To say the Lunar New Year is a taxing holiday for all of us would be a great understatement. From weeks worth of prep work to the event itself, families all over the country do their best to have a perfect celebration for this auspicious holiday. However, some believe that the festivities were interrupted thanks to cleaners in Klang going door-to-door and asking for that red envelope.
Some workers have been reportedly abandoning their posts to instead request some ang paos. A resident has captured one of these instances on their phone and shared it on social media, sparking wide-reaching debates about the ethics of giving ang pao to racial discrimination.
https://www.tiktok.com/@maxxtan5001/video/7334735030301822216
In the video, a worker in a waste management uniform is seen persistently knocking on doors, aggressively asking for red envelopes. Later on, the resident recording the video confronts the worker, demanding some identification and a work permit. The cleaner was next seen walking away from the house, but instead of going through the exit, he instead took a left turn and attempted to continue his solicitation.
The resident behind the camera, who was secretly tailing the man, chased after the worker and escorted him personally out of the residential area. Additionally, the resident can be heard claiming the man is of Rohingya descent — a stateless Indo-Aryan ethnic group who predominantly follow Islam and reside in Myanmar but were displaced following the Rohingya genocide in 2017. But many in the video’s comment section argued that the man is Bengali, not Rohingya
The incident has since fueled heated debates on social media, raising questions about the merging or clashing of cultures, workers’ rights, and community standards. Ever since the video’s posting, many netizens have sided with the worker, arguing that the poor man needed the additional funds for the festive season. Others have opted for the calmer solution, where the man could have asked the worker politely to leave or to just call security to deescalate the situation.
Unfortunately, this has also sparked some negative opinions towards the Rohingya community in Malaysia. Though the resident in the video only suspected the man was Rohingya, it has since been used to reinforce negative stereotypes about these ethnic minority groups. Some locals have confronted Rohingya refugees for allegedly using their United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) status to engage in illegal activities rather than working legally.
This incident risks sparking more resentment from Malaysians who feel the Rohingya are overstepping their bounds and violating community standards.
Sources: TikTok
