{"id":2279,"date":"2008-08-07T22:30:20","date_gmt":"2008-08-07T14:30:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/borninmalaysia\/2008\/08\/07\/playing-to-the-gallery\/"},"modified":"2008-08-07T22:30:29","modified_gmt":"2008-08-07T14:30:29","slug":"playing-to-the-gallery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/borninmalaysia\/2008\/08\/07\/playing-to-the-gallery\/","title":{"rendered":"playing to the gallery"},"content":{"rendered":"<div align=\"justify\">On one side, there&#8217;s <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/borninmalaysia\/2008\/08\/07\/forum-on-conversion-under-attack-as-another-convert-faces-problem\/\">condemnation<\/a> of the Bar Council organised forum on conversion, but at MCCBCHST&#8217;s dinner yesterday, Prime Minister Badawi sang a <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nst.com.my\/Current_News\/NST\/Thursday\/National\/2314481\/Article\/index_html\">different tune<\/a>. He says that more interfaith dialogues should be held to ensure continuous harmony among Malaysians of different religions. He would ask Unity, Culture, Arts and Heritage Minister Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal to continue having such dialogues.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I will tell Shafie to do what is good and have such meetings as regularly as he can. At some of these meetings, I plan to sit in, too,&#8221; he said at the silver jubilee dinner of the Malaysian Consultative Council of Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Sikhism and Taoism.<\/p>\n<p>Abdullah assured those present that what he said was not merely a ploy to pacify and please non-Muslims.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I understand your concerns and try to do whatever I can to find solutions to issues involving non-Muslims. We are brothers and sisters who must work together and continue practising tolerance and patience as a way forward for this nation.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Abdullah said non-Muslims, however, must understand and respect that matters relating to the aqidah (faith) of Islam could  neither be &#8220;touched&#8221; nor &#8220;changed&#8221;. But he assured non-Muslims that<br \/>they would be treated fairly and justly as required by the Quran and Allah. &#8220;When we are friends, between Muslims and the non-Muslims, it is easy to work things out.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Abdullah said he had been entrusted with the responsibility of looking after the affairs of all Malaysians.  &#8220;For me, justice for all is the most important thing. It is the command of Allah to be trustworthy in executing my duties. The people have trusted me and expect me to deliver. &#8220;I am here to assure you that all are protected and can enjoy living in Malaysia as Malaysians.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Earlier, the council&#8217;s president, Datuk A. Vaithilingam, said members had discovered that by sitting together and talking through interfaith differences, potential flashpoints and major problems could be avoided and disputes settled peacefully and amicably. However, he claimed many non-Muslims felt marginalised in today&#8217;s Malaysia.<\/p>\n<p>Well, can&#8217;t blame him. Politicians have to say things according to the situation. We can&#8217;t trust them. <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On one side, there&#8217;s condemnation of the Bar Council organised forum on conversion, but at MCCBCHST&#8217;s dinner yesterday, Prime Minister Badawi sang a different tune. He says that more interfaith dialogues should be held to ensure continuous harmony among Malaysians of different religions. He would ask Unity, Culture, Arts and Heritage Minister Datuk Seri Shafie [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,10],"tags":[112,113,28,225,302],"class_list":["post-2279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-borninmalaysia","category-religion","tag-discrimination","tag-intolerance","tag-mccbchst","tag-politicians","tag-religion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2279"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2279\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/poobalan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}