Transcript
VATSIKOPOULOS: It looks, sounds and even smells like it could be a night out in Bahrain, Abu Dhabi or Doha but its the middle of the Arabian summer, when gulf Arabs come to Kuala Lumpur to cool down.
Since September 11, its become the tourist destination of choice for many Arabs, especially those from Saudi Arabia and the Emirates. And why not? Its safe and terrorist free. A country with Islamic institutions. Yet what makes Arabian tourists so comfortable here, is making some Malaysians feel like the outsiders.
M. MANOHARAN: The non-Muslims are treated as a second class citizen. The Muslims are given the priority so they are not interested whether you are a Malaysian, they are more interested whether you are a Muslim Malaysian.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Malays benefit from affirmative action and other government policies designed to raise their living standards, something minority ethnic Chinese and Indians dont get and in the past two decades, the ruling Umno Government has strengthened Muslim or Sharia laws. The rationale being, these would curtail the growth of the Islamic opposition.
IMAM: Praise be to Allah, creator of all beings who speaks in his holy Koran, the most truthful of words. He did create in pairs, male and female, from a seed
VATSIKOPOULOS: Joined in an Islamic marriage, Malays are bound by Sharia law.
GROOM: I agree to be punished by whichever Sharia court, if I ever harm any part of her.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Its a personal code overseeing rites like marriage, divorce, inheritance and morals and its enforceable by the Sharia courts.
When Dr Mahathir amended clause 121 of the Constitution in the late 80s, he elevated the Sharia courts, giving them equal powers to that of civil courts, thereby creating two parallel legal systems replacing what was a secular judicial system.
Now Sharia courts only decide on family and Islamic issues but what happens when theres a religious dispute involving both a Muslim and a non-Muslim? Well its in the lap of the Gods.
Kaliammal Sinnasamy is praying for the soul of her dead husband. She says it was stolen from her by Muslim bureaucrats. Sinnasamy remembers Moorthy Maniam as a devout Hindu who performed sacred rites but hes been buried as Muhammad Bin Abdullah.
Moorthy Maniam was a Malaysian hero, a commando and part of the team that climbed Mt Everest. An army accident left him a paraplegic and when he lapsed into a coma and lay dying, Sinnasamy was told by an army major her husband had converted to Islam. It was news to her.
KALIAMMAL SINNASAMY: What Moorthy would do was to worship God according to Hindu practices, together with me. He would take a pot with fruit for worship which is a Hindu practice. He would read religious books on Hinduism. He knew the Hindu practices of worship.
VATSIKOPOULOS: When he died, the Islamic Religious Council sought permission from the Sharia court to claim his body and a large group of Muslim men arrived to make it happen.
M. MANOHARA: They used him with the intention to show that in this country, Islam is supreme. We have dominance over the non-Muslims. It is the government that is doing these things to the non Muslims. I think they should stop funding this religious movement, going around the country claiming dead bodies, claiming that they have converted, claiming that they are Muslims, taking the body and burying in their cemetery without even giving the family members their right to pay last respect.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Moorthy was buried in a Muslim ceremony that same day. Sinnasamy took the case to the civil courts, wanting to know exactly what happened.
KALIAMMAL SINNASAMY: I dont know what happened when he was in a coma. I was very confused. I wondered how he could have converted.
VATSIKOPOULOS: But the High Court ruled it had no jurisdiction over the Sharia Court and what it saw as a Muslim matter. Sinnasamy is now appealing against the decision. The case has captured the attention of multi-religious Malaysia and people are asking whats supreme? Muslim law or the countrys secular Constitution where Article 11 guarantees religious freedom. And there are other cases.
On a sunny day back in August 2003, romance was in the air for university sweethearts Ooi Kean Thong and Siow Ai Wei. Reuniting in a city park after a three month absence, they read out each others love letters. They may have embraced, held hands, even hugged but they deny ever kissing.
OOI KEAN THONG: For me its the holding hands, or maybe hugging - but not doing that thing. I think you can say its acceptable not doing, how you say, make love or whatever in a public space.
