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It is not good enough to say, in declining jurisdiction, that allowing a Muslim to come out of Islam would "create chaos and confusion" or would "threaten public order". Those are not acceptable reasons. The civil courts have the jurisdiction to interpret New Straits Times (Malaysia) April 27, 2008 the Constitution and protect the fundamental liberties, including the right to freedom of religion under Article 11. Let's have certainty in this law That jurisdiction cannot be taken away by inference or implication, as seems to be the argument, but by an express enactment Raja Aziz Addruse (Former President of Bar Council and National Human Rights Council (Hakam)) which says that it is the intention of parliament to deprive the courts of their jurisdiction. The Kamariah case also highlights other aspects of our justice system. When she was convicted of apostasy, the syariah court judge had deferred her sentencing to KAMARIAH Ali, one of the followers of the Sky Kingdom sect led by Ayah Pin, was convicted of apostasy by the Terengganu March 3 to give her a chance to show that she had repented. In sentencing her to prison for two years, the judge said that he was Syariah Court on Feb 17, 2008. Her long and futile legal struggle highlights the need to seriously address the constitutional not convinced that she had repented because she had failed to respond when he greeted her with Assalamualaikum at the start of issue of the right of Muslims to freedom of religion. the court proceedings. The picture of a lonely woman who has been ostracised from society, being continually harassed to repent, offends our sense of justice and fair play. No one should be subjected to such humiliation and shame, particularly by a Kamariah had years earlier been convicted of deviant practices in the syariah court and sentenced to 20 months' jail. Her appeal court of law, even a syariah court. The sentence passed by the syariah court took into account public interest and the sentiments against the conviction was dismissed but her sentence was suspended on condition that she appear before the Kadi's Court every of Muslims in the country. Those are factors which, to lawyers practising civil law, are too nebulous to use as principles for month for three years to declare her repentance When she breached the condition, a new charge was brought against her. On sentencing.. Kamariah had served a two-year jail sentence in 1992, also for apostasy. Nov 5, 2000, when her case was called up, she declared in open court that she had apostatised since August 1998, arguing that she was not subject to the jurisdiction of the syariah court. Despite having apostatised, she was found guilty of the new charge No doubt the Federal Court will one day have to rule if a person like Kamariah can be charged again and again for the same, or on Nov 19, 2000 and sentenced to three years' jail. A further charge was brought against her for apostasy, arising from the virtually the same, offence. declaration she had made on Nov 5, 2000. She made two applications to the civil courts, to seek her release by a writ of habeas corpus on the ground that her conviction and sentence of imprisonment were illegal; and, to ask for a declaration that she had a right to profess and practise the religion The Business Times (Singapore) July 2, 2013 Tuesday of her choice and, therefore, to renounce Islam. The Kota Baru High Court dismissed both applications and her appeal to the Non-Muslims call Malaysian religious bill unconstitutional Court of Appeal was also unsuccessful. But on Nov 5, 2002, she was granted leave to appeal to the Federal Court to determine specific issues, including whether the A CONTROVERSIAL bill that will allow a single parent or guardian to determine the religion of a minor is stoking protests right to profess a religion under Article 11(1) of the Federal Constitution includes the right of an adult Muslim to renounce his from non-Muslim and legal groups who view it as discriminatory and unconstitutional. The bill, an amendment to the Federal religion; and whether a law imposing any restriction upon the right of such a person to renounce his religion is inconsistent with Territories Islamic law on child conversion, is in its first reading now and has outraged non-Muslim lawmakers, who Article 11(1) of the Constitution and is, therefore, void. In a joint judgment delivered on July 21, 2004, four of the five judges complained that they had been blindsided by the bill and not been consulted. of the Federal Court who had heard the appeal (the fifth having in the meantime retired), dismissed it. The court held that although she had apostatised in 1998, Kamariah was still liable for any offence she had committed while she was still a Muslim. Indeed, the chorus of indignation has been loud. Almost all the non-Malay component parties of the Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition have protested the proposal with most saying they would not vote for it. One party, Gerakan, has even threatened to go The court said if Muslims charged for syariah offences were allowed to say that they were no longer Muslims to escape the to court. The Inter-Faith Council comprising the Hindu, Christian, Buddhist and Sikh faiths unanimously opposed the motion jurisdiction of the syariah court, the whole administration of Islamic law (and possibly other religions as well) would be while the Bar Council has denounced it as unconstitutional. The issue is controversial because mixed marriages are quite affected. In the court's view, the issues posed by the questions were not relevant and were academic. Kamariah, it said, should commonplace in multiracial Malaysia. In April, a Hindu woman in southern Negeri Sembilan state cried foul when she raise the issue of her right to freedom of religion at her trial on the apostasy charge. Since she faced prosecution for apostasy in discovered that her estranged husband had converted their two underage children to Islam without her knowledge or consent. the syariah court, it was difficult to explain how the question of Kamariah's right to renounce Islam could be dismissed as irrelevant or academic. What had been expected to be a landmark decision from the highest court of the country turned out to be It is also a sensitive issue in Malaysia, where the clause "freedom of religion", which is enshrined in the Federal Constitution, is a great disappointment. - to the minds of many Muslims in Malaysia - not considered applicable to Muslims. According to lawyer Faiz Abdullah, Islam in Malaysia "is a one-way street". Indeed, in 2007 the Federal Court implied that in a landmark case. Lina Joy, a Muslim All the efforts put in by Kamariah's lawyers and over eight months of waiting for the judgment proved a waste of time. The woman who had converted to Christianity in the late 1990s, had appealed against a dismissal of her suit against the government Federal Court had showed itself to be unequal to the task of discharging its most important constitutional function. Kamariah's that it should recognise her new religion by changing her identity card to reflect her Christian faith. The Federal Court - in a 2-1 lawyers had been careful to make sure the questions which the court had to consider and answer were couched in precise terms. decision - demurred, ruling that "a person who wanted to renounce his/her religion must do so according to existing laws or But it was not any ambiguity that was the problem: it was just that the court was avoiding the issue. One gets the distinct practices of the particular religion. Only after the person has complied with the requirements and the authorities are satisfied impression that the civil courts have been too quick to decline jurisdiction whenever the issue of Article 11 has cropped up. In that the person has apostatised, can she embrace Christianity . In other words, a person cannot, at one's whims and fancies, the Lina Joy case, the High Court referred to various provisions of the Constitution which it said were relevant to the reading of renounce or embrace a religion." The authorities had not changed her faith on her identity card as she did not have the necessary Article 11. But looking at those provisions closely, none of them appears to have any bearing on the issue. approvals from the Syariah Court. The view, for example, that a Malay, by virtue of the definition of the term "Malay" in Article 160(2), cannot renounce Islam as The proposed amendment is surprising as most people had considered the matter settled. After protests in the wake of a couple his or her religion but remains in the Islamic faith until his or her dying days, is contrived. The definition of "Malay" in Article of forced conversions four years ago, the government seemed to have made its stand clear. In 2009, the then minister in the 160(2) is nothing more than just that: it is intended for the specific purpose of identifying the "Malays" referred to in a number Prime Minister's Department, Nazri Aziz, had said the government would ban the unilateral conversion of minors to Islam, in an of provisions of the Constitution. A "Malay" as defined does not even have to be ethnically a Malay. The late Tan Sri Mubin attempt to assuage concerns among Malaysia's religious minorities. Sheppard, an Englishman, who professed the religion of Islam, habitually spoke the Malay language and conformed to Malay custom, was a Malay for the purpose of the definition.

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