M'sia undergoing 'Arab colonialism'
Published on: Monday, May 25, 2015
Kuala Lumpur: Datin Paduka Marina Mahathir has criticised the "Arabisation" of Islam in Malaysia amid the institutionalisation and growing conservatism of the faith here.The social activist pointed out that it is very difficult to find traditional "baju Melayu" for women during Hari Raya as Arab attire like kaftans, which are long tunics, became more popular instead over the years."This is just Arabisation. Our culture — it's colonialism, Arab colonialism," Marina said.
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"Kaftans are easy to wear. But what happened to our tradition, culture, everything? It's lost," she lamented, pointing out that Malay women below 50 generally do not know how to tie the 'baju kurung' skirt so that it falls into pleats and makes it easier to walk in.The eldest child of former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad said Islam's biggest problem in Malaysia is the fear of knowledge of the religion itself."Islam has a very strong intellectual history, but there's no intellect at all in the way Islam is taught here. We're taught rituals; we're not taught about the great thinkers and differences between them," she said."When you read the history of Islam when it first came down, it was about doing away with tribalism... but you now have this thing where you're wanting to go to a tribe, or else, the other tribes, even though all are officially Muslim, are not allowed," she added.
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The Sunni denomination is the prevalent ideology in Malaysia and any other Islamic schools of thought, including Shia, are considered deviant.Marina also criticised the authorities for "inventing new enemies all the time", questioning a Minister for telling Muslims to watch out for "Quranism" shortly after Dr Mahathir said the Quran is supreme and that hadiths, which are sayings attributed to Prophet Muhammad, come after the holy book.
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"It's a new 'ism'. Liberalism, pluralism, communism, feminism, Quranism. But racism, fascism, they don't include," she said.Friday sermons sanctioned by the government have repeatedly warned the predominant Muslim community against philosophies like liberalism and pluralism.Marina hit out at the government's repeated calls for Muslims to unite and conform, pointing out that it does not allow room for individuality, while Muslim women are criticised when they go against the norm, citing the K-pop concert controversy where Muslim girls in headscarves hugged the Korean artistes, the female BFM journalist who questioned hudud and women in tudung touching canines at a controversial pet-a-dog event."Women always get attacked," said the women's rights activist."The guys get away because you can't actually tell, unless they're in a kopiah and beard and they're touching a dog," she added.Marina also said sho would leave Malaysia if hudud law is implemented in the country."I cannot live in a country where people want to cut off hands, I'm sorry, or stone people to death."I would never live in Saudi Arabia. I don't want to live in a country where this is official policy," she said.PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang has submitted a Private Member's Bill to Parliament in a bid to remove the legal obstacles that prevent the implementation of the Islamic penal code in Kelantan.Hadi said Tuesday that the Kelantan state government run by the Islamist opposition party will meet with the Barisan Nasional (BN) federal government to discuss plans to implement hudud in the state. BN has yet to state its official stand on hudud.Critics of hudud have lambasted the strict Islamic criminal law, which punishes theft with amputation of limbs, as well as apostasy and adultery with death by stoning, as unconstitutional in secular Malaysia.Marina related an incident where she attended the United Nations women's conference in Beijing in 1995 and Iranian women living in exile in the US had opposed a session about including religion in feminism.She said the Iranian women, who were middle-class elites living in New York, had sounded bitter and were aggressive about keeping religion out of everything, noting that their counterparts had stayed back in Iran and fought from within, when women's rights were rolled back after Iran became an Islamic state following the 1979 revolution.Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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