Kuwait Times

Malaysia opposition party faces collapse over Islamic law push

DAP to meet next week to reassess its participat­ion in coalition

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KUALA LUMPUR: A Malaysian Muslim party yesterday launched a push for harsh Islamic criminal punishment­s in a state it governs, threatenin­g to tear apart an opposition political alliance which had soared to the brink of power.

The Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party’s (PAS) action in the northeaste­rn state of Kelantan drew a strong rebuke from one of its partners in Malaysia’s threeparty opposition alliance, which said it had been “stabbed in the back” by PAS and would review its participat­ion in the coalition.

The opposition partnershi­p has attracted a swelling tide of votes in recent elections, winning 52 percent of ballots cast in 2013 polls, though it failed to take parliament from Malaysia’s authoritar­ian regime.

But a stepped-up PAS campaign for the Islamic penalties-known as hudud in Kelantan has torn open festering divisions in the coalition just as it struggles to hold together following the jailing last month of its overall leader, Anwar Ibrahim.

Over its partner’s objections, PAS moved in the Kelantan state assembly yesterday to update and strengthen a 1993 law setting out hudud, which levies penalties include amputation of limbs for theft and flogging for offences such as consuming alcohol.

The law has never been enforced as it conflicts with the federal constituti­on, but PAS’s leadership plans to submit a bill soon in the national parliament seeking a federal law change to allow it.

In response, the Democratic Action Party (DAP) said it would meet next week to reassess its participat­ion in the opposition Pakatan Rakyat (People’s Pact) coalition.

“The DAP protests vehemently the action of Kelantan PAS that has defied (the coalition’s wishes and)... is tantamount to an act of provocatio­n to break up Pakatan Rakyat,” the party’s national organising secretary Anthony Loke Siew Fook said in an emailed statement.

PAS officials say hudud in Kelantan, a rural state in Malaysia’s northern Islamic heartland, would apply only to Muslims. Muslims make up around two-thirds of Malaysia’s diverse population of about 30 million.

Islamist power struggle

Malaysia practises a relatively tolerant brand of Islam, but conservati­ve attitudes have gained ground in recent years, fuelled by intensifie­d jockeying between PAS and the ruling United Malays National Organisati­on (UMNO) for the key Muslim vote. Analysts said the hudud bid reflects an effort by PAS’s conservati­ve leadership to underline its Islamist credential­s amid a power struggle with more progressiv­e party factions.

“It looks bad on the surface for Pakatan Rakyat,” said Ibrahim Suffian, head of independen­t polling firm Merdeka Center.

But he said the alliance could weather the storm, particular­ly if hudud is eventually scuttled on constituti­onal grounds, and if progressiv­es are able to assert some control in PAS party elections in June.

“Being practical politician­s I get a sense they won’t immediatel­y work toward disbanding the coalition,” he said. The fracas, however, is seen as heightenin­g voter doubts over whether the fractious alliance could be trusted with national government.

Besides PAS and the DAP, which represents Malaysia’s large Chinese minority, the opposition coalition also includes the moderate, multi-racial party of Anwar Ibrahim.

Anwar was jailed last month for five years on a sodomy conviction, a major blow that removes the opposition’s best-known figure. He has dubbed the case a conspiracy to thwart the opposition’s momentum. UMNO, which controls the federal parliament, has helped stir the opposition discord by supporting PAS’s move, but it remains unclear whether it would back the required federal law change.— AFP

 ??  ?? KUALA LUMPUR: A Malaysian Muslim man reads the Quran while the other prays at a mosque in downtown Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia yesterday. — AP
KUALA LUMPUR: A Malaysian Muslim man reads the Quran while the other prays at a mosque in downtown Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia yesterday. — AP
 ??  ?? NIKININI: In this Tuesday, March 17, 2014, photo provided by UNICEF Pacific, a Family in the Nikinini community sits surrounded by their belongings in the aftermath of Cyclone Pam. When Cyclone Pam ripped across the tiny South Pacific island nation of...
NIKININI: In this Tuesday, March 17, 2014, photo provided by UNICEF Pacific, a Family in the Nikinini community sits surrounded by their belongings in the aftermath of Cyclone Pam. When Cyclone Pam ripped across the tiny South Pacific island nation of...

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