PETALING JAYA, April 20 — The protest to demand the removal of a cross outside a Taman Medan church would have escalated if police and Umno members did not intervene, Datuk Abdullah Abu Bakar said today.

The Taman Lindungan Jaya Umno branch chief and elder brother to the Inspector-General of Police said the residents had reached out to him because of his seniority and because he has lived in the area since 1976.

“We met with the Muslim residents on the 18th (of April) and some of them have extreme ideas over what to do over the issue but we managed to stop them,” he told reporters after meeting the PJ mayor to inquire regarding the church’s permit to operate.

He was accompanied by Munaliza Hamzah, 52, Harun Ismail, 58 and Datuk Mad Shah Abu Anas, 54 — all Umno members and residents of the area who helped mediate the issue.

They stressed, however, that they were not representing the party in this matter.

Yesterday, about 50 Taman Medan residents staged a protest against a new church in the area for putting up a cross, a religious symbol for Christians, on its façade.

The Muslim group claimed that putting up a cross in a Malay-majority area is a challenge to Islam and could influence young Muslims.

Abdullah, who is also the chairman at a security firm, was present along with Munaliza, Harun and Mad Shah at the protest to speak to a church representative to communicate the protesters’ grouses.

Today, he expressed gratitude to the church’s representative, Madam Victoria whom he had met during the protest as she had acted swiftly in removing the cross.

“We proposed that due to the sensitivity of issue, we proposed that the cross be taken down.

“Without condition, she agreed. She told us they will take it down by today but she managed to do so within 2 hours [yesterday],” he said.

He said there is no more issue at the moment and although the mayor told them that the church does not have a permit to operate, he said he will leave it to the authorities to take further action.

Abdullah said they are not against religious freedom as there have been temples in the area for more than 20 years without issues.

But he claimed that there is a history of Muslim-Christian friction over residents’ fear of proselytisation by the latter religion.

Harun said they were “lucky” that they did not wait longer to meet with the church, claiming “there may be more than 1,000 protesters” by next week.

“If we didn’t intervene, we don’t know what is going to happen,” he said.

Munaliza chimed in and said if the church had not removed the cross, they would have done it themselves.

“Sister Victoria understands our sensitivity. We know our country has religious freedom but there are rules we have to follow,” she said.

Abdullah said his brother, IGP Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar, had also called him today to get his side of the story after several reports mistakenly identified him as the leader of the protest.