VATSIKOPOULOS: But two municipal inspectors claim they breached indecency laws.
SIOW AI WEI: He said you did wrong and you will be fined and you have to give me money and if not you will be... the school will punish you and I will tell your mother and father.
VATSIKOPOULOS: And so three years on, though theyre no longer a couple, theyre defending their conduct as acceptable behaviour.
DANIEL SELVAM: [Lawyer] If the defence are called, then you will have to explain your part of the story.
OOI KEAN THONG: Oh okay.
DANIEL SELVAM: The two enforcement officers, they were basically Malay origin. Maybe they were putting their values when they are booking these two for the offence.
VATSIKOPOULOS: But creeping Islamisation is not just affecting non-Malays. Malay women say its taken their rights backwards.
NORANI OTHMAN: [Sisters in Islam] We have to find and interpret the whole thing consistent to our situation and our cultural heritage. What we are doing is we are embracing, we are actually, it is not so much Islamisation as some of my friends and I have called it Arabisation of Malays way of life, Malay culture.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Sisters in Islam, a lobby group and irritant of the religious bureaucracy, says changes in Islamic family law have created a sexual apartheid among Malays.
WOMAN AT CENTRE: My husband just divorced me.
RAZLINA RAZALI: [Lawyer, Sisters in Islam] Did he say it clearly, that I want to divorce you?
WOMAN AT CENTRE: He said I divorce you. Thats all.
VATSIKOPOULOS: And its not even necessary to tell your spouse face to face. You can divorce them by SMS or even fax. Its then ratified by the Sharia judges. The sisters claim Sharia judges are taking Koranic edicts too literally and patriarchy is operating under the veil of Islam.
RAZLINA RAZALI: They pick and chose. This is what we are afraid of because they pick and chose the one that is favourable towards man but the one that is favourable towards women, they just keep it silent.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Razlina Razali is talking about scholars like Harussani Zakaria, the Mufti of the State of Perak. He leads the government funded religious bureaucracy in the state and he has no time for liberal Islam.
HARUSSANI ZAKARIA: Intellectual groups come out they say that Islam the Koran should be interpreted and all this. And of course these ideas we cannot accept because why? The Koran to us is the Word of God.
VATSIKOPOULOS: And the Mufti has allies in the wealthy and educated middle classes. Dr Mazeni Alwi is an Australian educated paediatric cardiologist who set up the Muslim Professional Forum as a lobby group that warns against liberal Islam.
DR MAZENI ALWI: One of the areas that we are concerned about when basic tenets of Islam which ordinary Muslims have practised and held for a long time and still practised today, are being challenged in a way which is disrespectful of the religion. We find that that is unacceptable.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Dr Alwi says the conservative Islamic push is restoring what was usurped by British colonialism.
Do you think its a good idea for polygamy in this day and age?
DR MAZENI ALWI: It depends. I think you cannot deny that there may be some role in it but in general, people dont want, I dont want to do it.
VATSIKOPOULOS: What role, what role would there be in the year 2006 for...?
DR MAZENI ALWI: For example widows who need support. Its good to have someone who can provide some kind of support and livelihood for children, for divorcees and also for young children.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Islamic civilisation or Islam Hadari has also been on the mind of the Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi.
PRIME MINISTER BADAWI: Islam is appreciated and admitted by the whole world because it is known for emphasising knowledge, which is an order from Allah. So we are empowered by knowledge and this is what contributes to the development of mankind.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Hes proclaimed Islam Hadari Malaysias Islamic creed, a modern progressive Islam that should not be feared but its definitely being talked about in the corridors of the countrys secular court system.
MALIK IMTIAZ SARWAR: [Human rights lawyer] The idea underlying the introduction of Hadari was aimed at curbing more extremist practices but on another level thats to me a bit worrying because in essence what its done is to validate assertion, assertions by some quarters that in governance and administration, Islam has a place.
