Mediacorp

History

The origins of Mediacorp lie down to the establishment in 1925 of the Marconi station 1SE (One Singapore Experimental). In 1933, Radio ZHI was launched as the first professional shortwave broadcasting station in Singapore, owned by the Radio Service Company of Malaya, though the station closed in December 1936 as it lacked a broadcast licence and franchise.

A more serious attempt at creating a radio station in Singapore emerged on 12 April 1935 with the creation of the British Malaya Broadcasting Corporation, whose regular broadcasts began on 1 June 1936 and was granted the right to a monopoly over radio transmissions later that year. BMBC station ZHL was formally inaugurated on 1 March 1937. A second station on shortwave, ZHP, opened on 19 July 1938; its wider coverage enabled live carriage of sporting events. Government aid began in February 1939.

The corporation was taken over by the Straits Settlements government in 1940 as a part of the British Department of Information, subsequently nationalised and reorganised as the Malaya Broadcasting Corporation (MBC),

During World War II, when the Japanese Imperial Army occupied Singapore from 1942 to 1945, the radio station on the island of Singapore was seized by the Japanese authorities and renamed Syonan Hoso Kyoku ('Light of the South' Broadcasting Corporation, 昭南放送局, known in English as the Syonan Broadcasting Station or SBS), the local counterpart to the Japan Broadcasting Corporation (NHK). Broadcasts under the new administration started on 13 March 1942 and broadcast over three frequencies, one in medium wave for within Singapore, another to relay output from Tokyo and a shortwave frequency aimed at the time in Australia. After repairs, broadcasts officially started on 28 March. The station broadcast in the same mix of languages but adding Japanese content. During occupation, a confidential British Far Eastern Broadcasting Service (BFEBS) was carried out by the UK to its occupied territories, briefly having its offices at Caldecott Hill. The facilities were later used as a relay station for the BBC.

After the war, the British came back into power and reclaimed the radio station, with the station managed by the interim government – British Military Administration (BMA).