KOTA BARU: The Gempur Aurat operation against Muslim women is a kind of moral policing by the Kelantan government, says MCA president Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai (pic).
He said the move was regressive and instilled fear in the business community, especially among Chinese employers of Muslim women workers.
“Moral policing is uncalled for. Imposing such a ruling on the workforce is clearly a wrong direction towards fostering harmony between the authorities and the people.
“More importantly, imposing a fine on people will cause problems for others, especially employers who have to fork out the money to pay compound fines for their workers,” Liow, who is Transport Minister, said after opening the 55th meeting of the Kelantan chapter of the Malaysian Road Safety Council here yesterday.
Stressing that he was not interfering with the religious need to cover one’s aurat under Islam, he said he was only echoing the worries of the Chinese business community.
On another matter, Liow said he would look into reports that 604 Chinese trainees of the National Service programme were found to be unable to speak properly in Bahasa Malaysia.
He said this in response to media reports on Cornell University lecturer Prof Dr Teo Kok Seng’s 2010 study of 14,000 NS trainees.
The results of the study showed that the number of young non-Malays who could not speak the national language was expected to increase as almost 90% of them were in vernacular national-type schools.
Liow added that MCA was concerned over the matter and would discuss this with the Education Ministry.
