Nazri: M’sia not a secular state
At the same time, the minister does not say if Malaysia is an Islamic state.
Patrick Lee, FMT
Malaysia, according to the federal government, has never been defined as a secular state.
Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Nazri Abdul Aziz said this in the Dewan Rakyat today, adding that the word “secular” was not even present in the Federal Constitution.
“…the allocation of the law shows that it is clear that Malaysia has never been determined or declared as a secular state,” he added.
He was responding to a question by DAP-Seremban MP John Fernandez, who asked Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak about the decisions made by the former Lord President Tun Salleh Abbas in the case of Che Omar Che Soh vs the Public Prosecutor (1988), where secular law came into question.
At the same time, Nazri did not state if Malaysia was an Islamic country.
However, he added that the country had been using secular law which had been brought over from before Independence, through Article 162 of the Federal Constitution.
The article states that laws existing before Merdeka Day 1957 would continue to be enforced.
