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Kuala Lumpur. An online video (see video here) of a KFC staff member assaulting a customer has gone viral in Malaysia and degenerated into racial name-calling on the Internet, despite no clear evidence of racism in the video.

The incident, which underscores the sometimes volatile nature of race relations here, has forced the Chinese customer to publicly deny making racist remarks against the fast-food restaurant’s Malay staff.

On Thursday, at a press conference organized with the help of opposition MP Lim Lip Eng, graphic designer Danny Ng, 26, told reporters that the scuffle happened on Monday at an outlet in Shah Alam.

Ng said it started after more than 20 customers of different races had queued for an hour for their food. They were upset when they were belatedly informed that the outlet had run out of chicken.

The group, including Ng, began shouting their displeasure at the staff. That angered those working in the kitchen, who allegedly asked if they wanted to pick a fight. Ng claimed that one staff member told the unhappy customers in Malay: “If you want to eat, go cook yourself, pig.”

An angry Ng, who was at the outlet with his wife and sister, then went forward to try and take a photograph of the staff, telling them that he wanted to make a formal complaint to the management as well as call the police.

That triggered the melee, which was captured in a 28-second clip uploaded onto video-sharing Web site YouTube.

The clip shows a few KFC employees charging out of the kitchen and shouting at Ng. One of them runs up to him and punches and kicks him, before being pulled away by other staff members.

Since it was uploaded on Monday, the clip has garnered more than 500,000 views and 10,000 comments. Most of the criticism was directed at KFC, with a few aimed at the customers’ impatient attitudes.

The incident also took on a racial twist online, resulting in a flurry of name-calling. Although there was no sign of racism in the video — the audio quality of the clip was poor — some netizens alleged that Ng had cursed Malays.

That led to a string of remarks about ‘rude Chinese’ and ‘uncivilized Malays,’ as well as other more incendiary and racist comments.

While Ng admitted that he was angry and had shouted at the staff, he stressed he “definitely did not use vulgarities or make racial slurs.”

“On the Internet, some people also said I was drunk,” he said. “I was not. I was completely sober.”

Ng said he is seeking a meeting with KFC Malaysia’s management, which has launched an internal investigation into the incident.

Lim, a Democratic Action Party MP, also urged netizens to stop the allegations as they were not present at the scene.

KFC on Thursday said the staff members involved have been suspended, as well as other members of the crew. A police report has also been lodged.

“We place respect of the relationship and trust between our customers and our employees at the heart of everything we do. We tolerate nothing that undermines this,” it said in a statement.

The racial twist to the issue appeared to underscore the sometimes fiery nature of race relations in Malaysia, which some observers say have been increasingly fraught in recent years.

New media consultant and political observer Oon Yeoh said it was not uncommon for online comments — shielded by anonymity — to descend into racial insults, as evidenced on blogs and forums.

‘“Malaysians have been conditioned to think along racial lines, and the fact that the video is grainy and shaky allowed people to put their own spin and interpretation of the events,” he said. “In cyberspace, sentiments can be fanned quickly, though it may not always translate to tensions in real life.”

In the aftermath, some have been asking for cooler heads to prevail.

“You know who’s dumber than the worker?” one netizen wrote in his response to the video on YouTube. “All the viewers who viewed this video and condemned other races.”

Reprinted courtesy of Straits Times Indonesia. To subscribe to Straits Times Indonesia and/or the Jakarta Globe call 021 2553 5055.