CONTROVERSIAL PIECE: A screenshot of the article posted on Keadilan Daily last week.KUALA LUMPUR: Pro-Opposition news portal Keadilan Daily has attributed the publication of a news article which claimed that the government was distributing 1Malaysia school exercise books bearing the image of the Prime Minister on the cover, to a "miscommunication".
It said the website's staff had "misunderstood" instructions, which led to the article being published.
Its editor Fazallah Pit, told Malaysian Digest that the error stemmed from a miscommunication with his staff.
"Our staff had misunderstood the instructions given and came out with a different story," he said.
Asked on how they obtained the information concerning the exercise book, Fazallah replied that this was obtained via blogs and online article which had claimed that the 1Malaysia exercise books were an Umno and Barisan Nasional initiative.
When asked on whether the staff had conducted checks to ascertain whether the reports were true, he reiterated that the initial tip-off came from blogs, and that a "different instruction" was given.
He said despite that, the story was somehow published on Sept 24.
Fazallah was also asked on the demand by the book's creators, June Low and Adila Abdul Malik for an apology.
He said the website is ready to issue one, and will do so soon.
"“We will issue an apology on our website, as well as in our newspaper Suara Keadilan by Tuesday (Oct 2)," he said.
Fazallah said he was also willing to meet with Low and Adila to apologise.
"We didn’t mean to delay issuing an apology. But we are a small team, and with the recent tabling of Budget 2013, we've been under a lot of pressure these past few days," he said.
One of two Parti Keadilan Rakyat leaders who had slammed the government for allegedly distributing the exercise books has already come forward to apologise. PKR’ Rembau chief Badrul Hisham Shahrin, better known as Chegubard, had posted a statement on his blog, retracting his comments regarding the story.
Chegubard said he only realized the error in Keadilan Daily’' story after reading a subsequent report on Malaysian Digest, quoting the exercise book's creators.
It is unknown if the other, PKR's central leadership committee member Fariz Musa, has issued an apology.
Last Monday, Keadilan Daily had published a story which alleged that the book was being distributed in schools and was part of Umno and BN's "desperate political move".
Low and Adila later discovered the article and sought to clear the air. They said the book was actually part of a collection of merchandise under their Gerai 1Malaysia art project for display at the ‘Art For Grabs’ event at the Annex Gallery at Central Market, which took place from Sept 22 to Sept 23.
Among the merchandise sold were a comedic poster of the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) guideline and plain printed white-Ts of Najib holding a cat, to suit the theme of the event.
The theme of the event was 'Janji Ditutupi', a play on the government’s recent Merdeka Day theme, Janji Ditepati.
The duo have since called for Keadilan Daily to issue apologize not only to them, but also to the public for misleading them with a false report.
- mD
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