KUANTAN, Nov 18 — Only non-Muslim houses of worship are exempted from the Pahang government’s directive to include jawi script on signboards, said state Local Government and Housing Committee chairman Datuk Abd Rahim Muda.

He said the directive to use jawi script on business premises and advertisement signboards, as well as road signs beginning Jan 1 this year, was subjected to all premises, including those that belong to non-governmental organisations and Chinese associations.

"We want to clarify that jawi script does not symbolises Islam, but it is part of Malay and Arab culture. In fact, agreements between the past government and the British were written in jawi.

"Supposedly there should not be any confusion regarding the jawi issue at this level, because everything had been informed together with the terms and font size,” he said when replying to a question from Lee Chin Chen (PH-Bilut) at the State Legislative Assembly at Wisma Sri Pahang here today.

As of Sept 30, he said a total of 198 compound fines had been issued by local authorities to the owners of business premises who failed to comply with the directive. — Bernama