Kuantan High Court to hear Orang Asli challenge over Islam status

 

The High Court in Kuantan will now preside over a legal challenge by 137 Orang Asli from the Bateq Mayah ethnic group to nullify their Islamic status following an alleged unlawful mass conversion 30 years ago.

The High Court in Kuala Lumpur earlier today allowed an application by the 137 plaintiffs to transfer the writ of summons to the civil court in Pahang.

The Orang Asli’s counsel, Fahri Azzat, confirmed with Malaysiakini that the transfer application was allowed, with no objections raised by the other defendants.

The civil action named six defendants, namely the Orang Asli Development Department (Jakoa), its director and officer, the Pahang Islamic Religious and Malay Customs Council (MUIP), the state government, and the federal government.

With the transfer done, the High Court in Kuantan is also set to later hear the various interlocutory applications by the defendants.

Several grounds

Five of the defendants have filed applications to strike out the lawsuit on several grounds, among them that the civil action was filed 29 years after the alleged mass conversion, and thus filed out of time per Section 2 of the Public Authorities Protection Act 1948 and Section 6 of the Limitations Act 1953.

The other defendant, MUIP, had filed an application to dispute the jurisdiction of the civil court to hear the case because the issues raised in the civil action comes under the jurisdiction of the Pahang Syariah Court.

Filed on Sept 28 last year, the lawsuit alleged that the wrongful and illegal conversion was carried out at the Orang Asli’s home at Kampung Benchah Kelubi, Merapoh, Kuala Lipis, Pahang, in April 1993.

The cause papers claimed that 57 of the plaintiffs were converted during the incident and that the remainder of the plaintiffs are children who were born later and also have the word Islam on their identity cards due to their descendency.

The plaintiffs claimed that in early 1993, two village leaders were asked by a Jakoa representative to not only convert to Islam but also get the other villagers to do so.

They alleged that when the villagers refused to do so, an officer from the department visited the village and issued several threats to ensure their conversion.

Legal implications

Among these threats are that the villagers would not be allowed to live in the village anymore, their houses and crops would be destroyed, and the villagers would be chased down and tortured if they ran to the mountains.

The plaintiffs claimed that the villagers were not informed of the legal implications of embracing Islam, namely that they would be subject to Pahang’s Islamic legal framework and that children born to them would automatically be Muslims too.

The plaintiffs claimed that they did not profess or practise Islam following the alleged mass conversion and continued to profess and practise the cultural and religious beliefs of the Bateq Mayah.

They alleged that after 2000 when more of the villagers learnt how to speak basic Bahasa Malaysia, they then realised that the word “Islam” was stated on their identity cards. - Mkini