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This would be that NST Jan406 article:

Defending Malaysia's
Diversity

PRIME Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has a well-deserved reputation for integrity and for the propagation of Islam Hadhari - a moderate, modernist Islam focused on basic principles and the pursuit of knowledge. But official Islam in Malaysia continues to play into the
hands of Islamophobes everywhere and upset the 45 per cent or so of Malaysia's population who are non-Muslim.

Two current issues suggest that Abdullah will have to invest more of his own political capital in bringing a narrow official Islam into line with his own vision of an inclusivist faith that is intellectually alive and can coexist easily with the nation's large Hindu, Christian, Buddhist
and other minorities.

In one case last week, a religious court declared that a deceased, M.Moorthy, a member of the first Malaysian team to climb Mount Everest, was a Muslim - and insisted that he be buried according to Muslim rites - despite the fact that he had been born a Hindu and, according to testimony by his wife and family, had never converted to Islam. The powers of the Muslim religious authorities were then confirmed by the High Court, which ruled it could not intervene in a decision by the religious court. In other words, in modern, multi-ethnic, inclusivist
Malaysia, the religious courts are a law unto themselves.

This is particularly worrying for non-Muslims. But it has wider implications in a society where all Malays are deemed to be Muslims, whatever they actually believe, and where religious movements by Malays have recently been persecuted on the grounds that they were judged heretical by the religious authorities. One sect that had been declared
"apostates" recently saw its headquarters razed to the ground.

In another current case, a new Islamic Family Law has been rammed through Parliament. Although it has the legitimate aim of standardising the implementation of Syariah, Muslim women from across the religious/political spectrum see it as a backward step that enhances an already male-biased law. It will, they say, make polygamy and divorce easier for men, and reduce a wife's property and maintenance rights in
the event of polygamy.

This legislation is being spearheaded by none other than the Prime Minister's Department. Bowing to old legal interpretations of Syariah on family issues is in contrast to Abdullah's public rhetoric calling for a progressive Islam, constantly reinventing itself in response to
contemporary challenges and social conditions. "The notion that the Islamic concept of law is absolute and hence immutable has resulted in intellectual inertia," he has said, noting that "pluralism and diversity" were keys to the universality of the Muslim message.

As ever in Malaysia, the underlying themes may be more about political power struggles than religious beliefs. The governing Umno must compete for Malay votes with the fundamentalist Pas.

Religion can be a weapon,
too, in Umno's internal politics. As with Christians in the United
States, religious pressure groups exert political influence at the margin
out of proportion to their numbers and politicians cynically use the groups for their own ends.

Abdullah generally has the trust of non-Malays, and Malays can recognise that his own beliefs are sincere, not the product of political calculation. That cannot be easily said of Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, the former deputy prime minister who proclaims liberal principles to
receptive Western audiences but increasingly flirts with Islamic fundamentalism as he seeks to return to Malaysian politics.

In reality, Malaysian society is a lot more plural and tolerant than
politicians' statements sometimes suggest.

Nonetheless, the currents show the difficulty that Abdullah faces in reversing the trends of 20 years
under his predecessor, Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

While Dr Mahathir's own agenda was an aggressively modernising nationalism, for political reasons he allowed religious authorities to expand their power at the expense of secular forces. In many areas, including dress, Malay traditions have been abandoned to conform with
alien but supposedly more Islamic practices imported from the Middle East.

Natural wealth and a benign history have enabled Malaysia to prosper economically while religious/ethnic divides have grown, at least in
peninsular Malaysia. (Things are different in the ethnically more diverse
Sabah and Sarawak.)

It may be hard to admit this in Kuala Lumpur, but Malaysia badly needs to look to Indonesia for an example of how to be a modern, multiethnic state. That will eventually require ending the automatic identification
of "Malay" with "Muslim" and acknowledging that different interpretations
of Islam can coexist within the same predominantly Muslim state.

In Indonesia, pluralism and Islam are synonymous, but in Malaysia the links between religious authorities and a state with huge powers of
bureaucratic patronage are inhibiting for both.

Unless Malaysia's Prime Minister tackles the social gap between Muslims and non-Muslims, it will continue to grow, whatever the claims of tourist brochures about Malaysian multiculturalism. Capital will continue to exit the country, and Abdullah's vision of Islam Hadhari will be stillborn. -end

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The question remains, how would the MOI have written on such a topic?

In other words, how would Zam "defend Malaysia's diversity" if he's arrogating a particular monoculture identity to a nationalism founded on multi-culturalism?

Therefore, can anyone be blamed for concluding that Umno 2006 has retreated to their doctrine of perjuangan melayu as the sole raison d'etre for their definition of nationalistic Malaysia, on threat of closure of any media that comes even to a mile of fashioning a modern-day intelligent discussion?

A doctrine that ignores the pluralities of this country, for that matter one that has usurped the spirit of the social compact by which this 'nationalistic Malaysia' was formed, cannot possibly be sustained for long by one party alone, for if it can, why has there been so many problems and issues which have emerged looking for solutions and answers?

The keris-wielding romanticism of Umno has to someday give way to a reality check. They have for so long avoided that because when they do, they can only conclude that what they've been doing are not irrelevant to the modern-day definition of Malaysia the country, they are irrelevant to the definition of Malaysia the concept - what Malaysia truly can be, shorne of stubborn and self-defeating angsts.

It should also not be lost on them, as it has not been lost on everyone else outside their little coterie of supporters, that people have already concluded they are trying to deflect attention from their irrelevance by picking on anyone and anything else not of their doctrine, so as to put the blame on others for what they could not, would not, solve.

If this be the character underpinning the development of a nationalistic Malaysia, woe betide her future.

JEFF OOI says: Who is the writer from The NST? Or is it an editorial/leader piece?

adjust:

..that what they've been doing are not only irrelevant....

Can someone please kindly tell me the fundamental difference between foreign concept of democracy and ours?

Metaphorically, I can certainly see how easy it is for us to say 'their moral value is not the same as ours' when we realize we don't even have any values to begin with.

Malaysian standard of journalism:
1. First priority news is what the PM said
2. Second priority news is what the DPM said
3. Followed by all the ministers, deputy ministers, parliamentary secretaries, menteri besar/chief minister.
4. Do not question any of the above even if they have said something really stupid.
5. Never report what any opposition fella said
6. If there is any more space left, then report what actually happened.