Very difficult meh?

Kuala Lumpur, (PTI): A day after ethnic Indian activists sought setting up of a Non-Muslim Affairs department, Malaysia on Monday said it was “difficult” to meet the demand as Islam is the country’s only official religion.

Deputy Prime Minister, Najib Tun Razak, however, said that absence of such a dedicated department did not mean that the government had forsaken other religious communities in this predominantly Islamic country.

Link: The Hindu News Update service 

Accepting momentarily, for the sake of argument, that a non-Muslim affairs department is a good way to address the grievances that Non-Muslims face in a multi-religious society, I don’t see Najib’s reasoning here.

As he has said it, I think it is precisely because-rather than in spite of-Islam being Malaysia’s official religion  that such a department needs to be set, if it even ought to be set up. Even more so, if we observe that an overwhelming majority of the country religious faithful are Muslims.

Any casual observer will note that the Hindu community wants an assurance that the government is looking out for them. Thus the call for such a dedicated government department. If that is the wish of those activists, then why is Malaysia’s official religion a barrier to setting up  such a department? Is it un-Islamic to have a government that looks out for all its peoples?

But I think the more subtle point is that already the Hindu community views itself and cornered in by four walls, such that they begin to compare themselves with the Orang Asli community. A very dangerous and unhealthy view, IMHO.
Obviously this is not a political answer to give, and for better or worse, Najib is right to discourage such views.

Certainly he (Najib) is correct to point out that the government doesn’t need a dedicated department to look after every Malaysian’s rights. That should be the first thing on every MPs agenda, more so on every minister’s actions. And when necessary, protecting the minority rights must be every judges priority. However, as we know, reality is not so rosy.

So why then-this is something I must ask those who want a extra department (and another layer of human incompetence)- is a Jabatan Hal-Ehwal Bukan Islam going to solve all the injustice and grievances that has been perpetrated so far?

Funny isn’t it, how one man is idolized

No, I really not against appealing to God for a little hand in a speedy recovery.

Ex-PM Tun Mahathir is recovering from a heart bypass op. He is 82 years old but it seems that he will make it. The man is made of tougher guts than many of us.

Which is why I find this rather unsettling.

Is it needful? Does it need to be public? And as I looked down the comments, it is as though this event is designed to provoke the consternation of some members of the blogging public.

I give you one thing though, the Malaysian’s blogosphere is as far away from Singaporean blogging in one respect- religiosity.

Terrorism

As I came back from work university, CNN is on the TV and they are blaring on the recent terror plots busted in Germany, Denmark etc…

Only a few days ago, tragedy shook Islamabad when bombs exploded killing 27 people in Pakistan.

Is this media bias?

It may not be so, but the temptation is that the news networks cannot resist is to associate Islam with terrorism. This is perhaps unfortunate.

This is perhaps one period in my life since 9/11 that both Islam and terrorism have been juxtaposed so much until tempers are raised and countries divided. In New York, a recent controversy erupted over the opening of an Arabic school.

One wonders how much of this is fear is justified,  or how much of it is an excuse just feel superior. Even in Malaysia, things are not going so well with regards to the relationship Islam has with non-Muslims. This needn’t be so. Farish A Noor tells us why.

So what if Gandalf is Gay?

Sir Ian McKellen, who played Gandalf the Gay Gray in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings visited Singapore recently to play King Lear in Shakespeare’s King Lear. CNA interviewed him and over Singapore national television announced that,

It’s not exactly okay to sodomize your male partner in Singapore too, much less have oral sex. It’s a criminal offense. So what do you do when an actor as magnetic as Ian comes to do theater in Singapore? You shut up and let him do what he does best: wow Singaporean audiences.

Singapore’s tourism strategy is to promote itself as an epicenter for arts and culture in this region.

Seems that Malaysia is not spared from embarrassing encounters with the rainbow league too. But this is much much more than a friendly trip down to the playhouse. Rev. Ouyang plans to open a church here in Malaysia and has held his first service in a hotel here.

