The Syariah Court in Penang has allowed a Chinese convert to renounce Islam in a rare decision today.
Apostasy, or renouncing the faith, is one of the gravest sins in Islam and a very sensitive issue in Malaysia where the Islamic courts have rarely allowed such renunciations and have also jailed apostates.
Syariah Court judge Othman Ibrahim said he had no choice but to allow an application by cook Siti Fatimah Tan Abdullah to renounce her faith and return to Buddhism.
“The court has no choice but to declare that Siti Fatimah Tan Abdullah is no longer a Muslim as she has never practised the teachings of Islam,” Othman told a packed courtroom.
“I order the conversion certificate to be nullified,” he added.
Siti Fatimah or Tan Ean Huang, 38, said she had never practised Islamic teachings since she converted in 1998 and only did so to enable her to marry Iranian Ferdoun Ashanian.
The couple married in 2004 but since then her husband has left her following which she filed for the renunciation.
Quoted froml Malaysiakini.
Certainly the Penang Syariah Court did the right thing in nullifying Siti Fatimah’s conversion certificate. With this decision from the Syariah Court, she should have no problem removing her religious status from Islam to Buddhism on her MyKad.
Cases like Siti Fatimah’s should be cause for Malaysia to review its non-recognition of marriages between a Muslim and a non-Muslim. If marriages between a Muslim and a non-Muslim is recognized then cases like Siti Fatimah’s would be a thing of the past.
In most marriages involving a Muslim and a non-Muslim, the non-Muslim’s conversion to Islam is not out of conviction but a necessity in order to fulfill the legal requirement; that is in order for the marriage to be recognized and legal in the eyes of the Malaysian law regarding marriages.
I don’t know if the syariah courts in the other states will use this case as a precedent when faced with a similar case of a muallaf seeking to renounce Islam. In the Nonya Tahir case, Pak Lah said it was proof that non-Muslims can get justice in the syariah court. Big deal. In the first place, a non-Muslim has no business having his/her case heard in the syariah court!
It used to be that it wasn’t too difficult for a non-Malay who converted to Islam because of marriage to a Muslim, to renounce Islam when that marriage dissolved. With the current sentiment against apostasy in Malaysia, I am not too sure anymore.
With this ruling in favor of Siti Fatimah, others caught in a similar situation where their conversion to Islam was not because of conviction, would no doubt seek to renounce the faith that they had never actually practised.