GEORGE TOWN, May 21 — A question on the sexual orientation of DAP’s Bukit Gelugor candidate Ramkarpal Singh Deo drew stinging rebuke from party secretary-general Lim Guan Eng today, who reprimanded the press for pursuing the innuendo from a rival contender.
Lim pointed out that while Parti Cinta Malaysia’s Huan Cheng Guan made allusions over Ramkarpal’s sexuality yesterday, it was the media who introduced the word “gay” into the coverage.
“Don’t turn this by-election into a farce. The opponent had only hinted at this and did not mention the word but it was the reporter who used this word and asked this question,” the DAP secretary-general said in a press conference this morning.
Yesterday, Huan Cheng Guan had questioned the 38-year-old’s bachelor status and asked if there was “something wrong” with Ramkarpal posting pictures of men on the latter’s Facebook account.
“If Huan had said the word, then relevant action can be taken against him, but he did not. He had only hinted at it, but it was the media that used the word,” Lim said.
He added that DAP’s Teluk Intan candidate Dyana Sofya Mohd Daud was also subjected to sexist attacks because she is a woman.
State executive councillor Jagdeep Singh Deo, who is also Ramkarpal’s eldest brother, read out a statement from the family objecting to insinuations over Ramkarpal’s sexual orientation.
“Despite this by-election being held less than a month after the untimely demise of Karpal Singh, it is unfortunate that the press whom Karpal had so much respect for, failed to execute their duties responsibly by weighing properly the facts before them,” he said.
Both later appealed to the media, particularly to Chinese vernacular newspaper China Press, whose reporter had asked the question, to maintain a certain decorum in reporting the by-election.
Ramkarpal and Huan are in a four-corner fight for the Bukit Gelugor parliamentary seat with two other independent candidates.
The seat was vacated after the late MP Karpal was killed in a car crash last month.
