Day: October 31, 2014

COMMENTARY BY THE MALAYSIAN INSIDER
31 October 2014

In most countries, civil servants who do not obey cabinet directives are disciplined. But in Malaysia, cabinet ministers have to appeal or cajole civil servants to follow government directives or the law.

The latest is the Royal Malaysian Customs Department’s move to seize some 300 Christian CDs and books containing the word Allah from Sabahan pastor Maklin Masiau in klia2 last week.

Masiau’s case is not the first, and is most likely not the last despite assurances from Putrajaya that it respects the religious rights of all Malaysians under the Federal Constitution. Continue reading “Again, Putrajaya shows its bark is worse than its bite”

The Attorney-General Tan Sri Abdul Gani Patail’s recent explanations have only reinforced public opinion that he has abused his discretionary powers and guilty of double standards in not prosecuting Perkasa President Ibrahim Ali for his threat to burn the Bible while going on a spree with blitzkrieg of sedition prosecutions against Pakatan Rakyat leaders, activists and intellectuals.

Datuk Stanley Isaac, who was formerly head of prosecution in the Attorney-General’s Chambers, said Gani’s reasoning that Ibrahim’s threat had no seditious tendency and that Ibrahim had “no intention to offend or provoke” are “flawed in law” and had not allayed public discontent over the AG’s decisions.

Isaac said it “boggled” “his mind how the AG could excuse Ibrahim on grounds of his good intention when the law says otherwise and that it also “boggled” his mind how burning the bible would defend the sanctity of Islam.
Continue reading “Gani Patail – what has happened to your Sept 9 promise to review the spate of sedition charges?”