Malaysian actor Zed Zaidi came under fire recently for spreading false reports about the Coronavirus outbreak.
The president of the Malaysian Artistes Association (Seniman) posted a photo of himself wearing a mask on his Twitter. Additionally, he uploaded a screenshot of a news claiming that all countries – except Malaysia – had banned Chinese people.
“Being in Malaysia isn’t safe, you have to cover your nose 24 hours a day from influenza and the coronavirus. After this, who knows what other dooms might come down upon us. For sure Malaysia must be doing bad things, I feel like only the people knows,” Zed (real name Rozaidi Jamil) sarcastically wrote on the caption.
The tweet has in turn received widespread backlash from local netizens. In this case, they pointed that the news shared by the “Sembilu” actor was obviously fake. They further claimed that the image shared by him was completely edited.
As a result, a number of internet users have demanded Zed to delete the post. Some of them even urged Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) and Polis Diraja Malaysia (PDRM) to take action against the 39-year-old.
It didn’t end there! A few Twitter trolls also came out with their own edited versions of the news in order to make fun of Zed. Check out some of the replies here:
— Parzival (@helahhidup) January 27, 2020
https://twitter.com/FXC69/status/1221772995410030592
tu la, aku pun terkejut jugak bila tengok berita ni tadi.. pic.twitter.com/QkekpdrZNb
— ⍟ FR ⍟ (@FairuzRusli) January 27, 2020
Bangang pic.twitter.com/GXhVqcrYCw
— oskortos 🇲🇾 (@oskortos) January 27, 2020
Following the massive amount of slams, Zed has finally stepped in to clarify the misunderstandings. He claimed that the photo shows a lot of people wearing face masks to avoid the spread of the germs, so he wanted to share with his followers that he’s doing the same as well.
“I tried to link the news with the photo of myself wearing the mask,” Zed told Malaysiakini. He further assured that he’s already aware that the news that he shared yesterday was indeed fake.
Update:
Relating to the coronavirus outbreak in our country, the Ministry of Health has recently confirmed 3 new cases this morning, totalling up to 7 in Malaysia as of today (Wednesday, 29th January), as reported by NST. Those who were affected are Chinese tourists.
2 of them are currently receiving medical observation at the Hospital Sultanah Maliha, Langkawi and Hospital Sultanah Aminah, Johor Bahru.
Sources: Malaysiakini, MSN.
