include political, religion and education concerns, not just how well and how right Dr Mahathir Mohamad is doing.

If all is well, why do we need to read the news? We read the news to discover things that will impact us. What concerns me most is not how well my life is going to be but how my life will be affected by the events that happened around me, especially those that will cause harm to me. If it is a government policy that will affect my children's future or my ability to provide for my family, I will demand to have a say in it and not wait until disaster hits and then voice my grievances to the government.

I am often pleasantly surprised, reading through the letters and articles published in malaysiakini, to find that other Malaysians hold the same opinion as I do, especially when the writer is a Malay and the subject is of Chinese or minorities' concern. It changes my opinions of the Malays. Often, I would send the URL of the articles to all my friends. It is things like this that strengthen the ties across races.

If the PM is so concerned about the 'fragile' race relation, he should not only allow the Chinese dailies to report all the Chinese concerns, he should encourage the newspapers of other languages to report them as well and vice versa.

After weeks of demonstrations by the Chinese community and the employees of Nanyang Siang Pau and China Press, Mahathir did nothing but turned a deaf ear, so why should I believe that he is actually going to do anything about the grievances voiced through the 'grievance procedure' ? Why should I not believe that the 'grievance procedure' and the meeting with media editors are nothing but a way to silence voices against Mahathir and the government policies?