Call on all Malaysians to condemn the two arson attacks on two suraus in Muar


Two suraus in Muar were targets of arson in the early hours of this morning –Surau Silaturrahim at Kg Sabak Awor (Jalan Ibrahim) and the Parit Beting Surau, both in the Bentayan state assembly constituency in Johore.

Gwee Tong Hiang, who visited both suraus, reported that the Parit Beting surau suffered more extensive damage.

All Malaysians regardless of race, religion, political affiliation or region must condemn these two surau arson attacks in Muar in the strongest possible terms and to demand a halt to the spiral of madness since January 8.

In the past two weeks, nine churches, one mosque, three suraus, one Sikh temple and one convent school have been damaged by fire, paint or stones in the wake of the Dec. 31 Kuala Lumpur High Court judgment that allowed the Catholic weekly Herald to use the term “Allah” in its Bahasa Malaysia section.

Many Malaysians are dismayed by the conduct of the Home Minister, Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein, as he is blamed not only for allowing the situation to get out of hand in his initial announcement that the government would not stop protest and demonstrations on sensitive religious issues against the Dec. 31 KL High Court judgment, he has also failed to deliver his assurance that “the situation is under control” which had been repeatedly marred by the spate of arson and vandalism of places of worship in various states.

Malaysians are also dismayed that at this important period, Hishamuddin, together with the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak and Deputy Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, had been out of the country.

With the latest spate of arson against the two suraus in Muar, the time has come for more proactive response so that the country does not continue to suffer adverse international publicity detrimental to the national effort to attract foreign investors, tourists and students.

Najib, who is currently on an official visit to India, should give the “green light” for the convening of all-party all-religion conferences to take united action from national to state and local levels to rally the unity of all Malaysians regardless of race, religion and politics to protect all places of worship and restore national and international confidence in the inter-religious understanding, tolerance, harmony and peace in Malaysia.

  1. #1 by k1980 on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 3:41 pm

    A bigwig claimed that 911 was staged by the Americans

    Will he now claim that the surau attacks are staged by unmo?

  2. #2 by taiking on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 3:58 pm

    BTN at work again. Shadow boxing with imaginary foes. Those clowns suddenly discovered that the joke they started was actually on and about themselves. And so in order to save face and mitigate the situation they engineered the attacks on surau.

    Condemn the attack. Yes of course. Its senseless. So pls umno. No more of such moves. Do something constructive and positive for once. But with 50 yrs of lousy record, I dont know how that can be possible. So the sensible thing to do is to step aside. Let some one else do it. Yeah. For the sake of the country, step aside.

  3. #3 by i_love_malaysia on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 4:09 pm

    Those who did this should be condemned with the strongest words available in the English dictionary!!!

  4. #4 by Jeffrey on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 4:10 pm

    “Spiral of madness” – thats a correct word to describe it. DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng says “We urge the police to step up its investigation and monitoring mechanism to bring the perpetrators to justice, and to prevent any further similar incident from happening in order to safeguard our harmonious way of life.” But didn’t they say earlier when the churches were attacked that the churches must keep security themselves as police lacked manpower to secure all the churches? Now to add to the manpower problem, suraus and mosques need also to be secured as well? PM Najib better come back fast from India to address this “Spiral of madness” problem.

  5. #5 by i_love_malaysia on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 4:12 pm

    All Malaysian should help to look out for all places of worship to prevent those with ulterior motives to cause racial and religious problems!!!

  6. #6 by Onlooker Politics on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 4:22 pm

    “Malaysians are also dismayed that at this important period, Hishamuddin, together with the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak and Deputy Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, had been out of the country.” (YB Kit)

    Two suraus in the same town were attacked with arson on the same dawn. It seemed that the chances for these two cases to happen by chance out of accidents were very slim. The arsonists must have the malicious intent to have committed such serious crime in the midst of intense religious tension amongst different groups of religions in Malaysia.

    Najib really made us wonder why he allowed Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin to leave the country at present when Najib himself was on an official trip to India. Who is the minister in charge as an acting Prime Minister at the moment when both Najib and Muhyiddin are still on an oversea trip. Is Najib really willing to give some ambitious men of malicious intent a good opportunity to overthrow the current BN Leadership with a bloodshed coup attempt? Why did the police still not take any action or come out with a concrete procedural control proposal for the administrators of the places of worship to follow so that the arsonists could possibly be detected in a much faster and much more efficient way, like using the aids of the CCTV being installed in front of the buildings of worship, or by encouraging the installation of fire insulation doors at the entrances of the buldings of worship so that more evidences could be collected from the residues of the vained arson attempt?

  7. #7 by artemisios on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 4:27 pm

    i condemn it. ALL my family members condemn it. ALL my co-workers of all religious backgrounds condemn it. Around 42 persons of my close friends (some are Hindu, some are Muslim, some are Buddhist) condemn it too.

    This has reached a scary point. At this point, I can actually see fear in the faces of the people around me, especially the Christians.

    Really hope everyone can remain calm.

    We are Malaysians. Since when do we do things this way?

    The Muslims didn’t attack the churches. Neither did anyone of any religion attack the mosques. Nuff said.

  8. #8 by monsterball on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 4:39 pm

    Ex MACC chief said..death of Teoh Beng Hock..small matter.
    Najib is waiting for sparks turn to fire.
    Attacking the churches…Najib immediately said…they are not UMNO members.
    Pak Lah was famous to go overseas….when troubles are at home.
    Najib and his deputy are doing same thing.
    That’s the kind of PM and DPM we have now..totally irresponsible.
    Only know how to talk kok politics…to fool Malaysians.

