Use of the word Allah: Federal Court decision on June 23

The Federal Court has set June 23 to deliver its decision on the Catholic Church’s application for leave to appeal against the Court of Appeal’s ruling that its weekly publication The Herald was prohibited from using the word ‘Allah’.

S Selvarajah, one of the lawyers representing the applicants confirmed this with Fz.com. He said he received the letter from the Federal Court yesterday evening.

On March 5, the seven-panel Federal Court bench lead by Chief Justice Tun Ariffin Zakaria heard almost two-hour long submissions from all parties and deferred their decision on the matter.

The other six judges were Court of Appeal president Tan Sri Md Raus Sharif, Chief Judge of Malaya Tan Sri Zulkefli Ahmad Makinuddin and Chief Judge of Sabah and Sarawak Tan Sri Richard Malanjum, Federal Court judges Tan Sri Suriyadi Halim Omar, Datuk Zainun Ali, and Datuk Jeffrey Tan Kok Wha.

The church filed an application for leave to appeal to the Federal Court on Nov 11 last year submitting 28 questions of law on the Federal Constitution and the Home Ministry’s jurisdiction if it could meddle into theological and religious matters.

During submissions on March 5, among the arguments made by senior lawyer Datuk Cyrus Das representing the applicant was that for the past 14 years in which the publication was using the word “Allah” there was no cases of violence or provocation and that disturbances only began after 2009. He added that this matter would also test if the Home Ministry had jurisdiction over activities done in the private sphere.

Representing one of the respondents, Majlis Agama Islam Wilayah Persekutuan and  Majlis Agama Islam Negeri Selangor, Mubashir Mansor argued that leave should not be granted as the case would merely be an “academic exercise”. He argued over ownership of the word and that one must go back to the scriptures to see if the word “belonged” to the Christian religion.

He also argued that should the matter go to the Federal Court, “it has to be proven that the word ‘Allah’ was a part of the Christian religion since the beginning of time”.

The Herald, a weekly published in four languages, has been using the word  Allah to refer to God in their Malay-language section, catering to Catholics in East Malaysia. They are appealing the Oct 14 decision by the Court of Appeal’s three-men bench lead by Datuk Seri Mohamed Apandi Ali which unanimously allowed the government’s appeal to ban The Herald from using the word Allah.

The Court of Appeal’s decision sets aside the High Court ruling on Dec 31,2009 which declared that the Home Ministry’s decision prohibiting The Herald from using the word Allah was illegal, null and void.