Malaysia 2014 : A Quick Look Back

My Journalism Internship with the Asia New Zealand Foundation really was one of those accidents of timing that meant the trip could not have been more eventful or more memorable.

I had been out of journalism school for around four months when I set off from the Stuff newsroom to take up an internship with Malaysiakini, at the time a new and exciting addition to the media landscape in Malaysia. 

I arrived in Kuala Lumpur on March 8, 2014. That date might seem vaguely familiar - it’s the date Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 disappeared from radar screens while flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

In a hurry to catch my connecting flight to Myanmar where I was spending a week before starting work I recall the early coverage, but headed on thinking it was surely just a technical glitch and the plane would have turned up by the time I got back.

Limited internet in Myanmar meant I couldn’t follow developments closely, but I returned around a week later to find MH370 still missing, and KL the centre of the response. 

 I was interning at Malaysiakini, a wonderful independent website full of warm and clever people, where my job was to help with English stories on the website and publish my own.

A Malaysiakini team meeting : KL 2014 / image supplied

After settling in for a day or so I said to the bosses I’d like to go down to the media centre set up to assist with coverage of search for MH370.

However - that was deemed impossible as each outlet was only given two passes and their journalists, quite understandably, wanted to be there.

I said I would get my own pass, and then got my boss at Stuff to write a letter supporting my media accreditation.

Next thing I knew I was in this huge press conference with journalists arriving from all over the world - at one point sandwiched between veteran foreign correspondents from the BBC and the Washington Post.

 The people handing out the media passes had asked if I was with (TV3's) John Campbell and crew, so I knew fellow Kiwis weren’t far away.

When they arrived I bowled up to John, introduced myself, and explained that I had found myself there quite by accident, and asked if they wouldn’t mind watching my bag while I grabbed some lunch.

Aimee Sinclair with John Campbell, KL 2014 / image supplied

The whole crew very kindly took me under their wing saying “you’re with us now” so it was fantastic to join them for dinner or drinks at the end of a day reporting.

John said to me that all the media organisations back in New Zealand were in the process of figuring out who they were sending over to cover MH370, and told me to tell Stuff that they weren’t to send anyone else – “you’ve got this”.

One night we were summoned back to the media centre late, and I remember very well the Malaysian Prime Minister announcing MH370’s last position was in the middle of the Indian Ocean west of Perth – a remote location, far from any possible landing sites, and thousands of kilometres away from its scheduled flight path.

MH370 is thought to have plunged into the Indian Ocean west of Australia / image Wikimedia

There was no hope left for survivors. Families of those on board were also at the hotel media centre that night and the outpouring of emotion was huge as they were told all hope for their loved ones was lost. The time difference was such that I knew our newsroom in New Zealand would only have a skeleton staff on, and suddenly found myself calling my boss back home to wake him up, with others quickly dragged out of bed to cover the unfolding story while I was flat out filing stories for both Malaysiakini and Stuff.co.nz

https://www.stuff.co.nz/world/asia/9862092/No-survivors-on-flight-MH370

Incredibly, the disappearance of MH370 was only one of the big stories I was involved in during just six weeks in Malaysia.

My colleague Tim Donoghue back in Wellington set me up for a meeting with Karpal Singh, a 74 year old lawyer-politician who had been convicted of sedition for criticising the Government.

Singh was prevented from returning to Parliament under the antiquated British law that he said was used to silence political critics.

As a lawyer Karpal had represented New Zealanders Lorraine and Aaron Cohen on heroin smuggling charges back in 1987, and Tim Donoghue had written a fantastic book about this amazing man - Karpal Singh, the Tiger of Jelutong.

I had been a lawyer before becoming a journalist and was fascinated by the fight Karpal was in to appeal his sedition conviction, while the Government was cross-appealing, seeking to imprison this man who had been in a wheelchair since 2005, when a car accident left him with spinal injuries and severely limited mobility.

Karpal was extremely generous with his time, and we spent a couple of hours together talking before I left to file my story back to N.Z.

Malaysian Lawyer and Human Rights Advocate Karpal Singh / image Malaysiakini

Less than a week later, I woke up to texts from colleagues asking how I was, and missed calls from Tim back in New Zealand.

Karpal had been killed in a car accident in the early hours of the morning, and I was the last person to have interviewed him. Last interview with Tiger of Jelutong

Journalists from all over Malaysia had been contacting Tim to get reaction from Karpal’s friend and biographer, but Tim had refused to speak to any of them until he had given me the story first – including the new detail that Karpal wanted his third son Ramkarpal to succeed him in his seat in Parliament.

A public memorial was held for Karpal and I gave a framed copy of the story to Ramkarpal and his family at the service on behalf of Tim and myself. 

As I left to go to Vietnam for a couple of weeks before coming home Malaysiakini was fundraising to move to new offices.

I have such amazing memories of what was a relatively short time in the country, and was delighted to sponsor a brick for my colleagues’ new place. I consider myself extremely lucky – to have been selected for an internship, to have been sent to Malaysia, to have reported on the biggest story in the world at the time, and to have met the great Tiger of Jelutong.

Asia Media Centre