Kurup embarrassed with report on religious restrictions in Malaysia

KUCHING, Nov 17, 2014: Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Joseph Kurup said he is embarrassed that Malaysia has been placed on par with Egypt, Syria, Somalia, Russian, Sudan and Iraq on religious restrictions.

" I am also little concerned with certain international reporting which makes our freedom of religion guaranteed by the Constitution questionable.," he said at the launch of the UN International Day for Tolerance at Limkokwing University College of Creative Technology in Kuala Lumpur yesterday.

Joseph Kurup...dramatic decline in culture of tolerance

Early this year a study by an American think tank, Pew Research Centre, published a report titled, Restrictions on Religion, which covered 198 countries and found that Malaysia is among the 24 nations with “very high” government restrictions on religion.

This particular report placed Malaysia on par with countries like Egypt, Syria, Somalia, Russia, Sudan and Iraq.

"Although I question the credibility of such findings but nevertheless something needs to be done before extremism finds a ‘hospitable environment’ in our country and changes everything we struggled to build for half a century," he added.

Kurup, however, admitted that Malaysia is experiencing some major challenges due to religious intolerances.

"Today religious differences are perceived as the most profound source of division among our people.

"Religious bigotries are in our news every single day. Group or individuals had outrageously called for Bibles to be burned, dragging cow’s head or insulting the Holy month of Ramadhan," he said.

He asked:"What is “wrong” with us today? How is such a monstrous, bizarre act by self-proclaimed race and religious champions and hypocritically playing the God card to justify their spiritual arrogance is even comprehensible?"

He said from a historically tolerant multi-faith country, Malaysia in the span of 50 years of its nationhood, is witnessing dramatic deterioration in its culture of moderation with a dramatic surge in intolerance and religious triumphalism. 

"For me these extremists in our society are not defenders of their religion, not by any stretch of our imagination. We have no right to denigrate the beliefs of other religions or race.

"Instead of the relationship between the various races which should be getting better and better as we move forward, the country appears to be moving in the opposite direction especially when to be a moderate is political incorrect today, inevitably sending the wrong signal to the rakyat. 

"Furthermore, amicably solution is not in the best interest these religious imbeciles because it will make them invisible, failing to extract maximum political mileage from petty issues.

"The actions of these so called religious defenders, the religiously deviant are not only emotional charged but are also a calculated and malicious move, intended to create hatred and division in this nation. These despicable acts only create anger and a feeling of uneasiness among Malaysians.

"If there’s one central theme emerging in the minds of Malaysians nowadays; it was how long we could sustain our peace and unity especially in Peninsular. Some even claim that “religious intolerance has reached a dangerous level” in the country.

"Acts of intolerance and intolerant reactions, only proves decisively the reality of extremism, its evilness and sadly also the fragility of our precious unity," he said.

He suspected that the "long peace" and harmony in the country had made Malaysians to have a lackadaisical attitude towards the threat of extremism. 

Although as a trained lawyer himself, Kurup said he does believe in freedom of expression and speech but all these freedom comes with limitations and boundaries.

"It is important to keep reminding ourselves although everyone have the right to express their opinions but if those opinions are motivated by extremism and to perpetuate bigotry than we have a problem.

"And when certain segment of the society exceeds or crosses the line of decency and violates the freedom of others for holding different opinions, animosities and feuds are engendered leading to an end of good feeling and neighbourliness," he said.

He warned:"We should not allow racists, religious bigots and other trouble makers to hijack our unity and take away the peace and tranquillity that we have been enjoying thus far. "