Stay calm, Ariff tells fans and friends

Najib's son-in-law takes offence at an article appearing on a website that Ariff Sabri has nothing to do with.

KUALA LUMPUR: Raub MP Mohd Ariff Sabri Abdul Aziz has told his readers and friends to stay calm and not to worry about a threat to sue him for an article that appeared on a website that he has no control over.

He said the article in question was a “restructured” version of an entry on his blog, Sakmongkol AK47. The original version was titled “Faulty Reward System and Changeable Governments,” but the other version, carried by Malaysia Chronicle, had “Son in Law Daniyar to Be Najib’s New Jho Low” as its headline.

Lawyers for Daniyar Kasikbayev, Prime Minister Najib Razak’s son-in-law, this week issued a press release asking Ariff to be accountable for the article, to remove it from the website and to apologise to their client. “If I don’t do these, they will sue on their client’s behalf,” he said in his latest blog entry.

Ariff said he had no association with Malaysia Chronicle and was therefore powerless to do anything about the article it featured.

“They uploaded my article and restructured it with their slant,” he said.

“I did not write an article with that title. So I am not responsible for the author of the article or the news portal that made it. I have no control over that news portal; so I cannot remove it. The lawyers must ask that portal to remove it.”

He said the article that appeared on his blog was essentially about the “rotten Umno system and its bad leadership.”

“It was not about the Prime Minister’s son-in-law. I did write some passages referring to the son-in-law as being a beneficiary of the rotten Umno system.” But he pointed out that he followed that statement with the following sentence: “I hope this news is not true.”

He said he was waiting for Daniyar’s lawyers to point out the material deemed offensive in the article on his blog.

He also said that if his own article was referred to, he was prepared to look at the offending passages and would remove them “if necessary” and tender “the required apologies.”