I,Malaysian!

On the front page of The Star today, there bears a news sensitive enough to embark the angst and confusion in any other human being. The case is so sensitive many people have voiced out their opinions regarding the Religious Law stated in the books of Malaysia.

For those of you who are not familiar with the Lina Joy case, she is a 42-year-old lady who was born a Muslim. But due to certain exposure and interests, she became a Christian and began attending churches and praying for Jesus Christ.

As her days went by of acknowledging herself as a Christian, she one day met a fellow Christian and fell in love. The odd couple wanted to go serious and decided to get married.

But as they were registering to get the contract of marriage from the National Registration Department (NRD), the authoritative personnel refused to give them permission of marriage because Lina's identity card still states "Islam" as her religion. And in accordance to the Islamic Law, Muslims are forbidded to marry a Christian.

Lina tried all the best she could to get the goverment to change her religion from Islam to Christian, but to no avail. So she had no choice but to bring this case to the Federal Court in Malaysia, the highest and most powerful court in the country.

However, because the law has already stated, and in a Majority decision, the Federal Court located at Putra Jaya rejected her appeal to compel the National Registration Department (NRD) to remove the word Islam from her identity card.

The 42-year-old will now have to either subject herself to the jurisdiction of the Syariah Court on whether she is an apostate or seek a review of the Federal Court decision, according to The Star Online.

Chief Justice Ahmad Fairuz Sheikh Abdul Halim ruled that the NRD had reasonably imposed a condition requiring Lina to obtain a certificate of apostasy from the Syariah Court before it proceeds to make the deletion.

The second most senior judge on the Bench, Chief Judge of Sabah and Sarawak Justice Richard Malanjum, however, handed down a dissenting judgment criticising the NRD’s act as “unconstitutional and discriminatory”.

The third judge on the panel, Federal Court judge Justice Alauddin Mohd Sheriff, concurred with the Chief Justice in dismissing Lina’s appeal.

Approached after the judgment, Lina’s lawyer Benjamin Dawson said he was considering filing for a review of the judgment.

As unfair as it seems, there is no use for argumentations as the Law already stated so. Let's hope and pray that there are still other alternatives for Lina and her partner. Brought to you by I,Malaysian! We share, we care.