Not worth my votes in GE16

I was shocked when I read this: https://m.malaysiakini.com/news/776675. I can understand if it came from PAS or UMNO, but from a coalition that always talks about mutual respect among races and people of different religions, what say you? 

Given the constraints to be imposed under the Selangor Planning Guidelines and Standards, as voters from non-Muslim communities, we in Selangor, will have to base our choices heavily on a candidate’s alignment with religious freedom, not by imposing more bureaucratic guidelines unique only to our places of worship. 

We have to think of our future generations and how these guidelines will affect them. 

We know that all this latest development stems from the ideology of Ketuanan Melayu, a Semantic Fraud of the actual phrase found in the federal constitution, ‘Kedaulatan Raja-raja Melayu.’ 

The first thing we can do is to stay away from all ceramah of fundraising events during the next general election regardless of parties. You may volunteer to serve as independent polling agents, counting agents and Barung Agent (PACABA) to make sure that our elections are clean.   

With the setting up of the town planning guidelines and standards set up and approved by the Selangor state government without proper consultation with stakeholders, I can only say that, if the very basic mutual respect between fellow Malaysians no longer exists under the present state government, it can expect my goodbye kiss. And for Ng Zhe Han from DAP to say that the planning guidelines will only affect future developments, it is a lame cover-up of states-sanctioned discirimation against the non-Muslim community. If I were in his Kinrara constituency, my family and I would refrain from voting him. So, if you are in his constituency, do it for me, will you?    

At the same time, if the incumbent is a non-Muslim, who choose to remain silent about the guidelines, I would say he or she is not worth voting for either, compared to CC Lee. 

Because Malaysian elections operate on a first-past-the-post system, and Selangor is a state with mainly urban constituencies, the upcoming polls will serve as a critical litmus test for Pakatan Harapan’s (PH) resilience in the state. 

For my part, the other deciding factor remains the individual’s performance: I will be evaluating whether our incumbent MP and state assemblyman have actively resolved local grievances over the past few years, or if they have merely hibernated while ordinary citizens continue to suffer under the whims of "little Napoleons."

It is our democratic right to choose who we vote for. In expressing my views, I am simply outlining what we can do to dismantle these discriminatory restrictions which, once gazetted, will disproportionately affect the non-Muslim community and their places of worship. Even if they bulldoze all the way, we will show PH that they will suffer a big loss of non-Muslim votes. After all, no one is indispensable. This is where politicians whether past or present have failed to realise because pride enters their hearts and they think they are powerful. It is power that corrupts and eventually causing their own downfall.

Meanwhile, we can only pray that PMX will find the audacity to state his position clearly. I believe there is a sabotage somewhere. But if these guidelines are still pushed through, PH will not have my votes — and yours, too?

We must be aware that there are no legal provisions in the federal constitution that prohibits churches from setting up their worship places in commercial centres. Most of the rules that restrict non-Muslim places of worship came subtly under the Local Government Act 1976 and the Street, Drainage and Building Act 1974, where all premises in Malaysia are strictly designated for specific uses (Residential, Commercial, Industrial, or Religious).  

I had initially thought that,

following the 2008 general election, when the Selangor state government explicitly established a policy of formal tolerance; however, subsequent leaders have departed from the original reforms we had expected to be implemented in Selangor.

Back then, there was formal recognition that churches and temples could operate in commercial premises without requiring rigorous commercial-to-religious land conversion permits, provided they simply notified the state’s non-Islamic affairs committee. This policy was grounded in Article 11 of the Federal Constitution, which guarantees citizens the right to profess and practice their religion. But now, they are telling us that there is a shift from the original reforms to one that basically imposes a lot of restrictions on the non-Muslim places of worship.

While I have consistently promoted national unity for nation-building, how can we foster honest unity with those who impose such restrictive policies? I know a lot of these things are either directly or indirectly linked to one man in the past, but we will leave the retaliation to Almighty God, from whom the wicked will eventually not escape. 

Perhaps, the best time to send our message of protest to all political parties will be in the next Johor state election. If non-Malays choose not to vote either way, whether for PH or UMNO, or even PAS or PN, or Bersama and MUDA, the outcome may send a very strong message to these politicians not to mess with non-Muslim religions, too. We respect your religion, you have to respect ours, as most of our places of worship cannot even exist in housing estates after it was first banned     

This whole thing is especially egregious when the Federal Constitution explicitly guarantees under Article 11(1) that:

"Every person has the right to profess and practise his religion and, subject to Clause (4), to propagate it."

We all understand Clause (4) but for restrictions to be imposed on the places of worship is to infringe our rights to our form of worship. 

Traffic jams are a common feature in Malaysian lifestyle. Going by the rationale put forward by Selangor state leaders shopping malls such as 1Utama should be banned from housing development projects, and should never be allowed to operate from its current location, which causes a massive jam every time a resident of Bandar Utama returns home from an outing to Kepong FRIM or Metropolitan parks.    

Ultimately, the introduction of these guidelines will impose severe constraints on religious freedom, the attempting to justify discrimination through bureaucratic overreach.

Please pray 🙏🏼