The six-month-old language switch controversy seems to have taken a new twist with political parties and influential non-governmental organisations publicly challenging the credibility and integrity of the official media, including pro-Umno newspapers and the state-owned radio and television stations.

On Nov 17, veteran parliamentary opposition leader and DAP chairperson Lim Kit Siang fired a salvo at the state-owned Radio Television Malaysia (RTM) for screening what he described "a most biased, unfair and distorted propaganda attack camouflaged as news".

Among others, Lim said the news clip featured "the attack of Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad on Dong Jiao Zong over the Suqiu issue as extremists and like communists" and it also "paints Dong Jiao Zong and DAP as chauvinists which posed threats to the national well-being".

Dong Jiao Zong is the collective name for two influential Chinese education movements, Dong Zong and Jiao Zong. The movements have strongly opposed the language switch.

Lim, who is a lawyer, Internal Security Act detainee and an elected member of parliament for 30 years from 1969 to 1999, was an English-language journalist before he became a politician.

The next day, Lim was echoed by both the chairpersons of Dong Zong and Jiao Zong, namely businessman Quek Suan Hiang and teacher Ong Kow Ee.