Malaysians joke their way through Negeri Sembilan royal row

Malaysians on social media are offering increasingly outlandish solutions to a months-long royal tussle in Negeri Sembilan state, from making rival claimants sleep on a bed of nettles for a week to putting the entire state through Islamic spiritual healing.

The dispute has left Negeri Sembilan with two men claiming the throne, a state government at odds with the palace and no clear legal route to settle the fight.

One social media user suggested reviving adat perpatih – the customary law of Negeri Sembilan – by subjecting ruler Tuanku Muhriz Tuanku Munawir and rival claimant Tunku Nadzaruddin Tuanku Ja’afar to the “stone mattress” test: seven days and seven nights on a stone covered with an intensely itchy variety of nettle, with whoever lasts the longest earning the throne.

“Whoever can endure it becomes [the ruler],” the user wrote, adding that the idea “may look illogical, but it is a fact”.