UK-based Malaysian comedian Nigel Ng sparked netizens’ anger recently after joking about the ongoing crisis between Russia and Ukraine.
On 24 February, Nigel, most famous for his Uncle Roger character, decided to promote his upcoming stand-up tour by tweeting, “Adding some Ukraine dates to my HAIYAA world tour! Stay tuned…”, and added the laughing crying emoji at the end of the tweet, not long following Russia’s attack against Ukrainian capital city, Kyiv.
Following the post, many took to the comments slamming the comedian for his lack of sensitivity, including YouTuber Xiran Jay Zhao, who shared the screenshot of the now deleted tweet and wrote, “This is why I never liked him.”
Despite already deleting the tweet, Nigel made no direct apology for it, instead tweeting, “Oops! Sometimes what’s funny in your head isn’t that funny in real life.”
When a netizen reminded him to just be careful in the future, he instead responded, “There definitely will be a next time. If you listen to @haiyaapod you know I say some crazy shit.”
To put some context, Aljazeera reported that 198 Ukrainian civilians, including three children, have been killed by Russian forces so far after the Russian invasion of capital Kyiv.
(Photo Source: Nigel Ng Instagram, Xiran Jay Zhao Twitter)