The G25 took issue with a Federal Court ruling in September that had upheld Selangor’s shariah criminal offences enactment as valid law.
They maintained that Section 16 of the enactment violated the Federal Constitution’s protection of free speech, and pointed out that only Parliament was empowered to restrict basic freedoms.
Such a power was not within the rights of state legislatures, the group said.
The group pointed out that the Ninth Schedule of the constitution explicitly defined “newspaper; publication; publishers, printing and printing presses” as matters only for parliamentary action.
The group’s statement was in support of Ezra’s legal challenge to the Selangor syariah court’s authority to restrict publication on religious grounds.
In May 2012, Selangor religious officials seized 180 copies of the translated book “Allah, Kebebasan dan Cinta” from the office of Ezra’s company ZI Publications.
He was charged in March 2013 for publishing the book, which the Selangor religious authorities say is contrary to Islamic law; with distributing the book to the Silverfish bookshop and Faisal Mustaffa; and with possesion of 180 copies of the book.
Ezra, who is the son of former law minister Zaid Ibrahim, had pleaded not guilty.
He had challenged the validity of the Selangor state law by taking the matter to the Federal Court, which upheld the law in September.
G25 said the Federal Court had used a “far-fetched and erroneous interpretation” of the constitutional provision in Article 3 for Islam as the religion of the Federation. The group said Article 3 must be read subject to the other constitutional provisions protecting fundamental liberties.
G25 said Ezra’s challenge was not to the Selangor syariah court’s judicial competence to put him on trial but rather the legislative competence of the Selangor State Assembly to enact the state law.
The group said state legislatures did not have an “untrammelled right” to legislate on matters pertaining to Islam but were bound by the provisions on fundamental liberties.
“With respect to the Federal Court, we are deeply disappointed with its decision. The Court is expected to perform its noble role as the protector of the Federal Constitution and of the citizens’ fundamental rights. We do not see that happening this instance,” the group said.
G25 described Selangor’s prosecution of Ezra as baffling because the book was “not at all about religious instruction but was meant to be an intellectual discourse on Islam and social issues”. It was not meant to demean the religion but merely set out the author’s beliefs about the essence of Islam: love, freedom and liberty.
The group also reaffirmed a joint statement by 25 Malaysian NGOs and 28 distinguished Malaysians which said the use of the law to make differences of opinion in Islam a crime was “a dangerous effort to monopolise the meaning and content of Islam, with far reaching consequences on all spheres of Malaysian public life”.
All citizens, Muslims and those of other faiths, had a right to engage in a dialogue on issues of national importance, be it religion, economics, political, education, culture, or social issues, the group said.