The pastor is homosexual and open about it.

Of course, the mainstream tabloids newspapers did a story and he seems to be public enemy no. 1 after

Muslim-majority Malaysia will block a plan by the country’s first and only openly gay pastor to establish a church embracing homosexuals, bisexuals and transsexuals, a minister said on Monday.

Reverend Ouyang Wen Feng, an ethnic Chinese Malaysian ordained in the US, caused controversy after saying he wanted to set up the church by 2010.

The government would block the plan, Tourism Minister Adnan Tengku Mansor told AFP, adding the country had always sought to portray itself as a “family-oriented” holiday destination.

“We have no intention of being portrayed the same way like other cities such as Bangkok or those other cities in that league,” Mansor said, apparently referring to the Thai capital’s sex industry.

Whatever our views towards being gay, being a pastor and running churches, you must admit that what Mansor said is quite undiplomatic (towards Thailand).

That aside, what concerns me more however is highlighted in bold. Is it right for the government to intervene into an internal religious affair concerning Christians? Back off Mansor, opening a church has nothing to do with tourism.

Dangerous precedents in the making.

Defending the defenceless…

There is a village in Kelantan named Kampung Jias. It is an Orang Asli settlement. Orang Asli are the native inhabitants on the Malay peninsular.

Something happened there that saddened me greatly.  But I am not a good storyteller as Bob Kee. He is perhaps more fitting to tell what happened there and is happening.

On June 4, 2007, a building erected by the Orang Asli on customary and traditional lands for use by their own community to serve as a place of worship was demolished by the Gua Musang District Land Office of Kelantan.

He has followed up with another more recent post detailing the whole incident and what is going to be done about it.

A police report has been filed on the matter and I pray that the police force will be impartial in investigating this case. The said place of worship was a Christian church to be built on the penghulu’s own orchard.

There is something to be said about a country where the local authorities are “free” to intimidate the less educated and less economically able. Although we have not seen the end of the whole incident yet, I can smell the rat already.

Will everybody entranced over the Altantuya Murder Trials, this incident won’t make even the 7th page on the news dailies. But honestly, as a concerned citizen, this is of more importance. Not only because I am with my Christian brothers in prayer, but because I cannot just sit back and watch someone get bullied right in front of me. Can you?

What the Federal court’s decision on apostasy means to me (and to all of us).

As you all have probably known, the Federal Court ruled yesterday that Lina Joy has to get the Sharia court to endorse her conversion out of Islam in order for her to remove the word ‘Islam’ on her I/C.

This is my opinion on the matter.  I am a Christian.
It is kinda ironic that I’m writing about Christian-Islam relations on a Wesak day. But I first knew about the Lina Joy case about 5 years back. My first impressions was that she was a very brave lady. Many Malay Christians have opted for a quieter life. Without trying to diminish the sacrifices other converts from Islam have made, but I have to say I admire her for what she did and believed.

To me she believed that every man and woman is responsible for their own choices. Lina Joy, born a Malay as Azlina Jailani must have believed that religion is a personal choice.  You do not inherit your religion from your parents.

Now this may be almost an axiom for most of us. Contemporary opinion has it that religion is a private matter.

Unfortunately, in Malaysia, the majority Malay population who happen to be Muslim do not think so. Islam is a way of life- a total way of life. One from which there is no turning away. It is the logical outcome of a faith convinced of its truth and a religion in which there is no separation between the private and public life.

Irregardless of Lina’s personal reasons for battling this case all the way to the highest court in Malaysia,  one thing is certain: Because of the majority Malay sentiment and the majority court decision, she has to continue to live in fear and in hiding. Her right to live freely has been curtailed whilst others live normally. Isn’t this injustice? How apt for a secular court to pronounce a ‘prison sentence’ of sorts for an apostate from Islam. 

