I Miss My Column.

I told myself I would not go down the path of certain people who left the New Straits Times only to devote their blog to bitching about the company and the people in it, even though their treachery seems to have been ultimately rewarded with triumphant returns to positions of power and prestige.

However, there is one thing on my mind which has been bothering me and I'm hoping this blog posting will prove cathartic. At the very least, it'll allow me to vent. So, here goes.

I never asked to be a columnist for the paper. I only ever volunteered to write one column, with disastrous results. In fact, the fallout of that column - and there's a huge back-story to the writing and editing of the piece itself - was so bad that I resolved to never write another column again.

However, I was encouraged and prodded to turn my hand to attempting columns and commentaries by an editor, who was very supportive and helpful in my early days. When my fellowship came up, it was this editor that told me to turn the column into a regular fortnightly thing.

It took a while to get used to it (column writing, to me, is a very personal thing, something which gives the reader a glimpse into my soul), but I did and began to really enjoy it. This despite the fact that most of the columns that really meant something were rejected because they were too sensitive. But hey, you don't work for the NST without knowing the constraints that come with it.

But anyway, before I left NST, I asked the Sunday Times editor whether I would be able to maintain my column. She said she saw no conflict of interest with my production duties in BRTV and writing columns in NST. I was happy, because it meant that I could still write and still, in a way, have some sort of a link to NST (which I was very fond of, despite certain odious trolls in charge of the paper today).

I mentioned the same thing to the CEO, GE and Deputy GE as I said my goodbyes. Everything passed with no negative comments from them.

And then from out of the blue, I was told by the Sunday Times editor that the GE had decided not to retain my column due to a supposed "conflict of interest". I was sad, but accepted it as a judgement call made by upper management in the best interests of the company.

But as time has passed, I realise that it is a shallow excuse. Why? Three reasons.

1) Jason Dasey. He writes a regular sports column. Yet, he is also the editor of 442 magazine and a host on Astro. Isn't there a conflict of interest here, considering that 442 is in the print media and Astro is a competitor  to Media Prima?

2) Teoh Teik Hoong. He's a friend and a nice enough dude. But he is also the owner and editor of the SJ Echo, which is a publication in direct competition with NST Streets. Yet, he too is writing columns for Sunday Times.

3) Malay Mail. When the paper decided to go free, NST blared the news. The decision didn't make sense to me as well as to a lot of other reporters. Why promote a rival newspaper. An editor who used to work at MM said it was because we were helping out a "friend". I'm all for helping my friends out, but it doesn't make any kind of sense to promote a competing business, especially when NST Streets itself is trying to get a foothold in the same market.

Ultimately, anybody who reads this posting would probably surmise that I am bitter and reeking of sour grapes over my expulsion as a columnist. And to a certain extent I am. But I'm not saying that I SHOULD have been retained. All I'm saying is I think I deserved to hear the real reason of why I was not retained.