After he was called out by the founder of The Cacao Project and Forbes listee, Louise Mabulo, for being “exploitative” and fuelling a “neocolonialist narrative” on Wednesday (4 August), Nussier Yassin hit back at her for sharing “falsehoods”.
Ms Mabulo took to Facebook to share her negative experience with the content creator and his company back in 2019, which she said he mocked the local people and only cared about creating clickable content.
In his response on the Nas Daily Tagalog Facebook page the next day, Mr Nusseir claimed that he flew in from Singapore to the Philippines just to support her, adding that he wanted to “go the extra mile” to cover the story of how Ms Mabulo had “revolutionised the cacao industry in [her] province”.
However, Mr Nussier said he was sad and surprised to find out that her story was “not true” on the ground.
“Once we arrived at your plantation, once we saw the village and talked to the farmers, we came to the conclusion that there is no story here,” he said, adding that “the awards on the Internet are just that…awards”.
In his version of events, Mr Nussier said: “Our investigation has made it clear that your story in the media is false. And that there are no ‘200 farmers’ that you work with, and there are no Cacao plantations that you don’t personally profit from.”
In her post, Ms Mabulo said that she was “fully transparent” on their phone call that she didn’t think her work was something Mr Nusseir could visualise and that there were not many factors to include in a one-minute video.
She said: “In his story, he assumed that I’d replaced coconuts with cacao— when in reality, this was unrealistic and absurd, and not the goal of my venture, which is to diversify income streams for farmers.”
“We mutually agreed it was best he should just leave.”
Mr Nussier, however, countered that he had told her in person that they believed her story was “not true”, adding that she had understood and bid them farewell.
He then alleged that The Cacao Project “is a family business” that Ms Mabulo profited from, adding that he flew back to Singapore “disappointed”.
Mr Nusseir went on to give Ms Mabulo two pieces of advice, the first of which is that she should “be truthful” about her work. He stressed that “the Cacao Project is not as truthful as the media says it is”.
The second piece of advice was to not share “falsehoods” online, stressing that is it “borderline illegal” to do so.
He added: “Everything you said is with malicious intent and it is clearly not how I speak. We have 5 years of evidence to back that up. 40% of my company is Filipino. Our actions back up our words.”
He concluded by saying that “good intentions get punished sometimes”, but that this incident wouldn’t stop Nas Daily from “believing in the good of humanity”.
He added, “Hopefully one day, I can come back and tell your story again. You are, after all, an inspiring individual.”
Lousie Mabulo responds: “Our farmers are real and well”
Following his post, Ms Mabulo posted a follow-up on her Facebook page in which she highlighted the success of The Cacao Project, noting that they are about to launch their own chocolates soon.
She said: “Our farmers are well and real, and are either blissfully unaware of you, or enjoying this exchange over a cup of hot chocolate or coconut water.”
“I will not take advice nor criticism, especially when you clearly don’t understand Filipino farming and culture, or refuse to,” she added.
Ms Mabulo went on to assert that his efforts to divert the issue to her wouldn’t work.
“Attacking me this way does not validate your behavior, the words you’ve said nor the injustice you’ve built your entire career on,” she slammed.
“Our culture is sacred and to be preserved, respected, and given justice— not commercialized for profit, or sold off to just anyone. We are not easily distracted,” added Ms Mabulo.
