Gerakan Youth deputy trades blows with RPK over hudud

(Malaysiakini) – Gerakan deputy Youth chief Andy Yong has slammed blogger Raja Petra Kamarudin for distorting the politician’s comments about the Hudud Bill and accusing the Chinese of being stupid.

“Raja Petra in his article published in Malaysia Today (READ HERE) yesterday has caused dissatisfaction among some non-Muslims in the country.

“There are complaints that such a statement is humiliating and causing disunity and enmity,” Yong said in a statement today.

He was responding to the article titled ‘Chinese should stop trying to prove they are stupid’, which referred to Yong and was prompted by one of Yong’s articles on PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang’s Private Member’s Bill.

Raja Petra wrote, “The non-Muslim Chinese and Indians may have earned the right to call themselves Malaysian citizens but that does not mean they have also earned the right to tell Muslims how they should practice Islam.

“Andy Yong needs to do a reality check and not assume that his Malaysian citizenship means he can define Islam. Islam is defined by the Quran and not by people like Andy Yong.”

“What is he trying to prove?” retorted Yong, a lawyer.

“First of all, I have never attempted to define Islam, but the constitutional aspect of it.

“What I explained was that it is inevitable that if Hadi’s bill comes into force, it will affect the non-Muslims as well,” Yong said.

Hudud or not?

The long-standing hudud row erupted once again after Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Azalina Othman Said asked Parliament to move Hadi’s bill up the queue, allowing the PAS chief to address the House on his proposed amendments to the federal syariah law.

Last Friday, Prime Minister Najib Razak responded to the outcry against the bill, claiming it was merely a big misunderstanding that the bill relates to hudud, and that the amendments do not concern non-Muslims.

Raja Petra in his article argued along the same lines, that the amendments Hadi sought had nothing to do with implementing hudud in Malaysia.

“On Raja Petra’s confusion, like some others about Hadi’s bill… it is actually to extend the power of the syariah court to be able to implement Kelantan Syariah Criminal Enactment (II) (1993) 2015, that is, to impose hudud punishment.

“Simply put, (it is) to give freedom for the state to enact higher punishment.

“So I am actually a smart Chinaman,” quipped Yong.

PAS Kelantan passed amendments to its state laws to implement the Islamic penal code in the state last year through a unanimous vote in the state assembly, which comprises a majority of PAS and Umno assemblypersons.

Following this, Hadi moved to table his Private Member’s Bill in Parliament to remove federal obstacles to have hudud punishments put into practice in the state.

“We want to test Muslims so that they understand and support this bill to allow Kelantan to implement hudud,” Hadi was reported telling the Federal Territories PAS convention last March.

Hadi’s insistence on tabling his bill caused a rupture with then coalition partner DAP, leading to Pakatan Rakyat’s demise and the departure of the Islamic party’s progressives, who formed Parti Amanah Negara.