Good news for Rihanna fans

Rihanna fans can heave a sigh of relief.

The Barbados-born singer will be coming to Malaysia after all.

After weeks of uncertainty following the singer’s bust-up, allegedly at the hands of her boyfriend, 19-year-old Chris Brown, the local event promoter Pineapple Concerts Sdn Bhd has confirmed that the Kuala Lumpur show is on.

“We spoke to Rihanna’s people and they are keen on having a replacement date within the next two months,” said Pineapple’s managing director Razman Razali.

While the exact date for the concert had not been confirmed, Razman said details should be released by the end of next week.

Additional details on how to get refunds for those who cannot make the new date will also be made known then.

“Those who can’t make the new date because of travel plans and expats who won’t be around have approached us for a refund. We will give out full refunds but we ask them to wait a bit longer, at least until we make an official announcement.”

Razman said the concert was “on track to being sold out” with only 20 per cent of the tickets left.

Earlier, Pas Youth had called for a boycott of her concert, saying that Rihanna was too sexy. The movement added that to allow her to perform was “akin to insulting Eastern culture”.

The alleged altercation with Brown in Los Angeles occurred on Feb 8, just hours before the two were scheduled to appear at the Grammys and scuppered her Feb 13 date with her Malaysian fans at the Putra Stadium in Bukit Jalil.

The show was part of her “Good Girls Gone Bad” world tour.

Celebrity website TMZ had carried a photo, purportedly of the battered star. It quoted the young diva’s close friend, Washington Elyse Umemoto, as saying that the picture was real because of a Roman numeral tattoo on Rihanna’s neck.

The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) is scrambling to track down the people who leaked the police shots to TMZ.

The LAPD came under a withering attack from the singer’s father after the pictures surfaced.

In a phone interview wi th People magazine, Rihanna’s dad Ronald Fentry said the leak of the alleged photo of his daughter was “sloppy work on their part”.

He added that he was disappointed wi th the way the LAPD was handling the case.