CHERAS, Feb 12 — Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob today expressed pride in his children who engaged in an Instagram war with users who accused the minister’s family of racism over his call for Malays to boycott Chinese traders.

He said the attacks were of a personal nature, which prompted the strong reaction by his children on the social network yesterday.

"I am proud of my kids; they defend their father when he was under attack," Ismail Sabri said.

"IG (Instagram) is very personal and my kids posted up pictures of a family dinner and nothing involving the boycott, so when someone called us "racist family", they got angry."

He added that the public should not drag his family into the controversy as they were not party to the remark he made.

Ismail Sabri said, however, that he does not plan to take action against those involved in the exchange with his children.

"You want to attack me, I can take it. But do not attack my family," the agriculture and agro-based industries minister said.

Several members of his family took to Instagram yesterday to defend the minister as critics rained insults on him, resulting in a bitter exchange of profanities and abusive remarks on the online photo-sharing service.

Among others, words such as “racist”, “dogs” and “b***h” were lobbed back and forth between two Instagram users and three individuals believed to be family members of the agriculture and agro-based industries minister.

Ismail Sabri on Feb 2, allegedly told Malays using Facebook to boycott Chinese traders in a bid to pressure them to lower their prices, saying: “As long as Malays don’t change, the Chinese will take advantage to oppress the Malays.”

The entry has since been removed as the minister later clarified in a second Facebook post that he meant consumers were the majority and traders the minority, and was directing his remarks at unscrupulous Chinese traders instead of the entire Chinese community.

But in his most recent statement that same day, he appeared to resume telling Malay consumers to use their majority power and target the minority Chinese traders who allegedly hike up the price of their goods and services, also claiming that Chinese consumers stand to benefit from the boycott call.

According to Transport Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai, the Cabinet has now directed Ismail Sabri to explain his racial boycott call.