KOTA KINABALU: Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) assistant secretary general Datuk Herbert T Lagadan said that the Christians and churches in Sabah have no choice but to continue using their Bahasa Malaysia Bibles which contain the word ‘Allah’ in their worship service and daily religious life.
He said the Christians in Sabah and Sarawak are fortunate since both state governments have given freedom to Christians to freely use the word ‘Allah’ in the church.
Herbert was of the opinion that it would be heartening to see all the Christian denominations in Sabah pool their resources to start their own printing of the Bibles in Bahasa Malaysia as per the 10-Point Resolution agreed by the government earlier.
“No one has the sole right to tamper with one’s freedom when it comes to the tenet of God’s Worship otherwise our nation will come under God’s wrath and calamities,” he said when commenting on the High Court decision on Monday to dismiss an application by Sidang Injil Borneo (SIB) church and its Sabah president Reverend Datuk Jerry Dusing for leave for a judicial review over the ban on religious books containing the word ‘Allah’ by the authorities.
Justice Zaleha Yusof ruled that she was bound by the Court of Appeal judgment dated Oct 14 last year which held that the word ‘Allah’ was not an integral part of the faith and practices of Christianity.
In their application for leave on Dec 10, 2007, SIB and Rev Jerry named the minister and the Government as respondents.
They filed the application after their religious publications, imported from Indonesia, were detained by the Customs authorities at the Low Cost Carrier Terminal in Sepang in August 2007.
Former United Pasokmomogum Kadazandusun Murut Organisations (Upko) president Tan Sri Bernard Dompok said Sabah and Sarawak will continue using “Allah” in its churches despite SIB losing its bid to challenge the ban on the word in its publications.
“This is a matter of language. If we are not allowed to use Malay, then maybe we need a new national language,” he said.
Dompok also said that it should be considered an honour that Malay is being used in churches in east Malaysia.
“Sabah and Sarawak will continue to use the word ‘Allah’ in churches as it has always been used, even before Malaysia was formed,” he added.
Angkatan Perubahan Sabah (PBS) president Datuk Seri Panglima Wilfred Bumburing, however, is disappointed with the High Court’s judgement.
“I have no intention to challenge the decision of the court except to say that what is happening to the other religious group, especially the Christian group as a whole, in the country is tantamount to a form of religious persecution in a subtle way,” the Tamparuli assemblyman said.
According to him, the religious practices and doctrine of a particular denomination should only be defined by the individual religious body itself and that anyone from outside of its own authority body trying to define what construed an ‘integral part of faith and practices’ of that particular body or of other religion is against the Federal Constitution and is also against the fundamental rights of every citizen to practise what their churches teach, not what are defined by others.
“The Malaysia Agreement of 1963 was supposed to ensure that Sabah’s rights are protected and its sovereignty as an independent State within the Federation of Malaysia is guaranteed. The indigenous people of Sabah have hoped for a prosperous Sabah within Malaysia and have looked forward to living in a peaceful country enjoying the fruits of its own land. The Federal Government can help keep it that way by giving Sabahans what rightfully belongs to them, he said.