— Jacob Sinnathamby
The Malaysian Insider
Jan 04, 2012
JAN 4 — I just read the report in The Malaysian Insider that Prime Minister Najib Razak is to meet selected Christian church leaders for lunch today.
I have some sympathy for the church leaders because, if they were to poll their individual congregations, then the overwhelming view would be that the likes of Archbishop Murphy Pakiam and his friends should decline to break bread with Najib because the administration and even the PM have not been honest in their dealings with Christians. If anything, certain individuals and groups have been given the freedom under the Najib government to denigrate Christianity like never before.
But some of the main tenets of the faith are forgiveness and compassion, so I can understand why many Christian leaders will go ahead and meet Najib today. Still, may I caution all Christians to remember a few things and events and not to view the lunch in isolation.
Fact 1: The last time Najib met church leaders for a meal last year, after the discredited claims by Umno bloggers and Utusan Malaysia of Christians wanting to take over Malaysia, he ended up asking them to reaffirm their commitment to Federal Constitution and Islam’s primacy. He DID NOT apologise to them for this defamation nor chastise Utusan.
Fact 2: On his return from the Vatican, Najib spoke to a group of Umno members and told Christians to respect the Islamic leadership of the country. This move was ridiculous given the fact that Christians have been law-abiding citizens all along and have given the Federal Constitution its greatest respect. Najib was just posturing and decided to use Christians as the whipping boys.
Fact 3: During the Umno assembly, the PM did not say one word when his party members whacked DAP as agents of Christianity. I would have expected the PM to step in and say that while it is OK to attack a political opponent, it is not OK to attack a religion. But I guess politics is more important than anything else.
Fact 4: Despite absolutely no evidence of large scale apostasy or conversion to Christianity as alleged by the discredited Utusan Malaysia, the Najib administration has kept silent.
The simple fact is that Christians have been treated like the enemy by Umno and its agent, Perkasa. And the PM has allowed all this to happen under his watch.
He probably wants to have a meal because elections are near. It would not surprise me if Najib offers a few “goodies” to church leaders. After all this is what happened just before the Sarawak elections.
But possibly the worst attack on the integrity of Christians in Malaysia in the history of this country was allowed to prosper in the months after the Sarawak elections.