Racial, religious tensions spiked after GE14, ‘Allah’ verdict, says group

 

The anti-ICERD protest in 2018 was one of the events that illustrated racial and religious intolerance among Malaysians, according to Initiative to Promote Tolerance and Prevent Violence.

PETALING JAYA: A spike in racial and religious tensions occurs almost immediately after a pivotal event that has some bearing on either race, religion, or both.

The Initiative to Promote Tolerance and Prevent Violence (Initiate My) revealed today that two such major events were the 14th general election (GE14) in May 2018 and the Kuala Lumpur High Court’s verdict on the usage of the word “Allah” in 2009.

A database established by Initiate My to document racial and religious conflicts in the country shows the correlation between such events and a rise in tensions.

The findings of the group were released at the “Importance of Datafication in Promoting Religious Freedom and Tolerance” webinar today.

According to Aizat Shamsuddin, Initiate My founder and director, GE14 and the High Court verdict in 2009 created spillover effects, where “one event could trigger another event to emerge or escalate”.

After GE14, which saw Barisan Nasional losing their hold on the government for the first time and the then opposition Pakatan Harapan coming to power, Initiate My recorded nine conflicts and incidents that illustrated racial and religious intolerance among Malaysians. These events took place in 2018 and 2019.

They included various protests against the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD), the ratification of the Rome Statute, the use of Khat calligraphy, the Buy Muslim First campaign, and the riots near the Seafield Mariamman temple in Subang.

Initiate My also recorded 10 incidents of vandalism that targeted churches across the country in 2010 after the High Court allowed the use of “Allah” in Bahasa Malaysia publications for Christians in December 2009. Nine of these incidents took place in the peninsula.

The group also presented its findings on instances of gazetted fatwas and enforcement of state shariah enactments throughout the country that targeted religious and sexual minorities.

They are as follows:

• 89 state provisions and gazetted fatwas on anti-blasphemy;
• 87 state provisions and gazetted fatwas on anti-apostasy;
• 128 state provisions and gazetted fatwas that persecute sexual minorities; and
• 135 state provisions and gazetted fatwas that target critical thinking and culture. -FMT