Jan 11, 2009
KUALA LUMPUR: The Home Ministry has denied HERALD permission to print the Bahasa Malaysia segment in its pages until the case on the use of the word “ALLAH” is resolved by the High Court. This was conveyed by a letter faxed to the office of HERALD on the eve of the expiry of the 2008 permit and that too after 6.00pm on Dec 30, 2008.
HERALD is the only Catholic weekly in Malaysia which carries Catholic news to the nations near 900,000 Catholics. Some 600,000 Catholics are bumiputera from Sabah and Sarawak. Today travel is made easy and a good number of them have migrated to West Malaysia for various reasons. They communicate mainly in Bahasa Malaysia — the Nationa lLanguage.
And how will they know what is happening in the Church or even know more about the teachings of the Church on current affairs if they are not able to pick up the information in the language they know — Bahasa Malaysia?
The restriction put in the way of faith development of the Catholics by barring the use of the Bahasa Malaysia in the Catholic Church’s Weekly is a violation of the citizens right and is unconstitutional.
The Publisher of the weekly, Archbishop Murphy Pakiam, on behalf of the Bishops of Malaysia, notified the Home Ministry, through a letter on Jan 2, 2009, that the restriction is in “clear contravention of the spirit and intent of the National Language Act 1967.”
He also said that in connecting the judicial review of the prohibition of the use of the word “Allah” which is being heard in the High Court with the National Language in the HERALD is “grossly unreasonable, irrational and illegal.”
Therefore, he asks the Ministry to reconsider their decision and revoke the conditions cited in their letter of Dec 30, 2008.
He warned that the Church “shall be constrained to seek legal redress in the courts” in the absence of any response.
The Malaysian Insider, a news portal, reported that the Church took the ministry to court last April challenging the government order that it cannot use the word “Allah” to mean God outside the religion of Islam.
The case is ongoing.
At the time of going to the press, we have not had any response from the Ministry with regards to the letter we sent asking the Ministry to withdraw its restriction. Thus we may not have a Bahasa Malaysia section in this issue.