Centre for a Better Tomorrow (CENBET) denounced Kuala Lumpur City Hall’s (DBKL) move to reject the application for the Better Beer Festival 2017.
CENBET’s board of governors member, Simon Lim said that the act was a slippery slope for banning legal activities.
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For starters, the event’s proposal was rejected, without citing any reason.
Perhaps CENBET did not receive the original copy of the rejection, and assumed ‘politics’ as the explanation for the ban.
Simon also questioned the event by saying that the banning does not go well with a plural society where the rights thereof are guaranteed by the Federal Constitution.
Simon has to remember that the right of Muslims to have a separate legal system is also guaranteed by Item 1 of the State List in the 9th Schedule of the Federal Constitution, CENBET did not think twice about voicing their opposition against the amendment to Act 355.
Are rights only selectively implied to non-Muslims in this country?
What about the Malay Muslim majority in a democratic nation?
Does the minority rule over majority?
That would not be democratic by any means, would it?
Another instance is of Lim Guan Eng, he too is a staunch critic of the move.
Being a patron of Oktoberfest in Pulau Pinang himself, he could not help but lambast DBKL for the ban, and said that non-Muslims should feel offended and disturbed, as though he was insinuating non-Muslims to actually feel offended if they were not.
Guan Eng however, never thought about offending the Muslims when he stood to object the amendment to Act 355.
Apparently, only non-Muslims can be offended, despite Lim Kit Siang’s statement that DAP supports Islamisation based on the Federal Constitution.
Kit Siang should know that the Federal Constitution in Article 3(1) states that, “Non-Muslims can practice their religion in peace and harmony in any part of the Federation.”
Father and son seemingly do not agree with each other on this issue.
Possibly, it could have been due to a misunderstanding between the two.
The pretext to practising any other religion in this country is ‘peace and harmony’, hence DBKL taking into account the event’s offensive nature towards Muslims chose to reject the application.
It would not have been in peace and harmony if it were offensive, would it?
MCA, DAP, PKR quickly joined forces this time around, putting their differences and ideologies aside.
Supporting beer and opposing the amendment to Act 355, supposedly the biggest unifying factor between DAP, MCA and Gerakan.
DAP is quick to act when they feel ‘offended’.
As a matter of fact, they are offended easily and often, but do not bat an eye when they are being offensive.
Guan Eng did mention that political sensitivities are no reason to ban the beer fest.
Conceivably, Guan Eng should not have been sensitive when removing PAS representatives from offices of the Penang Government.
Perhaps, it is time that we learned how to live among each other as a democracy and not an autocracy.
Opinion(s) of the majority matter, and it is the very nature of democracy that the majority rules.
Without being confused with the version of democracy as practiced by the neighbour down south, people can actually vote for a different party during elections.
The more DAP and the likes edge towards an Islamophobic ideology, the more they lose in support from the majority of the country’s population.
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