DAP touts own presence, Umno absence after Sarawak hudud ban

KUALA LUMPUR, May 16 — The absence of Umno and a strong DAP presence in the Sarawak state assembly are two key reasons behind the state’s rejection of hudud, DAP secretary-general  Lim Guan Eng said today.

Lim said these and Sarawak’s decision to join Penang in openly rejecting the Islamic penal was evidence that the Malay nationalist party’s authority over other Barisan Nasional state administrations was contributory to the continued existence of the hudud controversy.

“There are two key reasons why Sarawak became the first BN state government to declare that hudud will not be implemented in the state: One, there is a strong DAP presence as the largest opposition party with 12 State Assemblymen and secondly there is no Umno in the state.

“Clearly the other BN state governments will not follow the example of Sarawak because either there is no strong DAP presence or they are dominated by Umno,” Lim said in a statement.

Lim, who is also Penang chief minister, said he welcomed Tan Sri Adenan Satem’s decision to bar the implementation of hudud in Sarawak, which the latter announced at the state’s legislative assembly yesterday.

The Sarawak chief minister also said his government will continue to allow Christians there to use “Allah” to describe their god, as they have done for over a century.

The statement came amid continuing tension between Muslims and Christians in peninsular Malaysia over each group’s right to use “Allah”, the Arabic term for god.

Non-Muslims and Muslims are also currently engaged in an ongoing debate about the suitability of hudud laws in a multiracial country like Malaysia.

PAS is aiming to roll out hudud in Kelantan where it has governed for 23 years amid opposition from its allies in Pakatan Rakyat, particularly from the secularist DAP.

Umno, which had previously opposed the enforcement of hudud but not the code itself, was now openly supporting PAS’s hudud agenda.

Putrajaya recently proposed to engage the Islamist party through a joint technical committee to study the implementation of hudud.

PAS later accepted and announced it will delay its bid to table two private members’ bill on hudud pending the committee’s study.

Lim said Umno must bear full responsibility for the joint technical committee as it was announced by Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin.

“Further it was an Umno Minister that proposed on 27 March 2014 in Parliament that PAS move a private member’s bill in Parliament to implement hudud on Muslims in Kelantan and promised the BN government’s and Umno’s full support for PAS,” he added, referring to Minister in charge of Islamic affairs Datuk Seri Jamil Khir Baharom.

Lim today again took aim at BN components MCA and Gerakan for failing to point out Umno’s role in fuelling the hudud controversy as indicative of their “dishonesty” when publicly opposing the implementation of the Islamic penal law.

In 1993, the PAS state government passed the Kelantan Syariah Criminal Code Enactment II, allowing it to impose the strict Islamic penal code in the state. But the laws have not been implemented.

PAS is now looking for parliamentary approval to implement hudud. It plans to put forward two private members’ bills in parliament. One seeks approval for unconventional punishments, some of which are for offences already covered in the Penal code. The the other seeks to empower Shariah courts to mete out the unconventional punishments.