Morality policing in Malaysia
has certainly gone lopsidedly loony.
Who would have imagined a
mere staff of Borders charged before the Syariah High Court for “distributing by way of selling the book entitled, Allah, Liberty and Love (The Courage to Reconcile Faith and Freedom”).
WTH???!
Technically, the charge could well be valid since Nik Raina Nik Abdul Aziz was the Mid Valley outlet’s store manager, but logically, neither the books by Irshad Manji nor the outlet, Borders, are hers to start with.
Technically, the charge could well be valid since Nik Raina Nik Abdul Aziz was the Mid Valley outlet’s store manager, but logically, neither the books by Irshad Manji nor the outlet, Borders, are hers to start with.
Nik Raina faces a RM3,000
fine or a maximum of two years' jail or both under Section 13(1) of the Syariah
Criminal Offences Act (Federal Territories) 1997, if convicted.
Am
really not sure how the charge is worded but going by the Star’s phrasing of “distributing by way of selling”; it seems to be one of
strict liability. Legal eagles would definitely be able to explain this to all
us layman.
A store manager, huh?
Didn’t
have the balls to go after the real owner, is it? Borders, according to the
Star, belong to Berjaya Books Sdn Bhd.
Look
at the penalty for God’s sake and tell me if it’s just?
A
bookstore staff…
Did she have like total
control over the outlet? Over the procurement of all books?
How many books do Borders
have in stock?
The one at the Curve in
Damansara seems to have like a billion books from the
most innocent My First ABC to the horrendously explicit Brian
Azzarello’s 100 Bullets series (to cite an example).
But of course, the latter isn’t
something that is "deemed to be against the Islamic Law (Hukum Syarak)" even if it does feature
gratuitous sex and violence every other issue.
Is Nik Raina’s charging to
set an example? Couldn’t she be just slapped with a mere warning to take the
books out within a certain period - her convictions on the book’s contents and the banning
act notwithstanding?
How in heaven’s name are
Muslims supposed to show that Islam is the perfect Addin when you have
something so logically, chronically unjust?
What others see is the
authorities picking on the easiest of targets to make an example of.
Someone like Nik Raina.
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