G25 must get Najib to declare Malaysia not an Islamic state, says Zaid Ibrahim

Former Umno minister Datuk Zaid Ibrahim said Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak must declare that Malaysia is not an Islamic state. – The Malaysian Insider file pic, January 9, 2015.

With the group of 25 eminent Malays one step closer to a meeting with the prime minister, former Umno minister Datuk Zaid Ibrahim said it was imperative that they get Datuk Seri Najib Razak to state that Malaysia is not an Islamic state.

Zaid said Najib must withdraw his previous statement that this multiracial country was an Islamic state and instead affirm that the country was a democracy, the kind that Najib's father, Malaysia’s second prime minister Tun Abdul Razak Hussein, helped establish at the nation's independence.

"He must let our judges know the importance and sanctity of the Federal Constitution.

“He must affirm his belief in the kind of democracy that helped Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea and Indonesia overcome many years of poverty and mediocrity to become the dynamic countries they are today," he wrote in his blog posting today.

Zaid, who was the de-facto law minister under Najib's predecessor Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi after the watershed 2008 March general election until his resignation six months later, said Najib could no longer play "cheap politics" with the country’s future by embracing ideas that were only popular with the delusional, which did not work and were divisive for the country.

He pointed out that there were no Islamic states in the world that were prosperous and democratic, or that respected the dignity of individuals.

He said the prime minister must not make religion the central policy of his government if he wanted Malaysia to be peaceful and progressives in the future.

Instead, he must place his faith in building a country with good leaders committed to governing well, whose central focus was on improving the people’s welfare, not building their spiritual lives, as that was not the government's function.

"The Eminent 25’s meeting with the PM will only be successful if he can articulate his position on these issues clearly," he said.

However, Zaid expressed doubt that Najib would accept any alternative views, saying that the prime minister would probably tell the the group, dubbed the G25, the "same old story" – that Islam and the Malays were under attack.

“He will say that only a strong authoritarian rule, underpinned by the lethal mixture of race and religion that Umno/PAS offers, will help the Malays to be in power. Nothing else matters to him.”

Zaid said the G25 should not go into the proposed meeting with high hopes that Najib would accept the contents of their December 8 open letter, which has since gone viral.

He also told the group not to hope that Najib would support democratic government and the protection of civil liberties and rights of minorities.

"The meeting will be worthwhile only if they can forcefully and categorically state their position clearly, and convey to the prime minister that there are indeed Malays who will fight to save this country from the dangerous politics he is playing," he said.

The G25 met with a Prime Minister's Office (PMO) representative on Wednesday night and were assured they would be granted a meeting with Najib.

"We are all very happy. This is a good meeting before the actual appointment with the prime minister," the group’s spokesperson Datuk Noor Farida Ariffin told The Malaysian Insider.

The meeting included PMO representative Datuk Jailani Ngah, who is also Najib's political secretary, representatives from the Malaysian Islamic Development Department (Jakim) and shariah lawyers.

The meeting comes a month after G25 issued an open letter urging Najib to end extremist rhetoric and resolve disputes arising from the application of Islamic law in the country.

The G25 open letter had decried the "lack of clarity and understanding" of Islam's place within Malaysia's constitutional democracy, as well as a "serious breakdown of federal-state division of powers, both in the areas of civil and criminal jurisdictions".

They also called on Najib to establish an inclusive consultative committee and called for dialogue on Islamic laws.

Signatories of the letter were former high-ranking civil servants, including directors-general, secretaries-general, ambassadors and prominent individuals.

Since its publication last month, public support for the contents of the letter and for its 25 signatories has been strong, with many writing to media organisations expressing their thanks and solidarity with the signatories, while an online petition called #iam26 has drawn thousands of signatures.

Last week, Noor Farida said G25 had grown in number, with 10 more Malays, many of whom were former but influential members of the government service adding their names to the group.

- TMI