KUALA LUMPUR: The Tourism Ministry has finally decided to ditch the Visit Malaysia Year 2020 logo featuring a grinning orangutan in sunglasses.
Its minister Mohamaddin Ketapi said the logo had come under intense criticism from various quarters since it was introduced early this year.
He said the ministry planned to organise a contest for people to come up with a new design.
“We will improvise on the logo...we may get rid of the grinning orangutan in sunglasses...many have criticised it, saying that it looks hideous,” he said, adding that it was difficult for him to defend the logo with so many negative comments about it.
Mohamaddin, however, admitted that there will also be those who would criticise him for wanting to change the logo which had just been launched early this year.
Former Tourism Minister Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz had previously also come under fire for the logo, which featured the orangutan and turtle in sunglasses with its tagline "Travel. Enjoy. Respect".
Netizens condemned the logo, criticising the uneven font sizes and retro-looking illustrations.
Nazri had then said the logo was designed by the ministry's in-house team and that he trusted their designs, adding that criticism "was normal".
"I can't be putting a serious logo. This is tourism and it's supposed to be fun," he was quoted as saying.
However, despite his explanation, thousands of people later signed an online petition calling for it to be dropped by the tourism board.
Nazri had unveiled the logo at a travel forum in Thailand in January.
He said it was made up of things closely associated with Malaysia.
"We retained the Petronas Twin Towers as it is the most photographed tourism product in Malaysia.
"[The animals] are symbolic to Malaysia. If we do not include those animals in our logo, other countries will claim them," he was reported to have said.
He said the orangutan and proboscis monkey were wearing sunglasses to show Malaysia was a sunny country.
The 2020 tagline draws from the World Tourism Organisation's "Travel. Enjoy. Respect" campaign that was launched in August 2017, which called for tourists to respect the "nature and the culture" of the country they were visiting.