The angry protesters had initially refused to disperse despite warnings from the police, who then brought in a team from the Federal Reserve Unit to control the crowd. Downloaded from: http://www.malaysiakini.com/news/59545
Malaysiakini.com
14th November 2006
Perak mufti ticked off over SMS rumours
Perak Mufti Harussani Zakaria came under further criticism today for spreading rumours about a church in Ipoh conducting a baptism ceremony for Muslims which could have resulted in an ugly religious clash.
Women’s group Sister in Islam (SIS) slammed the controversial mufti for failing to “learn from past experiences the danger of disseminating unverified information especially regarding contentious issues such as apostasy”.
“This is not the first time the mufti has made careless statements and allegations,” said SIS programme manager Norhayati Kaprawi.
She cited a number of previous statements made by the mufti, including in February where Harussani claimed that between 100,000 and 250,000 Muslims had renounced Islam.
“To date, he has not been able to substantiate these claims, except to merely state that these were obtained from ‘reliable sources’.”
Harussani was implicated in an SMS (short messaging system) claiming that the mufti had mentioned about the conversion ceremony at a meeting with a group of Muslim NGOs at the state mosque.
As a result, about 1,000 Muslims gathered at the Ipoh church in Jalan Silibin on Nov 5 to protest against the ‘conversion’, forcing the police to be called in.
The angry protesters had initially refused to disperse despite warnings from the police, who then brought in a team from the Federal Reserve Unit to control the crowd.
It was revealed that the church was not converting Muslims but was instead holding the first holy communion service for 98 Catholic children.
Catholic lawyers express grave concern
In Penang, a group of Catholic lawyers also expressed their “grave concern” over the incident.
“We find it most alarming that the entire protest was a result of the circulation of a text message which had falsely claimed that the church planned to baptise and convert Muslims,” said Bernard Bhar, chairman of the Catholic Lawyers of the Diocese of Penang.
“The SMS was mischievous, irresponsible and very damaging to inter-religious relations in general, and the relationship between Muslims and Christians in particular.
“As a religious leader, the mufti should have acted with greater responsibility by verifying the authenticity of the facts with the church before making any such announcement.”
However, Bhar said that the rumour-mongering culprits should not be charged under the Internal Security Act (ISA) “or under any other draconian laws which deny them of their rights to a fair trial”.
“There are sufficient alternative laws under which they could be prosecuted in the court of law,” he stressed.
SIS concurred and said that it disagreed with the inspector-general of police and the deputy internal security minister on the possible use of the ISA against those responsible for disseminating such messages.