KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 23 — PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang was asked to include limits on punishments that the Shariah courts may impose in his private member’s Bill to enhance their powers, said a lawmaker from his party.
Hadi’s Bill in its current form seeks to empower the Shariah courts to mete out any punishment short of the death penalty.
According to Kuala Nerus MP Datuk Khairuddin Aman Razali, this was among the changes that will be in the amended version of the Bill that could be tabled tomorrow.
“Everyone in the meeting agreed that there should be a need to empower the Shariah courts and they agreed that there should be a limitation to the maximum punishments,” he said, referring to the special briefing for Muslim MPs yesterday.
The suggestion now was to raise the maximum sentences that Shariah courts may impose to 30 years’ prison, fines of up to RM100,000 and no more than 100 strokes of the cane.
The current limit for Shariah punishments are a fine of RM5,000, a jail term of three years and six strokes of rotan.
However, Khairuddin added that the enforcement of the specific punishments would be left to the respective states as matters of religion came under their purview.
“It was Jamil Khir that requested for Hadi to make amendments to his Bill so that there is a limitation,” he said, referring to Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Jamil Khir Baharom, who is in charge of Islamic affairs.
Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi yesterday had said that Hadi will table for a second time a tweaked version of his initial proposed amendments to the Shariah Courts (Criminal Jurisdiction) Act 1965 this week in Parliament.
Hadi tabled his private member’s Bill for the first time in the last Parliament meeting seeking to improve the Shariah courts and pave way for hudud implementation in Kelantan.
