Free publicity?

Free publicity?

Phnom Penh Post | 14 March 2017

If I was in the CNRP I would be rubbing my hands at the amount of coverage their new slogan is getting.

For 21 years I’ve been active in politics in the UK, and we were always told, don’t mention the opposition, don’t put them in leaflets, don’t talk about them in the media. Yet here we are with the new CNRP slogan for the commune elections being talked about all over the media, mostly by the CPP.

If I were the CNRP I would be rubbing my hands for two reasons.

First, they could not buy the amount of media coverage they have been getting. Nearly every edition of the papers has a new story about the slogan. Mostly as a result of CPP legislators and commune chiefs talking about the slogan. Especially in government media where it has featured heavily.

Secondly, what impression does all this CPP outrage create? That the CNRP is being an effective opposition and holding the government to account.

Imagine the CPP had said nothing about the new slogan? I would not have heard about it and would not have the impression of how much it has upset the CPP.

In the words of John Lennon’s alter-ego Dr Winston O’Boogie: A conspiracy of silence speaks louder than a thousand words!

Andrew Tattersall, Phnom Penh