Source: The Malaysian Insider – Another case looms over use of ‘Allah’
I don’t know if contentious issues such as this should transcend religious demarcations/boundaries and evolve into national problems. It’s quite hard deciding if declaring, or even admitting, oneself to be be Malaysian is an embarrassment. This self-censure becomes qualified only when the topic becomes a national concern – if it’s purely religious, then, no citizen has reason to be mortified over the abject lack of consideration and decency demonstrated by his leaders.
Even as an observer, i would say that the government should first find a way out of it’s current identity crisis. Is UMNO a political or a religious body? Or both? Emerging as ultra right wingers and championing the utter, unquestionable surpremacy of the polynesians with a middle eastern conviction is still better than wrangling and not doing anything. A playground fight with a definitive outcome beats a mess of kids screaming, kicking and eating dirt.
Then do the right thing. If ‘sharing’ isn’t a word in their vocabulary, at least draw the lines in the debate. Give your people a benchmark on which judgements can be made. They gave you your mandate, so ‘be a man. Do the right thing!’. And yes, maybe only the chinese would say such things. Anyways, without a basis of determining what’s appropriate, the matter will simply drag on. However, perpetuity doesn’t have that time to bother about petty squabbles.
Very rarely does one get a judicial system more enviable than its southern neighbour, but hopefully Malaysia’s hasn’t devolved to a state where the Bar Council, the main association of legal professionals becomes an open, easy target for attack. The hubris and self-righteousness that seems to be driving the Selangor Islamic Council, isn’t doing any good for national unity, by declaring itself above the judiciary (well, not the actual judiciary per se, but are legal professionals all part of that? :S). Attacking the Bar Council surely, is akin to trying to whack the mother-hive with a really really big stick, no? Hmmm….
Besides, the Bar Council simply had a poll asking their own members, if the use of the word ‘Allah’ by other races was permissible. Pitting two moral pillars of the community, one religious and one legal, isn’t what a nation that aspires to first world status (oh c’mon, we all know) should permit.
Furthemore, the doggedness and tenacity of the religious body in Malaysia undermines their very own authority as people question their grasp on doctrine, reality and their ability to lead the nation. And speaking of the entity of power – a stable nation should have only one. It might be split amongst various factions, but that singular entity of power should still exist as a stable, unifying whole. In this case, neither the voted government nor the local caliphate has stepped forward to properly occupy this seat of power, this vacuum, for better or for worse. Neither has demonstrated the necessary control and confidence.
This waffling is what’s hurting malaysia…
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