Oh, dear. Let’s recap everything we’ve got without blowing up the spot even more than it has been: Last Friday, the daughter of beleaguered UMNO leader, and former deputy prime minister, Zahid Hamidi made the fateful decision that the best way to proclaim her father’s innocence against a litany (45!) of fresh corruption charges was to have her 9-year-old daughter to make an Instagram statement about the whole shebang, and upload it to her social media account. You can peep it here. Sorry, we’re not sharing it — but here’s the transcript:
“You can lock my grandpa up, but not his soul and his fighting spirit. We are his family and we’ll never stop praying for him.”
“I will make your life un-peaceful. I will make you regret your life. Remember – I am only 9 years old and I am my country’s future.”
Yep, Nurul Zahid had her primary school-aged child tentatively spit what seem to be clearly coached lines threatening grandpa’s enemies.
It’s hard not to judge someone who would thrust a child unnecessarily into such a dirty game (politics, baby!), and we sat on this over the weekend, wondering — nay, HOPING, that maybe the post was made in the heat of the moment. Hamidi had just posted the RM2 million (US$481,000) bail the courts had ordered after having the laundry list of charges slapped against him: The wounds were fresh, hot tempers may have cooled, and perhaps the video would be removed.
Nope. The clip is still there, and over the past few days has garnered a lot of nasty comments targeted at a young child, who certainly has no real grasp on the gravity of everything that is going on. Taking the ethos that there’s no such thing as bad PR, Nurul Zahid seems to be relishing her young daughter’s time in the glaring shine of the social media spotlight, and posted this:
Point? Yeah, it seems you’ve totally missed it.
Deputy Women, Family and Community Development Minister Hannah Yeoh has weighed in on the matter, saying that parents should protect their children instead of allowing such videos to float on the Internet.
“I ask that we stop sharing the child’s video. She is too young to understand what is going on and it is normal for kids to be attached to grandparents.
“Adults should know better and not manipulate her emotions. The child is innocent,” she tweeted yesterday.
Seems that Nurul Hamidi hasn’t quite got the message.
Curious to see some of the news stories circulating about her father? Peep his charges here, and if you’d like a taste of actual injustice, look at what Nepali investigative reporters found regarding companies linked to the former DPM and the accusations surrounding them fleecing poor migrant workers looking for visas out of hundreds of millions.