Recent incidents, including Lina Joy’s case has made me realize there are two, perhaps three, parrallel societies happening to live in Malaysia. One is a sophisticated, liberal and almost secular people give and take a little religion here and there, another is the Islamic community-and the last, the poor. The classification is crude, but will serve my point nonetheless.

The point is identity. Who are you? The court thinks, and most Malays think that she (Lina) is a Malay and therefore a Muslim. She thinks she is no longer a part of the Islamic community by the simple virtue that she has made a choice based on conscience. The question is whose thinking will the court uphold? We have seen here that the judges think that the former is correct.

I believe that the 2-1 decision against Lina’s favour was the wrong one, as I have argued above. I think it was a cowardly decision. As it was not an unanimous decision I can see there is within the constitution a case for non-Muslim Malays. It is easy to hide behind technicalities to preserve the ‘peace’. Brawn and intimidation instead of reason and liberty has won the day, and it is a sad day it is.

I’m reminded of a Malay proverb: Diberi betis, nakkan peha. This is so true in Malaysian life, either overtly or subversively. 

I’m a Muslim. Period.

From Screenshots,

I remember when I was still in secondary school, my awareness of how this country was being run was still rather shallow. Ok, so it was the Anwar episode and it sort of opened my eyes to the excesses of Yours Truly. But I was just out prove to my best friend that I was politically sophisticated…

That was in the past.

Nevertheless, there hasn’t been much to celebrate about in the past 10 years. First, the financial crisis, Reformasi crisis, Mahathir’s threat to stepping down, 9/11, Mahathir stepping down, Badawi’s sweeping victory, Badawi’s Islam Hadhari, Badawi’s loss of his wife, Mahathir’s barbed criticism, crisis in higher education, crisis in press freedom, inter racial and inter religious tensions…

Ever noticed that since Abdullah’s articulation of Islam Hadhari as the central core of his political beliefs,
Malaysian’s have been living in more fear and tension?

Seems that his version of ‘progressive and moderate’ Islam while looking nice on paper, doesn’t seem to have the desired effect in practice.

There is one other political system that has the same characteristics. It’s called Marxism.
Mahathir’s takes one more shot at AB in that interview with Malaysiakini. But the more pertinent question we ought to be asking ourselves even more is this:

Why is it that so many Muslim’s are becoming more and more backward in their outlook and interpretation to the Koran? Has it got anything to do with Mahathir’s “Islamic state” proclamation and AB’s “Islam Hadhari” combined?

A good reminder…

In an article published by Amartya Sen in response to his latest book, this essay What Clash of Civilisations? has so much relevance to the contemporary Malaysian inter-racial dialogue. Hope that these few reminders bring our thinking to a higher level. Excerpts:

The increasing tendency to overlook the many identities that any human being has and to try to classify individuals according to a single allegedly pre-eminent religious identity is an intellectual confusion that can animate dangerous divisiveness…

People see themselves—and have reason to see themselves—in many different ways. For example, a Bangladeshi Muslim is not only a Muslim but also a Bengali and a Bangladeshi, typically quite proud of the Bengali language, literature, and music, not to mention the other identities he or she may have connected with class, gender, occupation, politics, aesthetic taste, and so on…

His conclusion is perhaps the most enlightening. A reality of this post-modern world we must all grapple with.

Perhaps the worst impairment comes from the neglect—and denial—of the roles of reasoning and choice, which follow from the recognition of our plural identities…

I think what he has written about the the international relations with respect to the events of 9/11 has great relevance to our experiences in Malaysia post May 13. I believe the resemblances and application is pretty straightforward from his essay. But I think the clearest and most potent part of his article is the second para I’ve quoted.

A Malay Muslim is not just a Muslim, but also Malay. It is with great detriment that muftis, politicians and judges continue to defend a defective intepretation of the constitution that being Malay implies being a Muslim. It is a detriment to the religion of Islam-as it is practised in Malaysia-and the rich Malay culture.

