Parlimen Malaysia - Moorthy, Art. 121(1A), Memo by...

The high hopes of greater national unity and inter-religious understanding suffered grave setbacks in the past year, particularly in the controversies over the late M. Moorthy case, Article 121(1A) and the memorandum by ten non-Muslim Ministers to the Prime Minister. At first the Prime Minister took the correct position on the M. Moorthy controversy in early January that the Cabinet decided to let the Attorney-General examine existing laws and the Constitution to see if any change or clarification was necessary –that the issue of religious conversion needs to be spelt out clearly in the Constitution and other laws to prevent confusion among the people. Abdullah’s comment was preceded two days earlier by that of the then “de facto” Law Minister, Datuk Seri Radzi Sheikh Ahmad that the controversial Article 121(1A) of the Federal Constitution should be amended to make the civil court’s jurisdiction clearer. In the following week, the Prime Minister was presented with a memorandum signed by nine of the ten non-Muslim Ministers asking for a review of laws that affected the rights of non-Muslims, which the Deputy Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak publicly criticized as “improper”, “not nice”, “against the Cabinet system and unprecedented”.