Old newspaper articles, interactive quiz on fake news feature in National Library exhibition

SINGAPORE - Seventy years ago, the highly-publicised court battle for custody of Maria Hertogh - between the girl's Dutch Catholic parents and Malay Muslim foster mother - sparked some of the worst riots in Singapore's history.

Sensational coverage of events surrounding the case has often been cited as a factor that led to the riots in December 1950, which killed 18 people and injured more than 170.

How did different newspapers cover the same topic then? What messages did they want to get across? A new permanent exhibition at the National Library, which puts a selection of old articles under the microscope with the help of multimedia, invites visitors to draw their own conclusions.

On Dec 2, 1950, the court awarded custody of Maria to her biological parents but before sending their daughter back to Holland, they put her in the Convent of the Good Shepherd.

Interactive screens in the exhibition show how different newspapers covered these developments. A headline in the Singapore Standard, for example, said Maria had knelt before a statue of the Virgin Mary, and the paper suggested that she was ready to embrace her Western identity. Malay newspaper Utusan Melayu portrayed her as miserable in the convent and said that she had been forced to give up her Malay attire.

After the riots, The Straits Times published a notice that it would stop printing discussion of racial and religious aspects of the case in its correspondence columns "to assist in promoting the return of a calm and normal atmosphere in Singapore".

A Straits Times writer would later remark in 1995: "In retrospect, the coverage seemed foolhardy, what with Singapore's racial and religious diversity. But, at the time, newspapermen thought they were just doing their job."

The National Library exhibition, known as The News Gallery: Beyond Headlines, is on Level 11 of the building - previously home to the Singapore Literary Pioneers Gallery - and opens to the public on Saturday (March 14).

The exhibition also looks at several other events in Singapore's history and the various ways in which they were covered. These case studies include the fall of Singapore in 1942, the Hock Lee bus riots of 1955 and the chewing gum ban that took effect in 1992. Write-ups and videos complement these old articles.

The exhibition also features early editions of newspapers - such as The Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser, Nanyang Siang Pau, Utusan Melayu and Tamil Murasu.

The oldest item in the exhibition is a copy of the Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser dated Jan 7, 1836. Its front page has a notice from prominent Arab trader Syed Omar Ali Aljunied - for whom Aljunied Road is named - announcing his departure from Singapore and asking those who were indebted to him to repay him at once.

Visitors can also head to a multimedia station to play a game aimed at raising awareness of fake news. Also on display are various games that ran in newspapers - such as sudoku, crosswords and "spot the difference" contests.

The National Library'shead of exhibitions, Mr Chung Sang Hong, hopes people will become more aware of the library's rich resources - the NewspaperSG online archive, for example, holds more than 40 newspaper titles dating from the 1820s.

He said: "We also want people to be discerning when they consume information, to be responsible when sharing information... and to be open to considering different perspectives."

Old newspapers hold up a mirror to history. Before World War II, Mr Chung said, the Chinese papers "focused mainly on a sense of China and the local Chinese community, with very little coverage of Singapore and international news. This was true for the Malay and Tamil newspapers as well".

"After the Second World War, when people started to identify with Singapore and making Singapore their home, the focus shifted to more Singapore and regional news."

Minister for Communications and Information S. Iswaran, who launched the exhibition on Friday (March 13), praised it for encouraging people to think critically and "compare differing accounts before coming to an informed interpretation of events".

"Indeed, in the past few weeks we have seen how rumours and misleading information about Covid-19 spread with alarming speed, sparking public panic and fuelling undesirable behaviour in some instances... Covid-19 is an example of not just a public healthcare challenge, but also an information and communication and psychological challenge."

He also said: "By thinking critically about the information we receive, and grounding our communications in facts and informed judgements, we are able to participate meaningfully in the information economy and shape our own story."