KUALA LUMPUR (UCAN): The Civil High Court in Penang, Malaysia rejected a 57-year-old woman’s bid to return to Christianity, saying on June 26 that it has no power to hear renunciation cases.
The court refused to hear a petition of the woman seeking a judicial review to overturn an earlier decision from the Sharia Court, the Malay Mail reported on August 4.
The name of the woman, a mother of three, was not published to protect her privacy, the report said.
Judge Quay Chew Soon of the Penang High Court rejected the woman’s plea and signed his judgment dated July 17. But it was only recently released, it was reported.
The woman, who was born into a Christian family, had converted to Islam for marriage in 1995. She and her husband divorced in 2013 and she wanted to return to her original faith but the Islamic Sharia court refused her permission. The Sharia High Court rejected her application in 2020, and the Sharia Appellate Court affirmed the decision this year.
“The issue of conversion, be it into or out of Islam, concerns the principles of Islamic faith and creed,” Quay said on August 2 explaining the grounds of the judgment, Free Malaysia Today reported.
It necessitates the determination to be made by those who are truly knowledgeable and understand the religion…
Judge Quay Chew Soon
“It necessitates the determination to be made by those who are truly knowledgeable and understand the religion to its depths,” he added.
The woman had sought six orders from the civil High Court, including a declaration that she is a person professing Christianity and that state Islamic laws do not apply to her, citing that the Sharia court’s decisions are invalid and inconsistent with the Federal Constitution, the Malay Mail reported.
While the court’s decision does not mean her application for judicial review has been rejected, it does the court has decided not to hear the lawsuit seeking the six court orders.
Her bid to return to Christianity faced a stumbling block after the Selangor Islamic Religious Council [MAIS] filed an application at the Sharia High Court. That court asked her to first undergo 12 counselling sessions with an Ustaz [Muslim cleric] that lasted about a year.
At the Shariah High Court, the woman, a bishop from her Church, and a MAIS officer testified in the proceedings on her bid to renounce Islam.
After dismissing the woman’s application to renounce Islam on 23 July 2020, the Sharia High Court ordered her to attend further counselling sessions for 60 days. Her appeal against the order was dismissed by the Selangor Sharia Court of Appeal in January.
