Umno and the Home Ministry, which the party’s vice-president is minister of, have proposed a constitutional amendment to stipulate that Islam in Malaysia is of the Sunni sect. Would such an amendment to the federal constitution be possible? And if so, what are the ramifications?
discrimination
Uncommon Sense with Wong Chin Huat: On the “Allah” judgement
By Jacqueline Ann Surin
The Court of Appeal’s ruling in support of the government’s ban on non-Muslims using “Allah” was not unexpected. Dr Wong Chin Huat spells out the judgment’s far-reaching implications and posits that Sabahans and Sarawakians are the ones who are now poised to show Putrajaya what Malaysia needs most.
Umno’s tangle over “Allah”
By Jacqueline Ann Surin
YET again, in the tussle over “Allah” and Malay-language Bibles, the Umno-led Barisan Nasional government shows how unclear it is about what it means to respect the religious rights of non-Muslims.
The benefit of being Malay first
Shape of a Pocket by Jacqueline Ann Surin
ARE you Malay first? Or Malaysian first? But is the question really about which should come first? Why does it seem to matter so much? And which of the two labels — one about race and the other about citizenship — is more profoundly important to us as Malaysian citizens?
Leading the student movement in the 1960s
By Gan Pei Ling
STUDENT activism in Universiti Malaya thrived in the 1960 and early 1970s. One of the key student leaders was Syed Hamid Ali who was University of Malaya Students’ Union (Umsu) general-secretary from 1967 to 1969, before he was elected president for the 1969 to 1970 term. Syed Hamid’s activism inadvertently began because he couldn’t be […]
The long wait to be Malaysian: The foreign spouse experience
By Deborah Loh
BINA Ramanand and Asha Lim are just two among what is believed to be many more with a predicament because they live in Malaysia. They are foreign spouses married to Malaysians who have waited years and in some cases, decades, for their permanent residency (PR) applications to be approved. As of June 2010, the Home […]
Violence against Penan: How the government ignores indigenous rights
By Ding Jo-Ann
THE phenomenon of indigenous women like the Penan being violated is not peculiar to Malaysia. Indeed, there are parallels in other countries, including a developed nation like the US. In their 2007 report, Maze of Injustice: The failure to protect indigenous women from sexual violence in the USA, Amnesty International (AI) reported that indigenous women […]
“Is Chinese penis really that good?”
By Shanon Shah
IN part two of stories about those who have encountered the religious police, freelance writer Nabila Nasir, 25, recounts the harassment and extortion she and a now ex-boyfriend experienced at the hands of moral guardians in mid-2007.
Malaysia, the model Muslim country
By Shanon ShahMalaysia? BACK when he was deputy prime minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak pledged that Malaysia would become “a role model to the Islamic world”. He said this in the middle of the 2009 Kuala Terengganu by-election, which Najib’s Barisan Nasional (BN) eventually lost to Pakatan Rakyat (PR). Najib’s pledge was poetic, since a “role model” […]
BN’s whipping quandary
By Ding Jo-AnnDigging…and digging…and digging THE big hole our government found themselves in after Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno was sentenced to caning for drinking alcohol has just gotten bigger. Stuck between pleasing those who thought moral offenders deserved caning and outraged human rights groups as well as the international community, the government decided to cane three other […]
