Hudud For Dummies

Hantu Laut

Blessings can come in any form of surprises.A year ago I have written off MCA, Gerakan and MIC, that they have become irrelevant and would be trashed by DAP at the polls and I still hold that view until Lady Luck came knocking on the door.Recent development has changed the political climate.

Just two days ago DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang posted an article written by one Thomas Lee exacerbating the end of MCA and Gerakan.Likewise, for the past one year I have written a number of articles predicting the same of MCA and Gerakan. Indeed, just three weeks ago that would have still been the case if not for hudud.

Here, another writer, also courtesy of Kit Siang's blog who got all riled up with the Star's report on hudud and said he made a colossal mistake of reading the MCA-owned ragsheet ?? ( not in dictionary yet, probably Manglish)

Sometimes, things can happen when you least expected it.Call it karma or blessing in disguise if you wish, but whatever it is MCA fortunes may be on the rise again after Anwar's big blunder of supporting hudud law and PAS determination to implement hudud not only in Kelantan but for the whole nation if they get Putrajaya.

Nik Aziz and Hadi Awang have, in no uncertain terms, declared they are determined to pursue their religious ideals.......to pass hudud to make Malaysia a truly Islamic nation.

Surprisingly, some non-Muslims writers show support for hudud either out of ignorance, political pursuance or pathetic lies.Ask a Chinese in private and would hear a completely different story. The version exuded by Pakatan's propaganda machine is dissimilar to the ones coming from the hearts.

I have in the past asserted that PAS is a leopard that will not change its spots no matter what its other partners say.Many Malaysians have been misled to believe otherwise, particularly, by DAP, who desperately wanted to be part of the Federal government to push forward its own agenda.

To PAS and PKR leaders, hudud has become the "buzz" word, a war cry to attract right-wing Muslims, comprising a very significant segment of the Malay population in rural and semi-urban areas.With the promise of implementing hudud they hope to break UMNO's stranglehold on rural Malays outside Kelantan.

As I have anticipated the so called liberal road or the rise of the Erdogen faction in the party was a lure set up by DAP to pacify and subdue the Chinese voters.PAS has no intention of giving in to DAP. The real PAS is beginning to show its true colour and DAP is whimpering as what to do next.

Malaysia already have the mild form of shariah which deals mainly with family law and minor offences but have excluded the harsher form of punishments.

Hudud is one of the four categories of punishment under Islamic Penal Law.The rest are shown below:

Qisas: retaliation which literally means an eye for an eye.

Tazir: corporal punishment usually dispense by a judge.

Diyya: compensation paid to heirs of victim, usually blood money paid in a murder case or personal injury.

Hudud deals with fixed punishments for serious crimes such as murder,theft,robbery,adultery/fornication, drinking alcohol and apostasy (not all imams or jurists consider apostasy as hudud offense).Malaysia do not at the moment consider apostasy as hudud offense but once implemented apostates may have to face the letter of the law.

Punishments for hudud ranges from decapitation for murder, to chopping of hands for theft and stoning to death for adultery.

Every Malaysian including yours truly here believe that Malaysia would never be able to apply hudud law due to composition of our population and representations in parliament.On the surface, it is true, but in reality it is not.

What you see at the present moment is the superficiality of the BN power sharing formula giving comfort to the other races.It may not happen now but it certainly can in the near future.With many marginal seats that can swing to the Malays with a bit of gerrymandering, the home truth will strike home sooner than you would have realised.

Do not underestimate that the Malays can't rule on its own, even at the moment, they can if they wish to with a simple majority, but it would be foolhardy as the time is not ripe yet to do so, but if pushed to the ground they may have no choice but to exercise that option, which will be a sad day for Malaysia.

I am not in favour of one communal party rule but I'll not rule out the danger of it happening and, of course the less initiated, the Malay intelligentsia, the smart aleck and the not too smart aleck would have a field day calling me by all sort of names..........anyway, I am not perturbed, it's just my opinion, which I am entitled to, wrong or otherwise.

The political stability, economic stability and pluralism that have made us one of the economic tigers before is an evanescent bubble and becoming more and more elusive due to political instability. With the threatening implementation of hudud looming on the horizon we may see further erosion in these areas.

Some Muslim friends I talked to were under the impression that we can be like Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States, where, in spite of hudud law the economy prosper.That is spiteful ignorance and wishful thinking.We can never be like the Saudis who can sit on their arses for next hundred years and need not work hard a single day yet the money will come pouring into the state coffers because they have the biggest oil deposit on the face of this earth.Foreign investors do not go to Saudi Arabia to invest, they go there to sell all kind of colossal projects to steal the Saudis money. They don't need foreign tourists too, they have 2 to 3 million tourists every year ordained by Allah.

Without Allah's gifts Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States would be the poorest countries on earth.Whether accidental or by divine intervention most oil deposits with cheapest extraction costs are located in mostly Muslims countries yet many of them are still disgracefully backward, poor and ruled by tyrannical leaders.

Let us take Libya as one example which is oil rich but the people are still poor.It has per capita income of around $14,000 (PPP), the same as Malaysia.

Below are figures in comparison with Malaysia.

Country Pop(mil).......GDP (bil)... Per Capita ......Oil Production/Export

Malaysia .....28 ..........$414.............$14,700 ............664,800 bbl/day

Libya ........6.5 ...............90 ................14,000 .........1,779,000 bbl/day

You can see the huge discrepancies and senseless figures coming out of Libya. It has small population, huge oil export and a GDP almost 4 times smaller than Malaysia.Muammar Gaddafi has completely screwed up the country, stifled freedom,suppressed the people, siphoned oil money and made no effort at all to introduce other economic activities, solely dependent on oil revenues.When the oil fields run dry the Libyan people may have to eat sands.

We should not be looking at the Arab countries or for that matter not even Western democracies as examples, we should be looking at countries like Japan,South Korea,Taiwan and Singapore that have progressed so far ahead, they must have the right formula for success.China, a much bigger country was not ashamed to admit they followed Singapore economic policy in the early days when it first opened its doors to the outside world.

Hudud is not suitable for Malaysia, not just yet and don't forget politicians seldom keep their promises.