Lim said TV3 owed a better explanation to the public and a sincere apology to Teo unless it has a specific agenda in mind. ― Picture by Hari Anggara

KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 4 — DAP’s Lim Lip Eng today rebuked local broadcaster TV3 for its negligent act in airing a Mandarin excerpt of Deputy Education Minister Teo Nie Ching during its Malay news programme.

The Kepong MP said TV3’s perfunctory apology was “unacceptable” as both Teo’s reputation had been tarnished, adding that the broadcaster had also failed to explain in its apology note that the deputy minister had first replied in Bahasa Malaysia to the question posed before translating her answer to Mandarin at a request from a Chinese reporter from ntv7.

“This is unacceptable, as negligence is on the part of the TV3 to capture and broadcast the footage in Malay. This has led to a lot of criticisms of Teo from the audience and the damage was already done.

“When other newspapers and TV stations could get it right, why did TV3 fail to report the news as it is? Was there something more cynical to this than just reporting the news for the station’s target audience?” Lim said in a statement.

He said TV3 owed a better explanation to the public and a sincere apology to Teo unless it has a specific agenda in mind.

In a statement on its official Facebook page last night, TV3 apologised for the erroneous excerpt, saying the use of the excerpt in Mandarin was supposed to be used only in the Mandarin News on ntv7 and 8TV.

The purported mistake triggered intense criticism on social media against the DAP deputy minister, including from an Umno Youth executive committee member Fariz Hadi who sarcastically welcomed Teo as the “Deputy Education Minister from China” and included the erroneous clip in his Tweet yesterday that has since drawn over 66,000 retweets and nearly 3,100 “likes”.