For Sarawak Christians, it is time to wake up

With odds stacked high against them, Barisan Nasional had decided to go all in by calling a historical bluff. This bluff is non other than their reassurance to East Malaysian Christians that the Malay bible issue had been resolved. Prime Minister Najib Razak said that the controversy over the bibles is no longer an issue as a 10 point proposal had been tabled by the Minister in the PM’s Department, Idris Jala.
What Najib Razak had failed in his capacity as Prime Minister, is to understand the difference between a proposal and a binding regulation or law. A proposal remains a proposal, and is subject to further and future amendments by UMNO. With the unveiling of the proposal being said to be well-timed right before the Sarawak state elections, many believe that UMNO will act according to their wimps and fancies, and conveniently sweep the issue under the carpet after the elections.

It wouldn’t come as a surprise if the proposal is wiped off after 16th April, and UMNO will start singing to the tune of Perkasa and Ibrahim Ali, who had repeatedly stirred religious and racial tensions by taunting the 10 point proposal. He said yesterday that Malays have been patient for “far too long” and have allowed non-Malays to make excessive demands. The silence and inaction of the Barisan Nasional government over the continuous irresponsible and racist remarks by Perkasa shows to prove that 1Malaysia continues to be overwhelmed by Ketuanan Melayu.
The 10-point proposal by UMNO also drew lukewarm response from Christian leaders, who repeatedly labeled it as a rushed-proposal. Besides that, the Council of Churches of Malaysia (CCM) had also refuted the proposal, by calling it superfluous. In the CCM’s very own 10 point statement, it was stated that Christians of Malaysia did not ask for anything extra, but only for their rights enshrined under the federal constitution of Malaysia.
In fact, if the Najib regime is to protect constitutional rights of the Christians and to ensure freedom of religion, he and the Attorney-General's Chambers should first drop the appeal against the high court's decision of allowing Christians to use the word 'Allah'.
Besides that, the expanding list of removal of ‘Christian fellowships’ in public schools and universities, and the erosion of the control of mission schools are instant proofs that it is UMNO and the Barisan Nasional coalition who had denied Malaysian Christians their constitutional rights.
Najib and UMNO's stance in issues revolving around Christians was also of stark contrast from that of the usually conservative PAS. PAS leaders had all these while been leaping to the defence of the Christians when these issues arose. It is only UMNO who had been toying with the sentiments of the Malaysian Christians.
With 43 per cent of Sarawakians being Christians, Najib and his desperate coalition is willing to tell any blatant lies and pledges just to cling on to power. It is therefore up to Sarawak Christians to either believe or rebut the pledges and proposals through the ballot boxes.