The decision was announced at a programme in Pasir Salak last night attended by Abdul Hadi Awang and Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, the PAS and Umno presidents.

“We will hold a peaceful rally. The majority have the right to voice out,” Hadi told some 30,000 PAS and Umno members, as quoted by PAS mouthpiece Harakahdaily.

The government’s announcement that it was considering ratifying the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, or ICERD, has been met with opposition from Malay and Muslim groups.

Malaysia is among a handful of countries that have neither signed nor ratified the treaty.

The treaty provides individuals worldwide with a mechanism for complaints over issues of racial discrimination, among others, and is enforceable against member states.

Specifically, it obliges parties to eliminate racial discrimination in all forms including in public institutions as well as in government policies, the issue at the heart of the opposition from Malay groups.

Several groups say ratifying ICERD will undermine the special position of the Malays, including provisions to allow quotas in public institutions, as spelt out in Article 153 of the Federal Constitution.

They are also opposed to the ICERD’s timeline on member countries to end affirmative action programmes, which they say would be a death knell for Malaysia’s decades-old Bumiputera policy.

At the event last night, a donation drive was launched to help fund the Dec 8 rally to protest ICERD.

In his speech, Hadi said PAS and Umno had many times come together to fight on issues involving Muslims and Malays.

He said the late Tunku Abdul Rahman and Burhanuddin al-Helmy, two past presidents of Umno and PAS, had once shared the stage in Melaka to demand independence.

He said both parties had also come together in the wake of the racial riots of 1969.

Zahid, meanwhile, warned of nationwide protests by Malays if there was no clear decision by the government to reject ICERD.