Malaysia`s opposition mounts campaign in cyberspace

"They control the television but we've got YouTube now," said 31-year-old Lee Sean Li, an accountant who avidly surfs the Net for alternative news and complains there are only negative glimpses of the opposition in the main media.

Lee was delighted to see parliamentary opposition leader Lim Kit Siang post a speech on the upcoming elections, just minutes after Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi dissolved parliament earlier this month.

"I was impressed at how professional he was and it is a clever use of technology," Lee said, adding that 67-year-old Lim is one of the most "wired" politicians in the country.

While many of his generation may struggle to send an email, Lim runs three blogs which are meticulously updated with multiple posts every day, and many of the party's other leaders follow suit.

"Blogging is one way to get word out and an opportunity to circumvent media control," said Lim from the Democratic Action Party (DAP), which is aiming to dent the government's thumping majority in the upcoming vote.

"We cannot neutralise the state-controlled media," he told AFP.