On August 9, the Bar Council held a forum at its office to discuss the conflict between Islamic and secular jurisdictions, which have been affecting families who have a Muslim convert among them. However, a group of reportedly 300 people from Islamist organisations and political parties demonstrated outside the venue at the capital city while the forum was going on inside. An hour after the forum started, several protesters stormed into the hall, demanding the discussion to be stopped. The organiser eventually halted the forum in view of the protesters going stronger in volume as well as following the police's advice.

The thuggish protest harks back to the response to the forums organised by the Article 11 coalition in 2006, in which Bar Council is one of the members, on the same issues. Muslim protesters pressured the forums to be stopped while the government ordered a ban on further forums as well as media coverage on the coalition and its activities.

On the eve of the Bar Council's forum, deputy prime minister Najib Razak discouraged the forum to be held, citing Muslim sensitivities.

While the protesters are entitled to the right to disagree, the state should take proactive and reassuring measures to dismantle the perception that an open discussion on Islamic laws is tantamount to attacking the religion. Efforts by the organisers, both the Bar Council and, previously, Article 11, to clarify that the forums were to discuss the legal issues arising from a person's conversion and not about questioning the religion, have fallen on deaf ears, as the state maintains the narrative of the pre-independence "social contract" in which the supremacy of Islam is upheld while open discussion on the subject is stigmatised.

In the aftermath of the forum, various Muslim government leaders were reported to have chided the Bar Council for organising the forum and sparking the protest.

CIJ asserts that all citizens have the right to question the legal anomaly inherent in the country's laws pertaining to conversion to Islam. The right to question the legal and administrative aspects in cases of conversion to Islam with regard to justice for all must be separately seen from questioning the religion itself and not be made a stake on the national order and harmony.

We call on the government to stop discouraging open discussion on the subject of Islamic laws in a democratic and multi-religious country that needs such openings for true understanding of and respect for each other's faiths.

Issued by

Centre for Independent Journalism

For more information please contact Wai Fong at 03 40230772