1. Council of Churches of Malaysia (http://www.ccmalaysia.org)
CCM Youth Protests the Prohibition of the Use of Bahasa Malaysia in The Herald - The Catholic Weekly
7 January 2009
Pemuda Majlis Gereja Malayisa Membantah Larangan ke atas Gereja Katolik Menggunakan Bahasa Malaysia dalam Penerbitan Mingguan The Herald - The Catholic Weekly.
Pemuda CCM juga berpendapat bahawa larangan edisi Bahasa Malaysia ini tidak munasabah, malah tidak adil saksama. Bukankah gereja kita diterima sebagai sebahagian masyarakat majmuk negara tercinta kita? Negara Malaysia sangat bangga dengan masyarakat majmuknya di mana rakyat berbilang bangsa, kaum dan agama hidup bebas, aman dan damai. Oleh itu, ia sangat menghairankan kenapa segolongan rakyatnya sekarang tidak dibenarkan menggunakan Bahasa Malaysia, biarpun untuk terbitan the Herald yang terhad untuk penganut Kristian dan istilah Allah telah digunakan oleh penganut Kristian di Malaysia sejak generasi-generasi yang lalu.
Pemuda Majlis Gereja Malaysia (Pemuda CCM / CCM Youth) merasa kesal dan bimbang atas larangan Kementerian Dalam Negeri (KDN) terhadap gereja Katolik menerbitkan edisi bahasa Malaysia akhbar The Herald-The Catholic Weekly.
Di samping itu, bukankah orang beragama Kristian di negara ini juga warganegara yang berhak dan patut digalak menggunakan bahasa kebangsaannya dalam segala urusan hariannya? Bahasa Malaysia adalah hakmilik bersama. Sering kita mendengar seruan pemimpin-pemimpin negara kita agar rakyat Malaysia berbahasa Malaysia. Oleh sedemikian, Pemuda CCM berasa hairan atas larangan KDN ini. Larangan KDN ini adalah tidak adil dan, malah, merupakan sesuatu penindasan atau diskriminasi terhadap penganut Kristian yang berbahasa (dan berbangsa) Malaysia.
Pemuda Majlis Gereja Malaysia membantah larangan KDN ke atas Gereja Katolik menerbitkan edisi Bahasa Malaysia akhbar The Herald-The Catholic Weekly. Kami meminta kerajaan Malaysia supaya menghentikan penindasan oleh KDN ini dan membatal larangan tersebut, demi kebebasan rakyat beragama Kristian. Kami juga membuat tuntutan bahawa perkataan Allah yang digunakan antara golongan Kristian di negara-negara Arab, Indonesia, dan juga di Sabah dan Sarawak telah lama digunakan.
CCM Youth regrets and is concerned over the Home Ministry's prohibition of the use of Bahasa Malaysia in the Roman Catholic Church's publication The Herald-The Catholic Weekly.
CCM Youth is of the opinion that the prohibition is sheer nonsense and unjust. Are not our churches an accepted part of our beloved country? We are, after all, quick and proud to tell the world of our multi-cultural and multi-religious society living freely in peace and harmony. It is, therefore, ironic that a segment of our very own Malaysian community is prohibited from using our national language which is Bahasa Malaysia, even more so that it is restricted to The Herald, a Roman Catholic publication that is read by only Christians, and just because of a dispute over the word "Allah" has been used by Malaysian Christians since generations ago.Furthermore, are not Malaysian Christians also citizens who, not only have the right to, but should be encouraged to use their national language in all their daily affairs? We reiterate that the national language belongs to all Malaysians and it is our right to use it. We so often hear our leaders encouraging and stressing the importance of using our national language. CCM Youth, therefore, finds the Home Ministry's ruling very strange. It is not only an injustice but, more seriously, also openly discriminates against Malaysian Christians who speak Bahasa Malaysia.
CCM Youth objects to the Home Ministry's ruling. We urge the Government of Malaysia to stop this discrimination and to withdraw the ruling, for the sake of freedom of Malaysian Christians. We also stress that the word "Allah" has long been in use by Christians even in the Middle East had also in Indonesia, Sabah and Sarawak.
Daniel Chai
Youth Secretary (Setiausaha Pemuda)
CCM Youth Committee (Pemuda Majlis Gereja-Gereja Malaysia)
2. Asia News.It (http://www.asianews.it)
Catholic weekly the Herald resumes publishing, but cannot use the word Allah, 9 January 2009
A contradictory statement from the interior ministry permits the publication of the weekly paper in 2009, but leaves open the possibility of revisiting the case, and therefore the risk of closure. The beginning of the affair goes back to December of 2007, with the ban on the use of the word Allah. Since then, the government has repeatedly changed its position.
