Loretto (second left) lodging a police report with his team at the Karamunsing police headquarters.
KOTA KINABALU: A screenshot of messages that has gone viral on social media has led to a police report being lodged against a Sabah party divisional leader.
Loretto Padua Jr, the special officer to PKR vice-president and Penampang member of parliament Darell Leiking, in lodging the report against the politician, said the messages had insulted the Dusun, one of Sabah’s largest ethnic groups, through his WhatsApp messages, recently.
“We lodged the report today to urge the police to investigate the alleged messages by him. As a Dusun (ethnic group), I feel his messages are insulting, racist, provoking and would create unrest amongst the people who have been living in peace and harmony,” he said when met at the city police headquarters in Karamunsing here yesterday.
Loretto claimed that he first noticed the posting on Facebook two days ago, and was insulted after seeing the messages, which among others labelled Dusuns as coward, stupid, and likening them to dogs.
“The viral picture has caused discontent among the people that have long lived in tolerance to one another. You can look from the posting in Facebook, you can see the feedback, especially by the village people,” he said.
“We want to know whether the messages are true, if it is, then we hope the police will take the necessary action against him. He must face the law, on incitement. If it’s proven untrue, then we would encourage the police to track down the source.
“I feel it’s our responsibility to lodge this report because we do not want to leave the issue hanging. People will start accusing, others will be angry, verbally abuse… So we don’t want that to happen,” stressed Loretto.