"In extremis, censorship is necessary," he said, though the power to censor must be used "wisely and sparingly".

Mr Ngiam ? chairman of his own consultancy, iGlobe Advisors, and also a SPH director ? was speaking on "Reporting, Then and Now" at the SPH Lecture in News Centre.

He was, after all, a Straits Times cub reporter in the 1950s before he went to university. Apart from regaling his listeners with newsroom stories from those early pre-tape recorder days, he spoke his mind on Singapore journalism today.

In his view, opinion writing is "not quite journalism"; he prefers straight reporting.

"Straight reporting allows the facts to stand on their own. Straight reporting allows the story to tell its tale. There is no attempt ... to juxtapose words and pictures to create misleading impressions. The straight reporter does not crusade. He has no personal agenda," he noted.

If journalists allow their own beliefs and convictions to creep into their work, "we should not be surprised if our neighbours and, indeed, the state, respond and challenge us frontally", he said.

"I am not suggesting that as citizens and journalists we should be simply unquestioning, uncritical, sycophantic admirers of the state and the power it wields."

But an unfettered free press is undesirable, he suggested. While the media can report the number of people killed in racial riots, it will be totally irresponsible to break down fatalities by race in the highly emotionally charged tensions of the first days, he pointed out.

On the other hand, a complete news blackout of the Tangshan earthquake that killed a million people in 1976 did untold damage to the credibility of the Chinese government.

The role and value add of the journalist is to make a complex subject easy to grasp, Mr Ngiam said.

"I asked many of my more erudite friends in finance and economics to explain what exactly are carbon credits. I am afraid I have yet to receive a crystal-clear exposition of carbon credits in the literature on climate control."

"In my more sceptical moments, I even wonder whether highly paid risk managers in banking ever really understood what are derivatives, collatorised debt instruments and sub-prime loans."

The "sacred mission" of the press is to "uphold truth and protect the integrity of our nation in clear, simple, inspiring writing", Mr Ngiam said.

"Our role is to read the verdict of the people correctly, so that the government can continue to retain the mandate of heaven to rule."