PARTI Sosialis Malaysia (PSM) deputy chairman S. Arutchelvan said the instance of ex-Kota Anggerik assemblyman Najwan Halimi making a racial slur against PSM should serve as a lesson for politicians.

In an interview with The Malaysian Insight, Arutchelvan said politicians must be more careful with their words, especially in the age of social media.

“Politicians, they say things differently with a different crowd. For example, when a Chinese politician speaks to a Chinese audience, he’ll use a different voice; a Malay politician will speak differently with a Malay audience.

“They should be more careful and this (incident) should be a good lesson for them. Three words become 700 words just to apologise, trying to make sense of what they said,” said Arutchelvan.

Najwan had made a racist remark about PSM and Sivaranjani Manickam, the party’s candidate for Meru, in a WhatsApp message.

Referring to a news report on Sivaranjani being fielded for the Meru seat, Najwan had messaged a PKR group, calling PSM an “Indian estate party”.

A screenshot of Najwan’s offending text was shared on Twitter by PSM secretary-general Sivarajan Arumugam.

Najwan, who is the deputy chief of Shah Alam PKR, was quick to apologise after the message went viral, saying he did not harbour any racial bias.

Arutchelvan said Najwan apologised to him after that.

“He did call me to apologise for what he had said. You (Najwan) started the fire, so you have to put it out. Social media is powerful; one slip of tongue and you’ll be in trouble.”

He added that PSM did not intend to lodge a police report as it was a waste of police resources.

Several other parties, however, had lodged police reports against Najwan for the racial slur. 

The government has warned politicians to be careful in playing up 3R (religion, race, royalty) issues.

Yesterday, caretaker Kedah Menteri Besar Muhammad Sanusi Md Nor was charged with two counts of sedition over his remarks against royalty.

At the same time, the police are busy completing investigations on PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang and DAP chairman Lim Guan Eng over remarks that touched on 3R. – July 19, 2023.