Malaysia is not a theocratic state

the book of Document of Destiny : The Constitution of the Federation of Malaysia by academician and social commentor, Prof. Dr. Shad Saleem Faruqi.

I REFER to the article in which former Chief Justice Tun Ahmad Fairuz Sheikh Abdul Halim was reported to have said in a lecture titled “Islam as the law of the land” that any law contrary to Islamic scriptures is null and void.

This is a rewriting of our constitutional history as defined by the Reid and Cobbold Commissions and the Malaysia Agreement 1963. Malaysia is not a theocratic state. The Federal Constitution very clearly states that the Constitution is the highest law of the land, not any extrinsic religious source. The special position of Islam as the religion of the Federation is clear in Article 3. However, this does not mean that Parliament must pass laws in conformity with Islamic principles for them to be valid.

“Gnosis” is the etymological Greek root word for both knowledge and ignorance, that is, the awareness or the lack of it. How can the ex-Chief Justice, who read and fulfilled his entire job-function and role in legal parlance and culture, and swore to defend the same Federal Constitution, suddenly now becomes a historian? Ahmad Fairuz does not seem to understand that hindsight should inform and educate, not lead one to rewrite history by abusing the prominence of his former public office and role.

Time magazine asked in a recent headline “Is Truth Dead?” The objective truths about Malaysian life is already documented in the Federal Constitution, our Document of Destiny. Those who don’t understand this should attend the public lecture by Professor Emeritus Dr Shad Saleem Faruqi on April 20 at Universiti Malaya’s Law Faculty’s Constitution Series.

KJ JOHN

Petaling Jaya