Inter-Research And Studies (IRAS)

Multimedia and communications minister Gobind Singh Deo had recently said that authorities will be going after news portals for maintaining public commentaries which are deemed to be insulting, inciting hate on others as well as those which are considered harming. Going after news portals may not be fair in the sense that these websites are open to public for reading and providing commentaries over news or articles of interests. Some may even suggest that the authorities should instead go after those commentators for the said statements or words penned on the news or articles. Is going after these kind of people adding value? There are millions of viewers and commentators out there. Is the authorities planning to go after them one by one, arrest them all, charge them in court and imprison them? There will be no end to such incidents. Practically, our nation's prison will be packed with these kind of people if the government were to serious in enforcing some of those multimed...

This article has earlier appeared in Beritadaily.com on 27/2/2017 Well, the so-called PAS-sponsored Himpunan 355 has come and gone. The rally was supposedly to garner support for PAS president Hadi Awang’s private member’s bill, which is expected to be tabled in parliament next month, to enhance punishments under the Shariah Courts (Criminal Jurisdiction) Act 1965, also known as Act 355. PAS’ long-time arch rival Umno has also come out in support of Hadi’s bill, citing the importance of uniting regardless of political affiliation in order to protect the religion from threats. Can PAS and Umno enlighten us on who is “threatening” Islam in Malaysia and how the “threat” has been initiated? Are they able to identify the culprits who have threatened the religion all this while? Prior to PAS’ decision to forward the bill to amend Act 355 to provide for stiffer shariah punishments, did they scrutinise the bill to look for measures that would enforce good governance and curb corrupt...

This article has earlier appeared in Beritadaily.com on 9/9/2016 ‘Vote for PAS and your place in Heaven will be secured’; ‘Vote for Umno to prove that you are a pure Malay’; ‘Without Umno, the Malays will vanish from this earth’; ‘Vote for PAS, you uphold Islam to the highest’; ‘Vote DAP and you are betraying the entire Malay generations’; ‘Vote DAP, you are a traitor to the Malay race’; ‘Vote DAP, you are a kafir harbi’; Vote PKR, your Malayness becomes lesser’. These words are usually coined among Malaysians by certain political parties who claimed themselves to be champions of the superiority of the race and religion today. The intimidation of voters with such words or should we say, blackmailing, has become a norm today among competing political parties, their leaders and supporters in our nation in order to gain or regain support from the voters. Are all these so-called racial and religious political parties running out of practical ideas and policies for our people and...

This article has earlier appeared in Beritadaily.com on 3/3/2016 Since 2008 when the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition first lost its two-thirds majority in the general election and again failed to regain the much needed numbers in the 2013 polls, BN leaders, particularly from its dominant party Umno, have frequently resorted to divide and rule tactics in an attempt to regain lost ground. These leaders would stir up racial and religious problems and put the blame on various opposition parties and their leaders, leading civil society and human rights groups claiming that these people are threatening the special rights of the Malays and insulting Islam. The intention of these leaders is crystal clear, to divert the people’s attention from the ugly scenes in the corridors of power: corruption, power abuse and mismanagement which have cost the nation billions of ringgit every year. Umno leaders have somehow realised that the people are now watching their every move and they have to c...

This article has earlier appeared in Beritadaily.com on 19/2/2016 If a leading politician or senior official from the Barisan Nasional (BN) government was caught or exposed for his corrupt practices, the people would make hell of a noise demanding that the person resign, be probed and charged for the crimes committed. However, today, the leading BN politician or senior official will fire back by claiming that those calling for action to be taken against him are threatening the existence of the Malay race in this nation. He will add that without Umno, there will be no more Malays in this land. Again, when people saw a leading figure from the BN government abusing his powers to award government contracts to members of his family, close relatives or cronies, calls for the person to be probed and demanding his resignation will be met with his response that it is un-Islamic to do so or it is not the way of Islam to call for action to be taken against the leader or official. In shor...

By Ahmad Fauzi Abdul Hamid The grim reality of elusive unity, plagued by ethnocentric and ethno-religious divisions, is underlined by the continual existence of fault lines that anthropologist Shamsul A. B. calls ‘axes of contradictions’ . The stubborn presence of such social cleavages, after half a century of nationhood, raises the issue of the efficacy of integrative policies pursued by successive Barisan Nasional (BN: National Front) governments. Momentarily eclipsed by the modernisation ethos of Mahathir’s Vision 2020 and Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s Islam Hadhari (civilisational Islam), the ‘national unity’ agenda has made a comeback during Najib Razak’s era since 2009 in the form of his ‘One Malaysia’ (1Malaysia) scheme. It has not been smooth sailing for Najib. It is understandably difficult for him to admit that the multiple polarisation of Malaysian society was effected at the hands of none other than his colleagues and former bosses in the ruling United Malays National Organisati...

