Cops pass fraudulent conversion case to Sabah religious authorities?

The case of villagers allegedly converted to Islam unwittingly will now be investigated by the Sabah State Islamic Affairs Department (JHEIANS), after state police handed over their report for further action.

Kota Marudu police chief Deputy Superintendent Mohd Isa Yusof confirmed that police have received the report filed by a group of villagers, who claimed they were “tricked” into converting to Islam, but noted that it is now in the hands of the religious authorities.

“We received a report and police have referred the issue to JHEAINS for their action. For more information, please refer to them,” he said in Malay in a brief text message to The Malay Mail Online late last night.

On Wednesday, a group of 27 villagers from Kampung Maliau, Pitas lodged a police report alleging that they were converted to Islam without their knowledge after they were promised welfare aid.

The group, who live in a remote part of Sabah’s interior-north region, were quoted by local Sabah newspaper Daily Express as saying that they were made to say “words we did not understand” at a ceremony on New Year’s Day, after which they were allegedly told by an unknown man that they had converted.

The villagers, who insisted they are Christians, also claimed that they were each handed an envelope that contained RM100 after the entire affair.

The fraudulent mass conversion claim is the latest to hit deteriorating relations between the country’s majority Muslim and minority Christian communities, who have been at loggerheads for several years now over the use of the Arabic word “Allah”.

Just last week, Selangor Islamic Department (Jais) officers accompanied by policemen raided the Bible Society of Malaysia (BSM) office here and confiscated 300 copies of the bible in the Malay and Iban languages, for containing the word “Allah”.

Jais said they were empowered to conduct the raid under the Selangor Non-Islamic Religions (Control of Propagation Among Muslims) Enactment 1988 that prohibits non-Muslims in Selangor from using 35 Arabic words and phrases, including the word for God, “Allah”.

The incident sparked outrage among non-Muslim communities and lawyers, who argued that the raid — and the very Enactment used to validate it — were unconstitutional and an act of harassment against Christians in the country.

Jais’ recent action reignited long simmering tension in the country that followed the Kuala Lumpur High Court’s decision four years ago in favour of allowing Catholic weekly the Herald to continue to use the word “Allah” despite an earlier prohibition by the government.

The Court of Appeal, however, overturned the lower court’s decision last year, arguing that it was well within the Home Minister’s purview to enforce the ban in the interest of national security.

The ongoing legal dispute between the government and the Catholic Church is still pending before the Federal Court, which is set to hear arguments from both sides on February 24 before it decides on whether it will hear an appeal by the Catholic Church.

Christians make up about 10 per cent of the Malaysian population, or 2.6 million. Almost two-thirds of them are Bumiputera and are largely based in Sabah and Sarawak, where they routinely use Bahasa Malaysia and indigenous languages in their religious practices, including describing God as “Allah” in their prayers and holy book.