Friday, January 10, 2014

Case Study: Jabatan Agama Islam Selangor (JAIS) raid on Bible Society of Malaysia (BSM) (Series 3)



Legal Implications
1.    The JAIS raid has brought into question the power of the religious authority, the jurisdiction of its control by the state and federal government, the Sultan of Selangor’s role in its authority and whether the state enacted law supersede Federal Constitution.
2.    The amendment proposed by 3 ADUN would only apply to Selangor.
3.    Conflict with Sultan and federal constitutional death lock, the Sultan may refuse to give his consent to the amendment of the bill under S78 (2B) of Selangor Constitution.
4.    Beside this, by allowing Sabah and Sarawak to use Allah wording in their bible but not peninsular would make Malaysia into a country that had 2 set of law, to resolve this problem, need to went back to emphasize the importance of tolerance in a multi-religion society.  

Possible solution

1.    "I believe tension can be defused if we settle contentions through dialogue engagement and the rule of law," Najib said at the Prime Minister's Department's first monthly gathering for the year yesterday.
2.    In calling for a more diplomatic approach in tackling sensitive issues, disputes must be settled in accordance with the law as the country's harmony was at stake.





Appendix

* subsection 9 of Non-Islamic Religions Control of Propagation among Muslims (Selangor) Enactment 1988, which states that a person commits an offence if he (a) in any published writing; or (b) in any public speech or statement; or (c) in any speech or statement address to any gatherings or persons; or (d) in any speech or statement which is published or broadcast and which at the time of its making he knew or ought reasonably to have known would be published or broadcast, uses the word “Allah” or 34 other Arabic words including Hadith, Syariah, Kalifah, Fatwa, Alhamdulillah, Insyaallah etc to express and or describe any fact, belief, idea, concept, act, activity, matter or thing of or pertaining to any non-Islamic religion.

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