With reference to Lim Kit Siang's Blog to the article "Church of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Puchong - why from freehold to 60 yrs lease?". This is an outrage. To see the outrage expressed by Malaysians of different faiths, please refer to the link above.
This isn't the first time this is being done to the Non-Muslim citizens of our "great" nation. You can refer to a previous article that we published on this site with regards to the "Goddess of the Sea". Actually apart from these two recent incidences, there have been others that have gone unpublished. There is a reason for that. One, the media can be biased and this may seem like stirring up racial sentiment. Two, the people affected, being compassionate buddhists/hindus and good Christians, just keep silent and not do anything, for fear of being arrested for sedition or because they don't see the extent of what these precedences mean for our young and the future of Non-Muslims. In summary, they are too Chicken Shit to do something about it.
If we were part of the Malay Muslim community, there will be riots led by people like Khairi as he has clearly shown what he is capable of in the past year, rallying against US Govt Officials. While people like Minister in the PMs department Nazri, tell the rest of us not to aggrevate the Malay community (or else...).
So, what do we do? Be good Christians and turn the other cheek, or perhaps be compassionate Buddhists and meditate on it?
There comes a time when a response is required, one that puts the government in check.
Here is what R had to say:
Even as the PM was talking overseas telling about love and peace and harmony in our multireligious country, there are many fundamentalists trying to derail his statements and prove him wrong.
I am a Catholic. I was informed that our new Church in Puchong, Our Lady of Guadalupe, suddenly faced a “crisis”. This church is in Selangor and you must remember what happened to our application for a church in Shah Alam over 20 years ago. Whether the Selangor govt or just the over-zealous local authorities are behind that problem, I don’t know. But now, it’s happening directly aimed at our church in Puchong.
This Church was actually an old chapel which was asked to relocate owing to housing development and the developers promised to give back a piece of land to rebuild a church. For many years we have been operating from temporary buildings including shifting from shophouse to shophouse. Finally a Church was built on a funny V-shaped piece of land in front of some shophouses just before an industrial area. It looked like remnant, left-over vacant land but beggars can’t be choosers?
The land in the whole area including the land over which the Church is built is freehold land. Now, suddenly out of the blue, we are told that the land on which the Church is built is alienated to a 60 years leasehold whilst the surrounding area is still freehold! Is this not discriminatory?
R has sent a follow-up email:
I just checked with someone. It’s getting complicated here. When SP Setia took over the chapel land (near Tesco Puchong), they promised to give back freehold land. When they finally gave the land for the Church to be built, they said that it was freehold land. Either SP Setia “pulled” a fast one over the first committee who were mostly very trusting estate people or the State government took the opportunity to alter the status.
In the recent May 15, 2007 copy of the “Reach Out” magazine issued free to residents of Puchong by IOI Properties, there is a write-up about the Selangor State Exco, YB Tang See Hang, presenting the approved land title documents to the parish priest.
The tenure of the land was stated as 60 years when all the while the Church was under the impression that the land is freehold. At which stage did the status of the land turn from freehold to leasehold?
By the way the surrounding area is freehold. Right in front of the church is a fenced up freehold land which is earmarked for our community building. Recently we had some banners regarding our activities draped on the fence of this place. MPSJ staff in a MPSJ lorry came in the evening and took away those banners. Why?
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All this talk about freedom of religion and Malaysia being a model for the world in terms of multireligious and multi ethnic society living in peace and harmony is a whitewash. Frankly, it's only because the minority races are the tolerant ones. It is the minority races and religions of Malaysia that ALWAYS turn the other cheek. They don't riot or make such matters into big political issues. However, try to shut down one mosque and see what happens, not even that, just talk about it and see the harsh and violent backlash from our Malay Muslim friends.
People, you have a choice. You can make your dissatisfaction known to the government by voting the other way. Many of us were raised to be Barisan supporters, however, times has changed the people in government and they have become more fanatical than before. UMNO increasingly is becoming arrogant and very much like PAS with such policies, MCA is ball-less and clue-less, while MIC is led by Samy, who will lead for another 20 years - we all know what that means.
Barisan was good to us in the days of old. But these days, the Malay Ultras are fast becoming no different from their competition in PAS. It's time for a change, or at least to balance the power in parliament. As of a few weeks ago, it seemed that Nazri owns the place, using inappropriate language and name calling - shame shame Nazri.
Here are some quotes:
"And where is the source of money used to build mosque? - Gambling tax, sales of alcohol tax, ……well it is not Haram business activities?… But it seems to be alright to build the mosques from Haram source of money…..
If they really care about haram or halal, it it holier to built the mosques from their own worshippers’ donation.:
"In PJ,within less than a square kilometre ,there are at least 10 mosques big and small.Can you imagine that?"
"Churches, buddist and hindu temples get built only through begging…whether for money or favours, whilst mosques get built under Malaysian plans and national budgets. What freedom…its a joke and as a result we lose our image through the eyes of potential investors. Any country which has a negative undercurrent will drive away investors..don’t these idiots know that."
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Also found a link to the Church website... http://www.olgpuchong.org/.
Christians, Hindus and Buddhists, it is time for you to respond. There is no place for religious opression in Malaysia or for these "little napoleons" (or rather little bastard Hitlers) to impose their own brand of governanace upon us.
If you're not going to rally and protest, then, it's time for you to think about where and for whom you cast your votes. We are not opposition supporters, but we seek to attain our basic human rights, and in our case, voting the opposition gives a greater voice to those who will speak for us and NOT against us.
