All quiet outside courthouse as church makes final bid to use ‘Allah'

The Federal Court in Putrajaya, where the Catholic Church is making a final attempt to allow them to appeal the ban on a Christian weekly's use of the word 'Allah'. – Reuters file pic, January 21, 2015.

It is all quiet with no signs of protestors outside the Palace of Justice in Putrajaya as the Federal Court prepares to hear the Catholic Church's review application against a decision denying leave to appeal the ban on the use of the word "Allah" in the Herald weekly.

In the past, thousands of supporters of groups such as ‎Perkasa and Ikatan Muslimin Malaysia (Isma) had turned up at the courthouse to lend support to the government's challenge against the Herald using the word in its Bahasa Malaysia content.

There were also no large groups of Catholic church supporters in past hearings.

Church lawyers will today try to convince the bench that there was injustice and abuse of court process when it was denied leave to appeal against the ban on the word Allah by the Court of Appeal.

In June, ‎four of the seven-member bench dismissed the church's application for appeal, citing that the Court of Appeal was right in its decision to ban the word in the Herald.

Chief Justice Tun Arifin Zakaria, president of Court of Appeal Tan Sri Md Raus Sharif, Chief Judge of Malaya Tan Sri Zulkefli Ahmad Makinuddin and Federal Court judge Tan Sri Suriyadi Halim Omar were in the majority.

Three other judges – Chief Judge of Sabah and Sarawak Tan Sri Richard Malanjum, and Federal Court judges Datuk Zainun Ali and Tan Sri Jeffrey Tan Kok Hwa – held that leave must be granted to the church.

Lawyer Annou Xavier (pic, right), who is part of the church's legal team said today that ‎the three dissenting judges had looked into the core issues of the appeal and questions of leave to appeal to the Federal Court.

He said the issues fell squarely within the threshold of Section 96 of the Courts of Judicature Act which sets out the conditions of appeal.

‎"We lost by the skin of our teeth, it was a 4-3 majority, not a 6-1 or 5-2," Annou told The Malaysian Insider.

He noted that one of the core issues was the lack of a clear decision on Article 11 of the Federal Constitution on the freedom of religion, and as such expressed hope that the new bench this round would act without fear of third parties.

"This is a fitting case for judges to exercise its power to review the leave that was not offered because it hinges on constitutional issues that goes to the root of the nation," he said.

‎The five-man bench today comprises Tan Sri Abdull Hamid Embong, Tan Sri Ahmad Maarop, Tan Sri Hasan Lah, Datuk Ramly Ali and Datuk Azahar Mohamed, all of whom are Federal Court judges.

It was earlier believed that the Chief Justice would co-opt one or two judges from the Court of Appeal to sit on the bench to hear the review today.

- TMI