MGG Pillai Commentary View

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Why is Pak Lah het up at the US list on religious freedom?

IS THERE RELIGIOUS FREEDOM in Malaysia? Yes. There is no doubt about it. But as in all societies - including the US: try building a mosque or a Hindu temple in the middle of a Christian community; or wear a Muslim headscarf to school in France or at work in a supermarket in Denmark - it is not absolute. It cannot be. The United States, like Malaysia, is fond of lists. They create one for every conceivable occasion and statistic. It is a powerful weapon to browbeat those it believes it can, and use these lists on various issues to shame the governments to believe they are unfit to be in the globalised world of nations it dominates. These lists are at best of doubful truth. The US, in these lists, would be among the top. But we saw what happened to Muslims there after 11 September 2001. The Guantanamo detention camp was for Muslims from the uncivilised world. If the Muslims were from Britain or Australia or other "civilised" nations, different rules apply. But if you from the "uncivilised" Muslim world, like Pakistan, Indonesia, the Middle East, and elsewhere, death is too good for them. Washington is critical of Malaysia's execrable detention laws, but keeps its silence when it enacts tougher laws to punish the Muslims for their temerity to challenge Christian civilisation in this, in President George W. Bush's memorable phrase, crusade.

The US government report on religious freedom consigns Malaysia amongst nine countries - the others are Belarus, Eritrea, Moldova, Turkey, Brunei, Indonesia, Israel, Russia - with laws that favour a particular religion and sidelines others. The allegations are in the International Religious Freedom Report 2003, the fifth in a series by the US Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labour. It is to warn these and other countries to behave if they want to be accepted as civilised - difficult for a Muslim country to be, but try and it might strike gold - and worthy of Washington's embrace or to damn countries it wants to make an example of. If, on the other hand, you have lots of oil and allow US corporations to rape it, these strictures can be ignored. Local traditions and customs are ignored, the lists do not lie, and if you object, it is you that is at fault. The Western dominated news organisations are quick to damn you for being in the list. Nothing would come out of it if you protest. For you would lose the slanging match.

So why is Pak Lah so tetchy at its findings, and why did he promptly deny it. The report accuses Malaysia of favouring Islam. Was there any doubt since independence that Malaysia is a Muslim country? Islam is the official religion. What has changed is that from an official religion, Islam is now a political football, kicked about by UMNO and PAS, so that in the heat of the moment, the non-Muslim religions get caught in between. This happens in India, where Hindusim prevails but allows considerable leeway to the other religions, in Bangladesh and Pakistan, where Islam prevails. In Bangladesh and Pakistan, the non-Muslim religions are all but scrubbed out. But not in Malaysia or Indonesia, where Islam coexists with the other religions. But when Islam is a political issue, its zealots, in UMNO and PAS, make their point by attacking the other religions. It happens in Kelantan and Trengganu under PAS and in Pahang and Selangor under UMNO and the National Front (BN).

So when Pak Lah retorts to "ask the Christians, Buddhist and Hindus who have their churches and temples here ... we are going to celebrate Christmas and Chinese New Year, including organising open hourses for different celebrations in Malaysia", he triviliases it as Washington. It is not the superficial amity of all relgions that Washington is interested in. It is in the small things that can be added to a list to damn a country. And that he cannot defend. When Shah Alam was planned, there was provision for a Catholic church. Over the years, the Selangor state government would not allow it to be build it on politically spurious grounds, that it would sully a Malay town, that there are not enough Roman Catholics to sustain it. The site was not alloted until it was forced to, and given a marshy piece of land. Work started, the foundations laid, but before it could begin, they were told to move.

The land, with its foundations properly and expensively laid, the UMNO-controlled BN state government decided, is too valuable for a church. Another piece of land was given them. I understand, the church was compensated, but that is not the issue. This church got caught in the Islamic debate between PAS and UMNO. There are other examples of other religions which irate the worshippers. But is that proof of religious discrimination? I do not think so. If the Roman Catholic church had stood its ground - it did not even if the parishoners were angry - the government would have retreated. If there was a Malaysian Cardinal Sin, would it have dared? The limits of religious freedom is widened only if fought from within, not because the lack of it appears in a contested list of statistics released in a distant capital. If there is no press freedom in Malaysia, as another list claims, and journalists here accept bribes, the fault lies not in the lists but that few in the trade would stand up to injustice, political machinations, and social skullduggery. These lists, as Pak Lah should know by know, reveals nothing but grounds for a scrap. He does not want one. So why is he so het about it?

M.G.G. Pillai
pillai@streamyx.com