Fix places of worship guidelines in your states first, BN leaders told

Selangor state assembly speaker Hannah Yeoh pointed out that contentious clauses on the distance and height limitations in Selangor's manual guideline and planning standard restricting non-Muslim places of worship are not exclusively found in the state.

The DAP Subang Jaya assemblyperson said the Federal Department of Town and Country Planning Peninsular Malaysia under the Ministry of Urban Wellbeing, Housing and Local Government had issued a draft guideline containing the same clauses for temples, churches and gurdwaras in 2010.

She added that the draft guideline has since been adopted by Pahang, Terengganu and Perlis.

Citing the guidelines, Yeoh said with regard to the distance limitation, a non-Muslim place of worship can only be built at least 100 metres away in areas with a multiracial make-up and must require the consent of the local residents' committee.

As for areas where the majority of residents are Muslims, the height of a statue or the building of a non-Muslim place of worship must be adapted to the height of surrounding mosques.

“We have done a comparison study between a few states in Malaysia and the same clauses have been in existence and implemented in Johor, Negeri Sembilan and Kedah,” said Yeoh in a statement.

In Johor, for example, a separating zone of at least 50 metres is needed between a non-Muslim place of worship and homes owned by Muslims.

BN leaders, said Yeoh, had used this issue to attack Selangor DAP while “ignoring the elephant in the room”.

Training her guns on MCA deputy president Wee Ka Siong, the DAP representative said as lawmaker for Ayer Hitam in the state of Johor, Wee should have done his homework by checking the guidelines in Johor.

“Or, was there a deliberate intention to mislead the public?

“I strongly urge BN politicians to fix the said guidelines in their respective states instead of wasting time in futile politicking,” she added.

Wee had called for the entire Selangor DAP leadership to quit over their failure to protect the interest of non-Muslims in the issue, Berita Daily had reported.

Among recommendations contained in the Selangor manual guideline and planning standard is that non-Muslim places of worship should not be built within 50 metres of a home owned by Muslims and that planned new non-Muslim places of worship in areas with a multiracial make-up would require the consent of residents within a 200-metre radius.

Senior Selangor state executive councillor Teng Chang Khim has since apologised and offered to resign over the uproar.

Teng yesterday explained that he had detected the error before and ordered the related officers to amend it.

"The report I received later said it was amended. Based on the report, I didn't double-check. I had believed that the requested amendment on non-Muslim places of worship had been reviewed,” he had said.- Mkini