Kuala Lumpur (AsiaNews) - A new page in the story of the Herald, the only Catholic weekly in Malaysia, which since December of 2007 has opened a dispute with the government, which wants to ban it from using the word "Allah" to indicate "God."
On December 31, the interior ministry faxed to the newspaper's offices a letter in which it permits the paper to print, for another year, the editions in various languages, including the local Bahasa Malaysia. But the same communication contains a ban: it prohibits the use of Bahasa Malayu, the local language written in Arabic script.
The weekly will inform its readers of developments in the case with an editorial dated January 11. In it, the editorial board expresses its confusion over a communication that is, if not contradictory, at least ambiguous. The Herald, in fact, has never used Arabic characters for its publication in the Malaysian language. That would make the ban superfluous, but given recent events, the publishers are asking "what is the ministry trying to tell us?"
The dispute over the weekly, produced by the diocese of Kuala Lumpur, opened more than a year ago with the government's prohibition against using the word Allah in its publications. The use of the word "on the part of non-Muslims," the prohibition said at the time, "could increase tension and cause confusion among Muslims in the country."
Although the Herald has gone through periods of closure, it has continued publication, and in the meantime the archbishop of the capital, Murphy Pakiam, has taken the government to court in an effort to clarify the situation. The country's legal system leaves ample room for interpretation, because on the federal-civil level it is regulated by the constitution, but it also has a juridical-religious level that is supposed to apply only to Muslims, and is regulated by Koranic law.
On the basis of the ambiguity created by this twofold structure, the Islamic religious councils of seven Malaysian states and the Malaysian Chinese Muslim Association have joined the seemingly endless legal dispute.
According to the Herald, the contradictory communication from the ministry conceals the attempt to avoid a definitive resolution to the dispute. The unwillingness of the ministry to offer clarification is of concern to the publishers, who face the prospect of having to shut down. Essentially, the government has permitted it to resume publishing the edition in Bahasa Malaysia, but not to use the word Allah, reserving the right to decide on this matter in the future.
As the upcoming editorial states, the edition in Bahasa Malaysia is the most widely read, reaching 600,000 of the weekly's 800,000 readers. The local language is, in fact, the most widespread among the population that has received a basic education, the "bumiputera," a term derived from the Sanskrit, meaning "sons of the earth."
3. Sun2Surf（http://www.sun2surf.com/article.cfm?id=29092）
Herald keeps its Bahasa Malaysia section, 9 January 2009
by Hemananthani Sivanandam
KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 9, 2009): The Home Ministry has allowed the publishers of "Herald- The Catholic Weekly" to continue with its Bahasa Malaysia section, overturning an earlier licencing condition that the church had immediately rejected.
In a letter dated Jan 7, the ministry allowed the continued publication of the Catholic Church's weekly newsletter's Bahasa Malaysia section, but prohibited the use of the word "Allah", an issue for judicial review that has yet to be decided.
Herald editor Father Lawrence Andrews told theSun he will continue to use the word "Allah" in future editions.
This week's edition of Herald, dated Jan 11, however, will not have the Bahasa Malaysia section in keeping with the ministry's licensing condition. This is because the removal of the condition came after the edition had been completed.
Last month, the publishers of the Catholic weekly were given the green light by the ministry to publish the newsletter. But the approval letter stated that the Bahasa Malaysia section in the Herald had to be stopped until the court decided on the use of the word "Allah".
The church however wrote to the ministry to reject the condition, on the grounds that it curtailed the constitutional right to freedom of expression and also went against the spirit of the National Language Act. It argued that many Christians, especially the Bumiputras in Sabah and Sarawak, still used Bahasa Malaysia to worship in church.
Herald has a circulation of around 14,000 in Malaysia, and is only sold in churches.
On Andrews's insistence on using the word "Allah" until the matter had been decided by the court, the ministry's head of Publications Control and Quranic Text Control Division, Che Din Yusoh, told theSun: "We’ll wait and see. When they publish the newsletter, we will review it and take the necessary action."
When asked about the change in licensing condition, Che Din said the ministry reviewed the matter. "We don’t want to be seen as rigid and unreasonable. However, we will wait until the court decides," said Che Din.
4. The Star Online (http://thestar.com.my)
No ruling against use of BM in the Herald, 10 January 2009
PETALING JAYA: The Home Ministry has never prohibited the use of Bahasa Malaysia in the Roman Catholic Church’s publication The Herald.
“The ministry is only against the use of the word ‘Allah’ to refer to God. The correct and appropriate translation for God in Bahasa Malaysia or Melayu is ‘Tuhan’,” said the ministry’s Quran Publication Control and Text Division Secretary Che Din Yusoh in a statement yesterday.
He made the statement in response to the Council of Churches Youth Committee statement on Wednesday that said it regretted the ministry’s ruling prohibiting the publication from using Bahasa Malaysia.
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