By Nesrine Malik "Allah" means God, unless you are a non-Muslim Malaysian, in which case you have to find another word. After a recent court ruling in the country, Allah can now be used only to refer to the Muslim God, and non-Muslims (mainly the Malaysian Christian Catholic community and press) have been banned from using it. It is a decision that has inflamed opinion among minority religions and disheartened Muslims. Apart from all the practical implications of this (re-printing Bibles and so on), there are other intangible but more heartfelt grievances. At first glance it looks like a petty scuffle over semantics, but the roots of the dispute go deep into the issue of national identity. The ruling was flimsily justified by the "risk" of conversion. Announcing the change, the judge said: "It is my judgment that the possible and most probable threat to Islam, in the context of this country, is the propagation of other religions to the followers of Islam....

By Waleed Aly Six years ago, Proton - Malaysia's national car maker - teamed up with carmakers in Iran and Turkey pledging to develop the world's first ''Islamic car''. Apparently automobiles had hitherto been non-Muslims. If that's not absurd enough, this week we learnt it's a good thing Malaysian cars can't talk, because if they could, they'd no longer be able to use the word ''Allah'' to mean ''God''. That's what a Malaysian appeal court ruled this week, after a Catholic, Malay-language newspaper had dared to drop the A-bomb. The ''Allah'' controversy has been running for years, and isn't over yet. This decision overturned the original finding from 2009 in favour of the newspaper. Now the editor is planning to appeal to the highest court in the country and the government will resist. This immediately reminded me of Proton's Islamic car: strip both these stories of ...

On the recent statement by the Parliamentary Opposition Leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim citing the importance and need to have more interfaith understanding, Inter-Research And Studies (IRAS) applaud his call as a step forward towards a stronger political will to ensure interfaith understanding in this country is in place. IRAS has seen this call by the country's top opposition leader as encouraging and we would like to see that the future government would take this step towards implementation once the voters decide the who should be the new government after the next general elections. Interfaith understanding is what the current sitting government in Putrajaya has failed to preserve. What we had seen and are seeing now is the Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition is disintegrating from within just because of this problem. Umno wanted a more "supreme" position for the Malays (actually for Umno leaders and elites), while MCA, MIC, PPP and Gerakan couldn't do much to pre...

By Koon Yew Yin Last week I received a copy of an email invitation to a joint seminar by two academics, one from University of Malaya and the other from Unversiti Kebangsaan Malaysia. The title of their talk was “Does race matter in getting an interview? A field experiment of hiring discrimination in Peninsular Malaysia.”. As I have been an employer with over 40 years experience, the seminar topic intrigued me. Unfortunately I was not able to attend. Subsequently, I have been following the internet discussion generated by the seminar. This includes the recent letter from the two researchers requesting an apology from an online news site which reported on the seminar findings. Is Racial Bigotry an Issue in Hiring? According to the letter, the online website had through its headline “Malaysian employers practise racial bigotry, study shows” grossly misrepresented the study. Although the two academics conceded that the article “fairly accurately conveys our main findings and conc...

By Simon Sipaun PROHAM is a new human rights NGO formed by former Suhakam and the Police Commission commissioners. It was launched on 21st March, 2011. Incidentally, 21st March every year is the UN International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. This RTD will go a long way towards realizing PROHAM’s hope to see that Malaysia will, sooner rather than later become a party to the UN International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, 1969 (ICERD). This move represents a realistic approach to the issue rather than sweeping it under the carpet and pretend it is not there. 2. I am unable to find one good reason why Malaysia should persistently continue to be not a party to ICERD. Any government which refuses to be a party to ICERD is a government that supports racism and racial discrimination. How else can I interpret such state of affairs? 175 countries are currently party to ICERD including many Islamic countries. Only 15 cou...

By Viktor Wong We wish to refer to an article written recently by the Star associate editor Veera Pandiyan which was published in The Star newspaper on 22 December 2011. The title of the article was "The harnessing of hatred". According to the editor, the acronym, ABU has long been associated with hate right from the United Kingdom to Malaysia. Besides, the ABU acronym, according to him, also represents many aspects, from education, aviation, broadcasting, medical to automotive. The subject which brought to our attention is not the whole article itself but on the ABU acronym in Malaysia, which stands for "Asalkan Bukan Umno" or Anything But Umno. ABU in Malaysia was recently launched by an NGO dedicated to reform and according to Veera, this NGO and their activist were well-known for their aversion towards Umno. Aversion towards Umno? In his article, Veera had also mentioned that it was this NGO who is inciting hate against Umno and its leaders and associating them ...