Class 95FM is the most-listened to English-language radio station.
No, wait.
That title belongs to Kiss92, which is the top English radio station.
Right?
Well, you are forgiven if you are confused as you read the conflicting claims of the two broadcasters with regards to the findings of the 2015 Nielsen Radio Diary Survey.
Class 95FM is a radio station of Mediacorp.
Kiss92 is a radio station of its rival, Singapore Press Holdings (SPH).
After the Nielsen survey results were made known on 2 June, Mediacorp’s Channel Newsasia ran this headline in its report:
Mediacorp’s print newspaper, TODAY, had this:
It even had its assistant vice-president for Class 95FM and Gold 905 saying, “We’re very happy that Class 95FM continues to be the most listened to English station in Singapore. We thank our listeners and partners for making us their top choice as we deliver our best to them.”
All well and good – except that SPH’s newspaper, Straits Times, also apparently made the same claim for its radio station:
“For the fourth time, SPH Radio’s Kiss92 emerged as the English station with the largest share of listeners, according to the latest Nielsen radio survey released yesterday,” its report said.
Mr Lim Li Keen was not too impressed by the conflicting claims to distinction, and posted the following photo on his Facebook page:
Mr Lim said, “Using the SAME EXACT sources, SPH (left) and Mediacorp (right) have the power to manipulate findings to their favor. Lies, goddam lies and statistics? No, we have to realize the amount of influence the media, people, governments have on us, and I won’t lie, we’re all affected by it, we’re all biased, we have inherent beliefs and axioms. So I hope we all take that first step in knowing this.”
Incidentally, Singapore’s press freedom is ranked 154th in the world.
What do you think of the seemingly conflicting claims of the two media companies?
