Perkasa slams Marina Mahathir for supporting Christians

Malay rights group Perkasa has hit out at Datin Paduka Marina Mahathir for showing solidarity with Christians currently caught in a storm of controversy over the use of the word Allah.

Youth chief Irwan Fahmi Ideris said Marina, who is the daughter of Malaysia’s longest serving prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, should be with them to defend Muslims’ rights to use the word and not show support for the church.



“As a Muslim, she should be with us to defend the word Allah so that it is not used by the Christians,” he said in a statement today.

Bearing a bouquet of flowers, Marina had turned up with a group of people at the Our Lady of Lourdes Church in Klang yesterday morning as Catholics turned up for Sunday mass.

After the service ended, she handed the flowers to parish priest, Reverend Father Michael Chua, with worshippers cheering and applauding the act.

Fahmi Ideris also questioned Marina whether she agreed with the use of the word Allah by Christians.

“As a Muslim and daughter of a former prime minister who had championed Islam and defended the Malays, her actions had resulted in numerous questions among Malaysians, especially the Muslims.

“Where is her faith and did she agree that the word Allah can be used by non-Muslims? We strongly condemn her actions,” he said.

He further criticised the social activist, saying that she supported beliefs that are un-Islamic, such as fighting for the rights of lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders (LGBT) and being closely associated with Islamic group Sisters in Islam, a non-governmental organisation that advocates equal rights for women, human rights and justice.

“What is her motive to be with other individuals to show solidarity with Christians at a church in Klang yesterday?” he asked.

Fahmi also slammed Marina and asked if she was looking for “cheap publicity”.

“Does she want to create another controversy or is she deliberately looking for cheap publicity and at the same time, coming up with a statement to criticise Jais’s conduct?” he asked, referring to the Malay acronym for the Selangor Islamic Religious Department.

On Thursday, a coalition of Malay-Muslim groups had said that they would gather at the church to deliver a memorandum protesting against the Christians' insistence on using the word Allah.

The Klang Muslims Solidarity Secretariat was the first to name the church where the planned protest would take place.

Its president, Mohd Khairi Hussin, had said that ties between Muslims and Christians had been cordial before the church insisted on using the Arabic word Allah in its worship.

Last Thursday’s seizure of some 300 copies of the Bible by Jais in Bahasa Malaysia and Iban language further strained worsening ties between Muslims and Christians over the usage of the Arabic word Allah which translates as God.

Although global Islamic scholars have clarified that the term can be used by anyone, state Islamic authorities in Malaysia have reacted negatively to reports of churches using the word Allah in its Malay language sermons.

The tussle over the word Allah arose in 2008 when the Herald was barred by the Home Ministry from using the Arabic word. The Catholic church had contested this in court and won a High Court decision in 2009 upholding its constitutional right to do so.

Putrajaya later appealed the decision and successfully overturned the earlier decision when the Court of Appeal ruled last October that "Allah was not integral to the Christian faith".

Christians make up about 9% of the Malaysian population, or 2.6 million. Almost two-thirds of them are Bumiputera and are largely based in Sabah and Sarawak, where they routinely use Bahasa Malaysia and indigenous languages in their religious practices, including describing God as Allah in their prayers and holy book.

Besides the Bumiputera Christians from East Malaysia, some of whom have moved to the peninsula to live and work, Orang Asli Christians in the peninsula also typically use Bahasa Malaysia in their worship. - TMI