PSA on Prudent Spending

A Johor Information Department tweet that featured a cartoon captioned, “Focus on needs. Spend on what you can afford. #KeluargaMalaysia #JabatanPenerangan” and widely shared by other state branches had caused disquiet among Malaysian netizens – so much so it was deleted within four hours. 

But not before screenshots of it had spread on social media. 

In one panel, a husband is depicted complaining about the lockdown while his wife says their savings have nearly been depleted. The same couple is then seen having arrived in Langkawi on a flight, with the wife saying she was looking forward to going shopping. 

While it received brickbats for allegedly deriding Malaysians’ spending habits, or worse, ridiculing the hardship faced by the rakyat, an official from the information department’s headquarters in Putrajaya told FMT that the cartoon was not aimed at scolding its audience. 

The assistant director at the department’s cyber media unit said: “It may have been direct, but we don’t feel the message was harsh or meant to mock anyone. Of course, the cartoon is very subjective, but we are willing to take risks. 

That’s the risk that we took and now we need to handle it. But we stand by the message in the cartoon, that is, to focus on necessities. 

I’m not saying don’t travel. If you have the money and you can afford it, then go. But what we want is for Malaysians to focus on their needs and not their wants”. 

So, if he is adamant that there’s nothing wrong about the said cartoon, why cancel it? They should have stood by it. 

Interestingly, the creative team at the department’s cyber media unit have been coming up with ideas for comics which their in-house artist has been producing once a month since the start of this year – and it’s no surprise the focus has been on the Covid pandemic. 

One example of one of their cartoons depicts a monkey making fun of four men for not following SOPs: