Putrajaya can override courts on ‘Allah’, says deputy home minister: KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 15 — The federal government has the power to override the judiciary on “Allah”, Deputy Home Minister Datuk Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar said today amid Christian uproar over an appellate court ruling that the Arabic word for god is not integral to their worship. The Sarawakian lawmaker also said said the Court of Appeal’s controversial decision yesterday only applied to the publication of the word “Allah” in the Catholic newspaper, Herald, but added that such a ruling would not be enforceable by any government agency. “Decisions made by the courts are case laws. Even though they become part of the law of the country, they are normally not enforceable. “That means you can’t get the police or other agencies to enforce them. They are not statute laws (laws passed by Parliament),” the Santubong MP was quoted by The Malaysian Insider news portal as telling reporters after marking Hari Raya Aidiladha with his constituents in Kampung Tabuan Hilir today. Wan Junaidi reportedly said the prime minister could propose in the Dewan Rakyat, a law to exclude Sarawak and Sabah from coming under the ban and so override the court decision on Allah without taking away the powers of the judiciary. “We can have a political decision to override the court decision,” he was quoted saying. The 67-year-old was reported saying the Cabinet had not backed down from its 2011 decision to allow the Arabic word to be published in the Al-Kitab, the Bahasa Malaysia bibles or those in native languages. He reportedly noted the legal dispute between the Catholic Church and the Home Ministry was not yet over and that a decision at the Federal Court could still reverse the appellate court’s ruling. A three-man panel of judges in the Court of Appeal yesterday overturned a 2009 landmark High Court judgment to allow the Catholic Church the right to publish the word “Allah” for the Christan god in the Bahasa Malaysia section of its weekly paper. According to the leading judge’s grounds of judgment, the use of the word “Allah” is exclusive to Muslims and is not integral to Christian worship, contrary to the Church’s arguments that the word was irreplaceable and vital to their religious doctrine. Two-thirds of Christians in Malaysia are Bumiputera, who are largely based in Sabah and Sarawak and number some 1.6 million. Sabah and Sarawak churches yesterday slammed the Court of Appeal’s ruling as “insensitive” and “repugnant”, and maintained that they would continue using the word “Allah” in worship and in the Al-Kitab, as they have done for centuries. Archbishop Datuk Bolly Lapok, chairman of the Association of Churches in Sarawak, said it was “utterly irresponsible” and “grossly demeaning, to say the least”, for the Court of Appeal to rule that the use of the word “Allah” was not integral to the Christian faith. The religious dispute that has been playing out in the courts over the last five years is seen to have driven a huge wedge between Malaysia’s Muslim majority and minorities of other creeds. Besides Malaysia’s Bumiputera Christians, the Sikhs also call their god “Allah”. dlvr.it/4821Wn
Posted on: Tue, 15 Oct 2013 15:06:18 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015