Upko: Be serious in resolving 'bin', 'binti'
Published on: Saturday, August 23, 2014
Kota Kinabalu: The National Registration Department (NRD) was told to be serious about resolving the problem faced by Malaysians in Sabah, many of whom still have their race and religion wrongly categorised in their MyKad. Upko Vice President Datuk Siringan Gubat said the department seems to just let this problem prolong without taking appropriate action to truly resolve it, since there are still many people facing the same problem. As the problem continues to persist, he said many Malaysians in Sabah are beginning to liken it to the yet-to-be resolved illegal immigrant problem in the State.
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"Based on feedback some of which I personally received, our people in Sabah are not happy with such mistake which continues to happenÉthey also feel there is just something very wrong with the NRD registration process and system," he said.He was commenting on the dilemma faced by 162 locals in Sabah who are reportedly Bumiputera Christians but due to "bin" or "binti" in their names have been so wrongly classified as Muslims in their MyKad. SIB Rev Datuk Jerry Dusing, President of Sabah Sidang Injil Borneo, had reiterated his call on the NRD to rectify cases involving Bumiputera Christians. The evangelical church said it lodged a complaint with NRD two years ago on the 162 such cases in Sabah but was told that no further action could be taken because the files were lost.
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Dusing said the wrong classification of Christians as Muslims in their MyKads only caused untold misery, including preventing them from getting married legally, which in turn prevented the registration of the births of their children, as well as the children's registration in schools and applications for their own identity cards. But NRD Sabah, in its response, denied receiving reports of lost files, saying they have records dating back to the 1970s, which were digitally uploaded into their system.
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Disputing the complaints raised by SIB Sabah on behalf of the 162, Sabah NRD Deputy Director Adrian Allan Richard also denied the department wrongly categorised Christians here as Muslims, insisting the changes were made after verifying records of the applicants. He said the department was aware that the use of "bin" or "binti" in Sabahan names does not necessarily mean the person is Muslim and as such it would not automatically "convert" their religion to Islam without checking their records. Nevertheless, he offered to scrutinise all the cases raised by the SIB if there is proof of wrongdoing. Siringan, who is also State Resource Development and Information Technology Minister and Paginatan Assemblyman, said he could not understand why NRD would simply change a person's religion or race without verifying with the person concerned. He said his wife encountered a similar problem where her religion was categorised as Buddhist although she was a Christian and had stated in her application form that she is a Christian. But this was already rectified. "The department must do the rectification properly, preferably with the person rather than just checking the records and rectify it itselfÉit is easy to make the mistake, but would not be that easy to rectify, particularly those living in remote areas," he said.He said he highlighted the problem faced by his wife during the recently concluded State Legislative Assembly sitting when the issue was brought up. Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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