[Addressing group] So I would urge all of you today to be very, very worried.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Liberal Islamist and human rights lawyer Malik Imtiaz Sarwar is apart of a coalition of thirteen human rights and religious groups. They call themselves Article 11. Two out of four of their forums have been disrupted by fundamentalists.
MALIK IMTIAZ SARWAR: Critics of these policies, of these measures have in turn been characterised as being anti-Islamic. Ive been characterised as being anti-Islamic for doing the kind of work I do.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Death threats have been made against him and the Prime Minister has asked Article 11 to stop their public meetings.
Officially, Malaysia prides itself on being a multi-ethnic, religious and cultural success story and with good reason. It has been that way since racial riots in 1969 left hundreds dead.
M. MANOHARAN: There is no future for non-Muslims in Malaysia. The non-Muslims have got no place to go to fight for their religious rights, to fight for their fundamental or rights enshrined in the federal constitution.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Fuelled by an increasingly conservative religious bureaucracy, Muslims are identifying with their religion rather than their country.
MALIK IMTIAZ SARWAR: Malaysia to some extent is at a cross roads and the next five to ten years could be definitive of the kind of nation we will have in the years to come.
HARUSSANI ZAKARIA: Do not disturb Islam. Thats all. Thats our worry. If you are trying to disturb Islam then something will come up.
VATSIKOPOULOS: What cost, what do you think?
HARUSSANI ZAKARIA: Cost, the cost may be racial conflict.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Like in 1969?
HARUSSANI ZAKARIA: Maybe. Thats why Im scared. Because we cannot accept all this. Now, the rich now, whos having the rich economy in this country? The Indians and the Chinese. They bully the Malays. That we know that I know.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Kaliammal Sinnasamy knows differently. Shes living with constant bullying. Under Islamic law, the child of a convert is considered a Muslim. Twelve year old Dineshweri is on a list for conversion so Sinnasamys taken her out of a multi-ethnic school and enrolled her in a Hindu one. Having lost her husband, shes desperate not to lose her only child.
VATSIKOPOULOS: It looks, sounds and even smells like it could be a night out in Bahrain, Abu Dhabi or Doha but its the middle of the Arabian summer, when gulf Arabs come to Kuala Lumpur to cool down.
Since September 11, its become the tourist destination of choice for many Arabs, especially those from Saudi Arabia and the Emirates. And why not? Its safe and terrorist free. A country with Islamic institutions. Yet what makes Arabian tourists so comfortable here, is making some Malaysians feel like the outsiders.
M. MANOHARAN: The non-Muslims are treated as a second class citizen. The Muslims are given the priority so they are not interested whether you are a Malaysian, they are more interested whether you are a Muslim Malaysian.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Malays benefit from affirmative action and other government policies designed to raise their living standards, something minority ethnic Chinese and Indians dont get and in the past two decades, the ruling Umno Government has strengthened Muslim or Sharia laws. The rationale being, these would curtail the growth of the Islamic opposition.
IMAM: Praise be to Allah, creator of all beings who speaks in his holy Koran, the most truthful of words. He did create in pairs, male and female, from a seed
VATSIKOPOULOS: Joined in an Islamic marriage, Malays are bound by Sharia law.
GROOM: I agree to be punished by whichever Sharia court, if I ever harm any part of her.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Its a personal code overseeing rites like marriage, divorce, inheritance and morals and its enforceable by the Sharia courts.
When Dr Mahathir amended clause 121 of the Constitution in the late 80s, he elevated the Sharia courts, giving them equal powers to that of civil courts, thereby creating two parallel legal systems replacing what was a secular judicial system.
Now Sharia courts only decide on family and Islamic issues but what happens when theres a religious dispute involving both a Muslim and a non-Muslim? Well its in the lap of the Gods.
Kaliammal Sinnasamy is praying for the soul of her dead husband. She says it was stolen from her by Muslim bureaucrats. Sinnasamy remembers Moorthy Maniam as a devout Hindu who performed sacred rites but hes been buried as Muhammad Bin Abdullah.
