Michael Backman, author of "The Asian Eclipse", said that Malaysia often gets bad publicity in international presses because of bad PR handling. The recent police raids on Malaysiakini is a good example. 'Mahathir raids Internet critic' , yells an Australian newspaper. Often over-zealous civil servants over-stepped their boundaries when they tried to implement government policies. Another recent case is the police raid on Indian nationals at Palm Court who turned out to be legitimate IT professionals.

And of course, the biggest bungle of all by the Malaysian police was the Anwar affair. Even Lee Kuan Yew couldn't help himself but to come to Dr M's defence by telling the press in an interview that Dr M did not not order the arrest of Anwar under the ISA but the Police Chief was the one who did it. It is Dr M's style to come to his civil servant's defence and to give them the benefit of the doubt.

Bad PR has cost Malaysia too much already. Often statements from the government are not made in a coordinated and coherent fashion, with everyone from party minnows to ministers giving their two-cents worth. The water talks with Singapore is another example. The many confusing statements made by everyone had allowed the Singaporean government to accuse Malaysia of constantly flip-flopping on its stand.

Ministers in Malaysia are too used to making off-the-cuff statements which often come back to bite them later. Perhaps that's the Malaysian style. Everyone is entitled to his coffee-shop talk. This blog is merely a cyber version of coffee-shop talk.

Backman said that paying too little regard to the PR side of things had allowed two things to happen. It has allowed some journalists to assume the worst motives and to see conspiracies where often there are none.

Take Mr Backman's advice, treat journalists as the link between the government and the electorate. In politics, perception is everything.