Abstract

Nowadays, media seems to be important indicator in general election. It is due to political change in Malaysian general election in 2008. The usage of media through be-election can be a signal to political parties to plan their strategies and manifesto in future election. Therefore, the way of information disseminate and issues deliver by them will enhance the fruitful in political landscape in Malaysia. Thus, this study was conducted to identify issues featured in Utusan Malaysia, Berita Harian, Harakah and Suara Keadilan as well as the differences in the issues presented by the four newspapers during the Parliament Permatang Pauh election campaign period in 2008. Agenda Setting Theory was used as the theoretical framework underlying this research. The study using the tree nodes analysis technique and the findings through qualitative analysis reveals 11 issues and three themes from the newspapers studied. The emerging issues were found consists of government formation, education, candidates, ethnic, elections, media, ruling party, Pakatan Rakyat, development, religion and security. The finding shows that the most prominent issue is about candidates. In terms of differences in how the four daily newspapers featuring equality issue most prominently displayed on different ideologies and views. The latter newspaper, however, was favourable in its reports on the Pakatan Rakyat political party. The findings based on Agenda Setting Theory indicates that the company shareholders and the newspaper editors had a heavy influence on the news reporting made by the four newspapers studied. In future research, the four newspapers should be free while reporting in order to have useful issues deliver to the public. They must have the proper rules and policy to ensure the transparency and adequate information will disperse accordingly.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.