You can’t rent out property with a ‘racial preference’ and still want ICERD — Hafidz Baharom
Not everyone wants to have the same equal treatment with the Bangladeshi and Indonesian construction workers, do they?
Hafidz Baharom, The Malay Mail Online
Landlords are coming out saying that they should have a choice of who to rent their properties to. On the other hand, some of those wanting to be allowed to list their “racial preference” on rental properties also wanted the government to ratify the United Nations’ International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD).
In an earlier letter to the media, I did point out that the want to set race as a precondition to renting out property to someone was extremely xenophobic, thus against the spirit of ICERD.
As such, the community bans on not wanting to rent to Africans, the cases in Penang and Petaling Jaya where there was discrimination against Chindian individuals wanting to rent, and even the bad choice of words by the Chief Minister of Penang in saying migrant workers should live in hostels because “some of them cause social ills”, really need to be considered.
Because – let us be honest here – I believe the idea of ratifying ICERD was NOT to stop racial discrimination in all shapes and forms against everyone, but just wanting to remove Bumiputera privileges which many see as institutionalised racism.
Not everyone wants to have the same equal treatment with the Bangladeshi and Indonesian construction workers, do they? Does everyone believe in the concept of equal renting opportunity for everyone, inclusive of the people from the African continent?
Why not?
After all, ICERD means to remove “all forms of racial discrimination” — not just the Bumiputera and non-Bumiputera divide, but also for everyone in the country, including foreigners from those branded expats all the way to migrant workers and even domestic house maids.
