An information board at the Nanyang Technological University )NTU) that illustrates how Lunar New Year is being celebrated around Asia, was vandalised – the word “lunar” was crossed out from the board and replaced with “Chinese”.
A photo of the board was then posted on the Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu by a user “谁能拒绝一根草莓冰”, with the post protesting NTU’s decision to replace “Chinese new year” with “Lunar new year”.
The post on Xiaohongshu claimed that NTU had allegedly “threatened” the NTU Chinese Society that if they didn’t use “Lunar new year” instead of “Chinese new year”, they would let the celebrations be organised by other societies.
A netizen who claimed to be a staff member at NTU said that they tried to fix the vandalism with a marker and some tape, but the tape was then taken off again.
They ended up having to use an isolation belt to protect and prevent further vandalism to the board.
A spokesperson for NTU spoke to 8world News that they used “Lunar new year” instead of “Chinese new year” because they wanted to include staff and students from other countries like Korea and Vietnam.
They said that they used “Lunar” in the spirit of diversity and inclusion.