-M. Kulasegaran, Member of Parliament, June 7, 2014.

Wanita MCA National Chairman Heng Seai Kie has today called on the government to amend the laws regarding unilateral conversion of minors.

She said that while the court’s decision to give custody of the child to S Deepa was correct, Article 12(4) must be amended in order to avoid future inconsistencies and possibilities for parents to exploit state religious authorities to gain custody of minors.

What Heng said is correct, but she needs to answer one question –what has MCA done all this while when the government did not follow up on the 2009 April Cabinet’s decision banning unilateral conversions of minors?

Similarly, why did the other component BN parties like MIC, Gerakan fail to ensure that the necessary law changes are presented to Parliament?

It has to be noted that MCA and Gerakan were represented in the Cabinet before last year’s general election while MIC leaders have always been in the Cabinet.

Can Heng explain why the MCA, MIC and Gerakan leaders have been sleeping on their jobs?

DAP has always been in the forefront fighting against the unilateral conversion of minors and we welcomed the Cabinet’s decision in April 2009 to ban such conversion.

The Cabinet had then decided that children remain in the religion of the parents at the time of marriage, should one of them decide to convert to Islam. It also decided that outstanding issues in a marriage must be settled before conversion to avoid children from becoming the victims.

Five years have passed, yet the Cabinet has failed to introduce the necessary law changes to effectively stop the unilateral conversions. Neither has the government given any indication as to when the laws will be amended.

Learn from Indonesia

Deepa is not the first and the only person to suffer the pain and plight due to the unilateral conversion of minors.

M. Indira Gandhi of Ipoh too faced such similar pain and plight when her husband converted to Islam and subsequently converted their three children before claiming custody over them at the Syariah court.

I have raised the issue of interreligious custody battle in Parliament and I wish to remind the government that there must be no further delay in passing legislation to ban conversions to Islam as a means to gain custody of children.

It has to be noted that Indonesia which has the biggest Muslim population in the world has no problems relating to conversion cases. We have much to learn from the Indonesia authorities!