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The Malaysian Insider (June 3rd) reports that Nik Zawawi (above) a leader from the ulama wing of the Islamic Party of Malaysia (PAS) said that newly converted Chinese Christians are to be blamed for the anti-hudud movement in society which is preventing PAS from implementing its Islamist agenda. (see full report below).
Chinese + Christian – what better way to appeal to both racists and extremists in Malaysia. Nik Zawawi needs to find a convenient scapegoat for the deep unpopularity of the party’s Islamic agenda and their failure to make much headway in multicultural Malaysia so he resurrects the twin bogeys of Chinese and Christians and merges them into a single super-bogeyman.
The truth is that the party’s Islamic agenda is opposed by a wide cross-section of Malaysians who strongly believe that Islamic law has no place in a multicultural, secular democracy like Malaysia. Malaysians of all ethnic stripes including Malays have spoken out as have Malaysians of all religious backgrounds including Muslims.
One of the staunchest opponents of hudud was the late Karpal Singh, a Sikh. Former cabinet minister Dato’ Zaid Ibrahim, former ambassador Datuk Noor Farida Ariffin and the group of 25 retired senior civil servants, and Marina Mahathir are all on record opposing hudud; they are all Malay Muslims. Marina, a social activists, went so far as to say recently that she cannot contemplate living in a Malaysia governed by hudud.
In addition, the Malaysian Chinese Association, the Malaysian Indian Congress and Gerakan Rakyaat – all members of the ruling Barisan National government – together with the opposition multiracial Democratic Action Party oppose hudud.
And let me go on record again to state that I am a Christian (though not a Chinese) and I too oppose the implementation of hudud in Malaysia. I will not argue its merits but simply say that it has no place in a secular multicultural democracy like Malaysia.
Christians in Malaysia have seen their churches attacked, their bibles confiscated, their leaders arrested. They have been accused of being anti-national and seditious. As I wrote in an earlier article, after more than 400 years in Malaysia, suddenly the crosses on our churches are too high, our bibles are too seditious, our building are too big, our worship too loud, our lights too bright. This is what the Islamic agenda means for us. Why on earth wouldn’t we oppose it? What reason would we have to trust those who would usher in yet more discrimination, yet more intolerance, and a system that would further marginalize us and deprive us of our constitutional freedoms?
PAS’ Islamic agenda is bad for Malaysia and a wide range of Malaysians irrespective of their ethnic background or religious affiliation are rightly united in opposing it.
PAS leader blames Chinese Christians for anti-hudud move
Newly converted Chinese Christians are to be blamed for the anti-hudud movement in society which is preventing PAS from implementing its Islamist agenda, said a leader from the party’s ulama wing.
Nik Zawawi Salleh, who is the wing’s deputy, said that a wave of Christian conversions among the Chinese increased opposition to the party’s Kelantan Shariah Criminal Code.
This opposition towards hudud, said Nik Zawawi, is not just from those in the DAP, but also from Chinese Christian leaders in Barisan Nasional component parties, MCA and Gerakan.
Nik Zawawi said, unlike Buddhism, Christianity is a missionary faith and had a history of conflict with Islam. But Buddhism did not.
“This wave has been going on for the past 10 years,” said Nik Zawawi in his winding up speech during the ulama wing’s assembly in Gombak today.
“In the past, Buddhists have not opposed our aim of implementing Shariah law in Kelantan,” Nik Zawawi said.
But he claimed that this changed in the past 10 years as more Chinese leaders in DAP, MCA and Gerakan started converting to Christianity.
“When they become Christians, they are worried about Islamic principles being implemented in Malaysia. So they attack us so that Islamic principles cannot be implemented in Malaysia.
“They are different from Buddhists who have not attacked us,” said Nik Zawawi.
He added that the party’s syura council, a committee of its most senior scholars, is due to meet and decide over how the party is supposed to deal with this phenomenon.
PAS faces stiff opposition from its Pakatan Rakyat partners DAP and PKR, and all non-Muslim parties in the BN to its aim of enforcing the Kelantan Shariah Criminal code.
Civil society groups such as the Bar Council and the G25 have also opposed the code and PAS’s efforts to amend federal laws to allow Kelantan to enforce it.
These parties have opposed hudud ever since the Kelantan PAS government passed the enactment in 1993.
Umno, the country’s largest party of Muslims, had also opposed the Kelantan enactment when former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamed was in charge. – June 3, 2015.
Dennis Ignatius 
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