Singapore ― Individuals dressed as clowns were spotted loitering outside schools, asking students to follow them, in what appears to be a marketing stunt by a speech academy.
A screenshot of a man dressed in a chequered shirt, wearing a clown hat, his face painted like a clown, has been widely circulated on social media on Monday (Sept 20).
The man was seen in the Tampines area, hanging around outside schools and offering children money to follow him, wrote Facebook page Beh Chia Lor – Singapore Road.
The post included screenshots from parents whose children were approached by the clown.
One shared that a clown had approached her daughter and offered her S$1,000 if she followed him.
“Please alert your kids to be vigilant. I’m thankful my daughter didn’t follow him and instead sought help from one of the mommies at the bus stop,” the parent added.
Speaker of Parliament Tan Chuan-Jin also commented on the incident and urged students not to follow the clowns.
“Whoever is doing what I assume to be some viral marketing nonsense, stop it!” wrote Mr Tan.
“I trust the police are investigating this. It’s not amusing and just plain dangerous,” he added.
With multiple police reports filed, the police responded that they were investigating the incident.
On Monday afternoon, Speech Academy Asia, the company behind the marketing stunt, took to Facebook to apologise for the incident.
“We would like to clarify that, although indeed, the promoter is an employee, our team do not offer any form of monetary rewards for children to follow them,” the post noted.
“Additionally, our promoters strictly do not take any children out of the vicinity.”
“We truly understand your concern for the safety of your children; hence we will be putting an immediate stop to our roadshows,” said Speech Academy Asia.
The company director, Kelvin Tan, said that its marketing team had been sent to east and west Singapore to promote its school courses over the past two weeks.
However, they did not expect the backlash for having the clowns hang around outside primary schools trying to get parents to register their children.
“There was no evil intention behind the costumes, and we sincerely apologise for it. We will not do it again,” said Mr Tan in a Straits Times report.
“Maybe the clowns were too scary. It’s wrong, and we won’t do it again,” he repeated. /TISG
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