Moorthy Maniam was a Malaysian hero, a commando and part of the team that climbed Mt Everest. An army accident left him a paraplegic and when he lapsed into a coma and lay dying, Sinnasamy was told by an army major her husband had converted to Islam. It was news to her.
KALIAMMAL SINNASAMY: What Moorthy would do was to worship God according to Hindu practices, together with me. He would take a pot with fruit for worship which is a Hindu practice. He would read religious books on Hinduism. He knew the Hindu practices of worship.
VATSIKOPOULOS: When he died, the Islamic Religious Council sought permission from the Sharia court to claim his body and a large group of Muslim men arrived to make it happen.
M. MANOHARA: They used him with the intention to show that in this country, Islam is supreme. We have dominance over the non-Muslims. It is the government that is doing these things to the non Muslims. I think they should stop funding this religious movement, going around the country claiming dead bodies, claiming that they have converted, claiming that they are Muslims, taking the body and burying in their cemetery without even giving the family members their right to pay last respect.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Moorthy was buried in a Muslim ceremony that same day. Sinnasamy took the case to the civil courts, wanting to know exactly what happened.
KALIAMMAL SINNASAMY: I dont know what happened when he was in a coma. I was very confused. I wondered how he could have converted.
VATSIKOPOULOS: But the High Court ruled it had no jurisdiction over the Sharia Court and what it saw as a Muslim matter. Sinnasamy is now appealing against the decision. The case has captured the attention of multi-religious Malaysia and people are asking whats supreme? Muslim law or the countrys secular Constitution where Article 11 guarantees religious freedom. And there are other cases.
On a sunny day back in August 2003, romance was in the air for university sweethearts Ooi Kean Thong and Siow Ai Wei. Reuniting in a city park after a three month absence, they read out each others love letters. They may have embraced, held hands, even hugged but they deny ever kissing.
OOI KEAN THONG: For me its the holding hands, or maybe hugging - but not doing that thing. I think you can say its acceptable not doing, how you say, make love or whatever in a public space.
VATSIKOPOULOS: But two municipal inspectors claim they breached indecency laws.
SIOW AI WEI: He said you did wrong and you will be fined and you have to give me money and if not you will be... the school will punish you and I will tell your mother and father.
VATSIKOPOULOS: And so three years on, though theyre no longer a couple, theyre defending their conduct as acceptable behaviour.
DANIEL SELVAM: [Lawyer] If the defence are called, then you will have to explain your part of the story.
OOI KEAN THONG: Oh okay.
DANIEL SELVAM: The two enforcement officers, they were basically Malay origin. Maybe they were putting their values when they are booking these two for the offence.
VATSIKOPOULOS: But creeping Islamisation is not just affecting non-Malays. Malay women say its taken their rights backwards.
NORANI OTHMAN: [Sisters in Islam] We have to find and interpret the whole thing consistent to our situation and our cultural heritage. What we are doing is we are embracing, we are actually, it is not so much Islamisation as some of my friends and I have called it Arabisation of Malays way of life, Malay culture.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Sisters in Islam, a lobby group and irritant of the religious bureaucracy, says changes in Islamic family law have created a sexual apartheid among Malays.
WOMAN AT CENTRE: My husband just divorced me.
RAZLINA RAZALI: [Lawyer, Sisters in Islam] Did he say it clearly, that I want to divorce you?
WOMAN AT CENTRE: He said I divorce you. Thats all.
VATSIKOPOULOS: And its not even necessary to tell your spouse face to face. You can divorce them by SMS or even fax. Its then ratified by the Sharia judges. The sisters claim Sharia judges are taking Koranic edicts too literally and patriarchy is operating under the veil of Islam.
RAZLINA RAZALI: They pick and chose. This is what we are afraid of because they pick and chose the one that is favourable towards man but the one that is favourable towards women, they just keep it silent.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Razlina Razali is talking about scholars like Harussani Zakaria, the Mufti of the State of Perak. He leads the government funded religious bureaucracy in the state and he has no time for liberal Islam.
