WHILE Prime Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob has been
asking Malaysians, since his inaugural speech on 22 Aug 2021, to set aside
their differences and come together to lift the country to greater heights and
help realise the Shared Prosperity Vision 2030, he seems oblivious that a
Government agency is clearly going against the Malaysian Family spirit.
Six months ago, I asked, “Apart from Allah, why is the word
‘Tuhan’ exclusive for Muslims too?” (Focus
Malaysia, 17 April 2021). This issue was highlighted when I noticed
a “silent” movement going on, undermining the religious rights of non-Muslims
in Malaysia.
Ismail stressed that the Malaysian Family (Keluarga Malaysia) is
an inclusive concept that cuts across religious, ethnic, and racial boundaries
and encourages Malaysians to come together as a unified family.
What I noticed in Meredah Kabus, an anthology
published by Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka (DBP), the Government’s language and
literature body, was doing totally the opposite.
In all the short stories in the anthology, whenever a non-Muslim
author wrote “Tuhan”
(God), it was changed to “tuhan”
(god) without their consent. More surprisingly, “Tuhan” was retained when the author is a Muslim.
After this unfair practice was highlighted, DBP initially claimed
“it was oblivious on the ‘Tuhan’ controversy” and that “DBP made no such ruling
to differentiate between ‘Tuhan’ and ‘tuhan’” (Focus Malaysia, 19 April
2021).
But the very next day, its director general Datuk Abang
Salehuddin Abg Shokeran in an official statement defended its
decision to make a distinction between the words “Tuhan” for monotheistic
religion and “tuhan” for polytheistic faiths.
DBP made it clear that “Tuhan” can only be used to refer to Allah. The language and
literature agency has slowly but surely become a fascist organisation that goes
all out to undermine non-Muslims in general.
Many non-Muslim individuals and NGOs were furious after reading
DBP’s nonsensical explanation – see here. People started
asking about “Tuhan” in the Negaraku (national
anthem) and the very first principle in Rukun Negara; “Kepercayaan kepada Tuhan”.
But everything fell on deaf ears; clearly against the Malaysian Family spirit
which our prime minister is eagerly talking about.
On 23 April 2021, I sent an e-mail seeking a meeting with Abang
Salehuddin to discuss the matter. I was told that DBP would need some time to
get back to me since it was Ramadan (fasting month).
And that was the end of it. The media too lost interest to follow
up after a month of silence from DBP. Perhaps the authorities in DBP assumed
that everything would be forgotten in due time.
On my side, I have been writing for DBP since 1992. I also
encourage others to submit their works to magazines published by DBP. On 21 May
2021, I officially decided to boycott
this fascist and racist organisation.
Since Ismail is busy promoting the Malaysian Family concept and
also asking every ministry and agency to identify suitable products to be
adopted as part of the effort to meet the people’s need, I could not help but
wonder how DBP could ever fit into this.
Obviously, the prime minister and education minister are in the
dark about the “Tuhan”
and “tuhan” fiasco.
Nevertheless, the recent racist and fascist policy practiced by DBP would
slowly but surely destroy Malaysian Family to the core.
Since the national language and literature is important for nation-building
from a very young age, DBP at present is clearly nothing more than a subversive
movement to create disunity among the Muslims and non-Muslims in this country.
Ismail is introducing the Key Happiness Outcome (KHO) to
complement the Key Performance Index (KPI) as an evaluation tool to measure
each Government agency’s effectiveness under the Malaysian Family policy.
No such KPI and KHO is needed for DBP as it is already obvious
that this particular organisation is nowhere close to the Malaysian Family
spirit in anything they do at present.
As long as DBP stands by its bigoted decision that “Tuhan” can only be
used to refer to Allah, Ismail can forget about getting an ounce of
contribution from this language and literature agency towards the success of
his policy.
While the prime minister wants to see a united Malaysia, DBP seems
to be working very hard (except in Ramadan, perhaps) in making sure non-Muslims
and non-Malays in general would never, ever be part of the family. They are to
be forever treated as outsiders and second-class citizens. DBP clearly knows
that Bahasa Malaysia is an effective
tool to degrade non-Muslims.
Ismail has stressed that despite our diversity in religion, race,
and ethnicity, we are all part of the Malaysian Family; we complement and need
each other as different parts of a single body. Perhaps for DBP, non-Muslims
are seen only as the anus.
The 12th Malaysian Plan has been
formulated with the objective of “A Prosperous, Inclusive Sustainable Malaysia”
and also formulated based on the “bottom-up” approach where the voices of all
the stakeholders are given due consideration.
Perhaps the prime minister is unaware that DBP is subversively
working totally against the Malaysian Family concept by making sure non-Muslims
are denied the right to even write the word “Tuhan”
using a capital T.