Screenshots

Ku Nan's 'Blame That Indonesian Woman Blogger' stance has backfired.

Bloggers seberang -- and mainstream media too (see another Screenshots blog entry) -- have upped the ante against our Tourism Minister, because they are unhappy with Ku Nan for labelling our blogger friends there tukang kibul.

Now, Ku Nan's boys in Jakarta have pressed the SOS button through the recruitment page of Jakarta Post. Apparently, they are now in need of Public Relations specialists to crisis-control the situation.

Pardon Tourism Malaysia's Manglish...it's atrocious no doubt

Blogger Nila Tanzil, the target of our Tourism Minister, after his Jakarta boys cost her her job with SCTV, has come out in defense of herself. She demanded Ku Nan to seek clarification from her directly rather than demonising her as a jobless liar.

Popular online media Detik.com is challenging Ku Nan and his boys in Jakarta to state specifically which portion that Nila Tanzil claimed in her blog was lie? The web portal has open a feedback section particularly to debate this issue.

Detik.com closes the story, published yesterday, by giving Nila a platform to address the bloggers what to do next:

"Baru kemarin Tengku Adnan mengklarifikasi bahwa yang dia maksud adalah blogger Indonesia," Nila berujar. [...]

"Sementara untuk para blogger, Nila berpesan agar tidak takut menuliskan kebenaran. "Tetaplah menulis. Keep telling the truth! Selama apa yang kita tulis benar, nggak usah takut," tandasnya.

Meanwhile, Enda Nasution, Indonesia's foremost bilingual blogger who is termed as 'Bapak Blogger Indonesia', and whom I introduced into Global Voices Online in 2005, felt that Tourism Malaysia should be thankful to Nila for telling the truth rather than condemning her.

In the company of Cambodian blogger ThaRum (l) and Enda Nasution (r) during GVO2005, hosted by Reuters at its Global HQ at Canary Wharf, London

Via roving Malaysian bloggers Unspun who says the backlash has begun; and SK Thew who observes that Malaysia has done a very bad PR in trying to lure visitors from overseas, notably those from Indonesia.