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Non-Muslim Places of Worship In This Land Of Religious Freedom

When Shah Alam was planned as Selangor's capital, in the 1970s, the master plan had marked off places of worshipareas for non-Muslim residents. The non-Muslims accepted that they would not have as many as they would have liked, and accepted the reality of half-a-loaf is better than no bread. Shah Alam is now a reality, but the state government, still controlled, the last time I checked, by the National Front, has decided that since Shah Alam is a Malay city, there should not be places of worship for the non-Malays. Since all Malays are, by constitutional definition in Malaysia, Muslim, it in effect does not accept the existence of any religion but Islam. This is not unusual. The National Front's public posture of religious freedom is marked by an illiberality in practice. Even the non-Malay members of the coalition dare not rise up to question it.

The Shah Alam Catholics had attempted to build a church on the land they were allotted. But permission had been difficult to come by. And when that did come, with plans approved and work begun, the state executive council decided to first reduce its height and then ordered it to stop work. More than RM1.5 million had been spent on its foundations by then. Pleas fell on deaf ears. The government just ignored the request for a review. And four months ago, in December 2000, it was ordered to stop work. It is not given an alternate site so far from where the parishoners are that it appears to be a way of evading the intentions of the town planners which they had accepted.

The churches and temples are reluctant to fight for their rights, and this helps the overzealous bureaucrat to ride rough shod over them. But the Catholic archbishop of Kuala Lumpur has now decided that enough is enough, and filed a petition for judicial review in the Shah Alam High Court over this standoff. The issue should be a denial of constitutional rights although there is no indication yet if this is pleaded. That it has now become legal would speed matters up. The state government would not want to defend its policies in open court. The chances are that it would look for a graceful way out. Parti Rakyat Malaysia had applied for a licence for its party organ, and when after years of no response, it took the home ministry to court. The licence was promptly issued. But should organisations have to fight their way through the courts what should be theirs constitutionally?

In Trengganu, the National Front administration rejected, consistently and for 20 years, a now-retired civil servant's application to build a Catholic church in Kuala Trengganu. A convent there had wanted a multipurpose hall for years, but had been automatically rejected. Now that PAS is in power there, the convent has its multipurpose hall, and the retired civil servant the permission to build his church. In neighbouring Kelantan, similar stories abound: the Hindus in South Kelantan had applied for permission to build a temple in Gua Musang; the PAS state administration had approved it in 1978, but the National Front forced it out that year, but would not allow the temple to be built; when PAS returned to power in 1990, it promptly approved it, telling the committee it had done so in 1978. The mentri besar, Dato' Nik Aziz Nik Mat, has asked priests of churches and temples, Buddhist and Hindu, to spruce up their places of worship, even offering financial help when the cost is too much to bear.

Unfortunately, the confrontations more than the religious freedom is what we should expect in the coming years. The Malay is so politically and culturally divided that it is easy for a demogogue -- from both sides of the cultural and political fence -- to force UMNO and PAS to react in horror. The Trengganu PAS government's ban on alcohol drinking in public is yet another indication that its open religious approaches to non-Islamic religions is challenged. But could the state government really prevent Chinese wedding parties, which is always in public, be forbiddin to serve drinks? What has brought the confrontation to this level is the refusal of the non-Malay to stand and fight for his rights. The non-Malay partners in the National Front for their own reasons would rather not fight for their communities' rights. And with a more vibrant non-Malay community, insistent on given what is their due, the Malay leaders, having to fight from two fronts, would give up the ghost and preach a communal line.

M.G.G. Pillai
pillai@mgg.pc.my