In the news

Still remember this post. Well here’s another story, which is similiar.

You won’t see this kind of reporting on national media of course. Mind you, Al-Jazeera is a Arabic news network, created for the sole purpose of countering the Western spin and slant of international news networks.

Technorati : al-Jazeera, apostasy, islam, malaysia, revathi

Outrage!

From the blog Disquiet, run by lawyer Malik Imtiaz Sawar.

Just remember, we gave the present Government a mandate. Something we are constantly reminded of. The law requires that the welfare of the children be the paramount consideration. The law also requires that all of us be treated equally. And yet, it would seem that those amongst us charged with the welfare of the nation and its citizens appear to think otherwise. What justifies tearing a family apart, separating children from their parents? Islam does not. The law does not. How can we even begin to understand the anguish of the father, the mother and the children? How can we even begin to understand that some believe that the law countenances, warrants, such cruelty? Someone has to be made accountable for this.

MIS http://www.malaysiakini.com/news/65995

Family torn apart over ‘religion’

Yoges Palaniappan Apr 16, 07 4:26pm

Rubber tapper P Marimuthu’s life changed drastically when seven officers from the Selangor Religious Department (Jais) came to his house in Kampung Baru Tambahan Ulu Yam on April 2. The father of six was told that his wife of 21 years Raimah Bibi was a Muslim and that she and their children, aged between four and 12, must be placed in a rehabilitation centre. The couple’s eldest son was staying with an uncle at that time. Relating his ordeal at a press conference in the Parliament lobby today, the 44-year-old rubber tapper said he had no choice but to let the officers take his family away. He also claimed that an ‘ustaz’ (religious scholar) had told him to covert to Islam or threatened to charge him for khalwat (close proximity) with Raimah, 40. Raimah, who returned to help him with the rubber tapping work two days later, told him that Jais had placed the family in the nearby Kampung Melayu Liga Emas. She purportedly said the villagers, who are predominantly Malays, have been asked to keep an eye on her daily activities and prevent her from meeting outsiders, especially her husband. Marimuthu said he felt threatened by the villagers’ stares when he attempted to visit his wife and children. “My wife was so afraid that she refused to come out and talk to me. I had no choice but to leave that village,” he said. According to him, Raimah managed to sneak their children over to his house several times without anybody’s knowledge. “We will be together for some time and then she’ll leave again to the other house,” he said. Another heart-rendering saga Marimuthu also does not know if his wife was a practising Muslim before they got married. Since then, he said, the two of them have been practising Hindus. “We got married in a temple, according to Hindu rituals. All our kids were brought up as Hindus,” he said. He said Raimah, who was adopted by an Indian Muslim family, cannot remember her adopted mother and her late adopted father had approved of their relationship. According to Marimuthu, his wife’s MyKad had stated her name as Raimah Bibi binti Noordin and her religion as Islam. The couple did not apply to the National Registration Department (NRD) to have this corrected either. Meanwhile, Parliamentary Opposition Leader Lim Kit Siang, who accompanied Marimuthu, said the authorities learnt about Raimah’s ‘religious status’ when the couple enrolled their children into a school and copies of their identity cards were submitted to the education department. “It is a simple mistake that has brought a great tragedy to the family,” he said, adding that the matter must be checked with the authorities in order for the family to be reunited. “This is the latest in heart-rendering family sagas like in the case of R Subashini where human rights are completely ignored. Such incidents should be stopped,” he stressed.

Posted by Malik Imtiaz Sarwar at 6:28 AM

Of late, cases like these have become common. But notice something: it always always involves Hindus and not just any Hindu, particularly those who cannot defend themselves. The poor, those without economic clout. This is not an issue of religion or faith. It is oppression. Imagine this, Malaysians are being oppressed by their own fellow Malaysians! Who can read this and not feel his blood boil.

Technorati : malaysia, religious freedom