KUALA LUMPUR, July 16 — The government should eject the Vatican’s first envoy to Malaysia over his remarks on the use of the word “Allah” by local Christians, Sabah MP Datuk Bung Mokhtar Radin said today.
The Barisan Nasional (BN) lawmaker lashed out at Archbishop Joseph Marino (right) for allegedly interfering in this issue, saying that the Vatican envoy should note that Malaysia is a sovereign country.
“And I ask the government take firm action, usir (eject) him from the country because we don’t need him here.
“Dia memecah-belahkan perpaduan, agama, bangsa kita (He is breaking up our unity, religion, nation),” the Kinabatangan MP said in the Dewan Rakyat when debating a Bill.
Bung Mokhtar’s remarks came as far-right Muslim groups here demanded Marino retract his statements or risk expulsion from Malaysia.
Last week, Minister in charge of Islamic affairs Datuk Seri Jamil Khir Baharom slammed the Vatican envoy over the issue, accusing him of causing anxiety among the public and threatening the unity among Malaysians.
On Sunday, Foreign Minister Datuk Seri Anifah Aman issued a strongly-worded statement over the alleged meddling into the “Allah” controversy, which he deemed to be Malaysia’s internal affairs.
In his first media interview here last Thursday, Marino, the Vatican’s first envoy to Malaysia, observed that the “Allah” storm that has been raging here for the past five years was unique to this Southeast Asian nation due to the widespread use of the Malay language, the lingua franca of Malaysia’s Bumiputera Christians.
He indicated that the local churches have presented a “logical and acceptable” argument to counter the allegations by some hardline Muslims here that “Allah”, a word of Middle Eastern origin, was exclusive to Islam.
“But the document that they produce seems to be very well-presented in terms of explaining why Christians use this word,” the Apostolic Nuncio said, referring to the Christian Federation of Malaysia’s (CFM) fact sheet on the “Allah” released a couple of months ago.
But Marino carefully pointed out that the ongoing appeal by the Home Ministry to reverse a 2009 High Court judgment in favour of the Catholic Church was an “internal matter” when asked to comment further on the dispute.
He was asked to comment on the lawsuit after Malaysia’s Catholic Church filed an application last Monday to strike out the Home Ministry’s appeal.
The High Court had stirred waves when it ruled in 2009 that the “Allah” word was not the exclusive right of Muslims, and the Catholic Church’s newspaper, Herald, could publish it in its Bahasa Malaysia section, which caters to its Bumiputera congregation.
The “Allah” row erupted in 2008 when the Home Ministry threatened to revoke the Herald’s newspaper permit, prompting the Catholic Church to sue the government for violating its constitutional rights.
Muslims are the country’s dominant religious group and represent over 60 per cent of Malaysia’s population of 28 million, while Christians make up less than a tenth of the number.
A 2010 census puts Christians as Malaysia’s third-largest religious group at 2.6 million people, with slightly over one million of them being Catholics.
About 64 per cent of the Christians here are Bumiputera and Malay-speaking.