HARUSSANI ZAKARIA: Intellectual groups come out they say that Islam the Koran should be interpreted and all this. And of course these ideas we cannot accept because why? The Koran to us is the Word of God.
VATSIKOPOULOS: And the Mufti has allies in the wealthy and educated middle classes. Dr Mazeni Alwi is an Australian educated paediatric cardiologist who set up the Muslim Professional Forum as a lobby group that warns against liberal Islam.
DR MAZENI ALWI: One of the areas that we are concerned about when basic tenets of Islam which ordinary Muslims have practised and held for a long time and still practised today, are being challenged in a way which is disrespectful of the religion. We find that that is unacceptable.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Dr Alwi says the conservative Islamic push is restoring what was usurped by British colonialism.
Do you think its a good idea for polygamy in this day and age?
DR MAZENI ALWI: It depends. I think you cannot deny that there may be some role in it but in general, people dont want, I dont want to do it.
VATSIKOPOULOS: What role, what role would there be in the year 2006 for...?
DR MAZENI ALWI: For example widows who need support. Its good to have someone who can provide some kind of support and livelihood for children, for divorcees and also for young children.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Islamic civilisation or Islam Hadari has also been on the mind of the Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi.
PRIME MINISTER BADAWI: Islam is appreciated and admitted by the whole world because it is known for emphasising knowledge, which is an order from Allah. So we are empowered by knowledge and this is what contributes to the development of mankind.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Hes proclaimed Islam Hadari Malaysias Islamic creed, a modern progressive Islam that should not be feared but its definitely being talked about in the corridors of the countrys secular court system.
MALIK IMTIAZ SARWAR: [Human rights lawyer] The idea underlying the introduction of Hadari was aimed at curbing more extremist practices but on another level thats to me a bit worrying because in essence what its done is to validate assertion, assertions by some quarters that in governance and administration, Islam has a place.
[Addressing group] So I would urge all of you today to be very, very worried.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Liberal Islamist and human rights lawyer Malik Imtiaz Sarwar is apart of a coalition of thirteen human rights and religious groups. They call themselves Article 11. Two out of four of their forums have been disrupted by fundamentalists.
MALIK IMTIAZ SARWAR: Critics of these policies, of these measures have in turn been characterised as being anti-Islamic. Ive been characterised as being anti-Islamic for doing the kind of work I do.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Death threats have been made against him and the Prime Minister has asked Article 11 to stop their public meetings.
Officially, Malaysia prides itself on being a multi-ethnic, religious and cultural success story and with good reason. It has been that way since racial riots in 1969 left hundreds dead.
M. MANOHARAN: There is no future for non-Muslims in Malaysia. The non-Muslims have got no place to go to fight for their religious rights, to fight for their fundamental or rights enshrined in the federal constitution.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Fuelled by an increasingly conservative religious bureaucracy, Muslims are identifying with their religion rather than their country.
MALIK IMTIAZ SARWAR: Malaysia to some extent is at a cross roads and the next five to ten years could be definitive of the kind of nation we will have in the years to come.
HARUSSANI ZAKARIA: Do not disturb Islam. Thats all. Thats our worry. If you are trying to disturb Islam then something will come up.
VATSIKOPOULOS: What cost, what do you think?
HARUSSANI ZAKARIA: Cost, the cost may be racial conflict.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Like in 1969?
HARUSSANI ZAKARIA: Maybe. Thats why Im scared. Because we cannot accept all this. Now, the rich now, whos having the rich economy in this country? The Indians and the Chinese. They bully the Malays. That we know that I know.
VATSIKOPOULOS: Kaliammal Sinnasamy knows differently. Shes living with constant bullying. Under Islamic law, the child of a convert is considered a Muslim. Twelve year old Dineshweri is on a list for conversion so Sinnasamys taken her out of a multi-ethnic school and enrolled her in a Hindu one. Having lost her husband, shes desperate not to lose her only child.