Christians in Malaysia on Monday lost their final bid to use the word “Allah” to refer to God with the highest court ruling that the ban on it was lawful, ending the years-long highly divisive legal case in the Muslim-majority nation.
The case was brought by the Catholic Church, which was seeking to overturn a 2007 Government ban on it referring to God by the Arabic word “Allah” in the local Malay-language edition of its Herald newspaper. The Herald, failed to get leave from the Federal Court to challenge the Home Ministry over the ban.
The seven-judge panel in the administrative capital Putrajaya ruled that a lower court decision siding with the Government stood. Chief Justice Ariffin Zakaria, who chaired a seven-man panel on Monday, held this in a majority 4-3 decision. This is the first time that such a large panel has sat to hear and determine the application for leave.
In dismissing the application for leave, Justice Arifin held that the minister’s decision with regard to the ban was lawful and reasonable.”It (the Court of Appeal) applied the correct test, and it is not open for us to interfere,” Arifin said.