By Sebastien Berger in Bangkok/Telegraph
Muslim women in Malaysia are being discriminated against so severely that they face a “growing form of apartheid”, the daughter of the former prime minister Mahathir Mohamad, a prominent social activist, has claimed.
Marina Mahathir, a Muslim herself, yesterday wrote in the Star newspaper: “Non-Muslim Malaysian women have benefited from more progressive laws over the years while the opposite has happened for Muslim women.”
Polygamy is allowed for Muslims but banned for non-Muslims, she pointed out, and under Islamic family law the father is the primary guardian of the children of a marriage, while for others guardianship is shared.
Marina Mahatir
“Only in Malaysia are Muslim women regressing,” she wrote. “In every other Muslim country in the world, women have been gaining rights, not losing them.”
* Really? Just wondering in which Muslim country women have been ‘gaining rights..?’ Are we missing something here…?
Marina Mahathir’s article was so sensitive that it was delayed for two days, with the paper claiming at one point that the relevant editor was “too busy” to deal with it.
*
* Perhaps Marina was talking about this:
Malaysia considers switch to Islamic law
* Islam is a failed religion and a failed political ideology. It can only be cured by having MORE ISLAM, right?
* Sharia Alert from modern, moderate Malaysia. Via DW
Hardline Islamic law could be introduced across Malaysia under reforms proposed by the country’s chief justice.
As the nation in south-east Asia celebrated 50 years of independence from Britain yesterday, its government was preparing to discuss a plan that would revolutionise the legal system put in place by its former colonial administrators.
As Kuala Lumpur witnessed celebrations that included parades, fireworks and a fighter-jet fly-by attended by the Duke of York, the proposal pointed to the deep differences which locals say are poisoning social relations beyond the glitter and skyscrapers of Malaysia’s modern capital city.
Ahmad Fairuz, the chief justice, told an Islamic conference in Kuala Lumpur that 50 years of independence had failed to free Malaysia from the “clutches of colonialism”. Sharia law should be “infused” into the gaps created by abolishing common law, he said.
Malaysia’s non-Muslim Chinese and Indian communities, who form 40 per cent of the population, are alarmed at creeping Islamisation.
Abdul Badawi, the prime minister, this month joined other leaders for the first time in denying what the British-authored constitution has said for 50 years – that Malaysia is a secular state.
Sharia law already operates in some Malaysian states and is occasionally applied to non-Muslims, as in July when Islamic officials forcibly separated a Hindu-Muslim couple with six children after 21 years of marriage.
The majority ethnic Malays are defined as Muslim by law and forbidden from converting….
In line with Muhammad’s dictum, “If somebody discards his religion, kill him.”
The result of Islamisation in Malaysia will be a racially divided, failing state on our back door, perhaps ready for Indonesia to annex as part of the JI Caliphate. Singapore had the right idea, & seceded from Malaysia shortly after it was formed.
That stupid cow can blame her own power-hungry father for the predicament she and other Moslem women are now in. Thanks to Daddy’s crazy Islamization program and weakening of government institutions, fundamentalist hardliners grew in number and are now chipping away at Moslem women’s rights. What a legacy to leave for one’s own children. If it weren’t for Daddy’s power protecting her, the fundamentalist crazies would have been out to get her a long time ago. I won’t be the least bit surprised if she shows no faith in the stinking mess of a country that Daddy created and flees abroad like only a true hypocrite can at the earliest opportunity when things turn nasty.