NSTP's legacy? Sarcasm lost?

Read here, here, here, here and here for context. You can watch the video of the debate here. The newspaper have single out DAP Lim Kit Siang for leading the attacks of Zainul Arifin's column. However is that the true picture? IMHO, from what I saw from the video and read from the verbatim of the debate, DAP Lim Kit Siang was being sarcastic. Didn't any of the editors in NSTP realise that? I mean they are well experience in this kind of things right? Even a guy like me realise he was being sarcastic. So I beg to question, have the newspaper's journalist and editors shoot themselves in the leg by misleadingly reporting DAP Lim Kit Siang's statement?