  9. #9 by dawsheng on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 5:11 pm

    “Malaysians are also dismayed that at this important period, Hishamuddin, together with the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak and Deputy Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, had been out of the country.” (YB Kit)

    What is happening to Malaysia?

  10. #10 by Bigjoe on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 5:16 pm

    I am going right out and say this despite possible backlash: NO non-Muslims in this country will do this on his own. So who and why?

    More than that, we know whoever did this, BN/UMNO is the one responsible because they bankrupt the social strength of this country for their own greed for power and money…

  11. #11 by Thor on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 5:23 pm

    Attack on surau?
    Are u kidding?
    I strongly believe that it’s all staged up by certain quarters as just to mislead everyone.
    They firebombed the church and it got backfired because the whole world, especially America, are condemning them.
    Now they did it on their surau as just to divert their wrongdoings.
    If it’s retaliation by someone, it would not be the surau.

  12. #12 by son of perpaduan on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 5:27 pm

    Curse to those who spark fire at the churches and surau. May this raining season spark more thunder and lightning strike to who behind all this.

  13. #13 by boh-liao on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 5:34 pm

    Sorry 2 read abt d senseless arson news
    We hv reached a stage of WYSINWYT
    What you see is not what you think – things start 2 get complicated now
    A place of worship is torched, what’s d purpose?
    Sinister purpose 2 cause huru hara among residents here?
    Financial purpose 2 get NR n others 2 donate big buck 2 erect a new building?
    Syiok diri purpose 2 get some grps busy n excited?
    A tit for tat purpose?
    D blame USA-behind-all-destructions purpose?

  14. #14 by yhsiew on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 5:45 pm

    Malaysians are also dismayed that at this important period, Hishamuddin, together with the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak and Deputy Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, had been out of the country. – (Kit)
    =====================================================

    They are comfortable to be in another country at this important period because they know that they will be successful in their appeal through the Appeal Court to overturn the High Court ruling that Christians can use the word “Allxh”.

  15. #15 by dawsheng on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 5:50 pm

    With the latest spate of arson against the two suraus in Muar, the time has come for more proactive response so that the country does not continue to suffer adverse international publicity detrimental to the national effort to attract foreign investors, tourists and students.” LKS

    What proactive response? Inter-religious dialogue? Come on, that is not going to work.

  16. #16 by rahmanwang on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 5:53 pm

    Ok Mahathir will be announcing that the arson attack at the 2 suraus are staged by Anwar!!

  17. #17 by dawsheng on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 5:57 pm

    What is next? Police announced they have identified physical attribute of the suspects and it look like Chinese or Indian, as the speculations go all over pro UMNO’s blogs. This is the last straw for UMNO. If burning Suraus cannot shore up Malay-Muslims support for the party, are they going to burn the Masjids?

  18. #18 by hibou on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 6:47 pm

    It should be clear by now, Mr Lim that your analysis of the issues over the last few weeks serves no more than raise awareness amongst us the netizens but completely fall on deaf ears of the powers that be.

    Unlike the proverbial three wise monkeys who “see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil”, the evil monkeys amongst us “see no good, hear no good, speak no good”

    Rather than condeming their evil acts, you should call on all Malaysians of all faiths to pray for divine intervention. That is all thats left.

  19. #19 by HJ Angus on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 6:47 pm

    There are always a few people who will exploit any situation for their own advantage…. as TDM says it is possible the USA schemed the 9/11 bombing to gain the major foothold in oil-rich Iraq and get possibly closer to Iran for deployment of arms.
    In the geo-political arena, one can never be certain of anything; although advertising the movie AVATAR certainly lacks a solid basis ….more the realm of sci-fi.
    It is possible that both the church and surau fire-bombs are caused by a mastermind to ignite another 513.
    Let’s hope that both the Muslims and Christians reach out and understand each other better to keep the peace and harmony.

  20. #20 by ekans on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 6:49 pm

    Pakatan Rakyat, DAP, PAS & PKR, should start some sort of initiative to allay any fears or suspicion amongst all Malaysians, regardless of ethnic origin & faith. The cousin of the Pekan MP was clearly wrong when he said that the situation is under control. The Pekan MP himself is also wrong to say that this is some minor aberration…

  21. #21 by ktteokt on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 6:50 pm

    Remember who it was who gave the green light to demonstrate in respect of this ALLAH matter? Yes, he is none other than Najis, our present PM!

  22. #22 by limkamput on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 7:11 pm

    Yes pursue relentlessly those involved in the arson attacks on the two surau in Muar. A clear message must be sent – these people can’t expect any mercy from the authority and the society at large.

  23. #23 by AhPek on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 7:31 pm

    ‘A bigwig claimed that 911 was staged by the Americans.Will he now claim that the surau attacks are staged by UMNO.’ k1980

    The bigwig will ask you back,’Muslims attacking surau,a Muslim holy place of worship are you sure you not committing sedition?’

    ‘I am going right out and say this despite possible backlash.No non Muslims in this country will do this on his own.’.Bigjoe.

    I think you’ve got bull’s eye.When the firebombings and vandalising of 10 churches and 1 convent school failed to stir up anything that warranted a coup,some ambitious and malicious men might have thought it best to push things further to make it happen and achieve what they want!

  24. #24 by gofortruth on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 8:01 pm

    “I don’t need your RM10 if all you want to post are comments praising me. Instead, go do your duty. Go get as many Malaysians as possible to register as voters”
    http://malaysia-today.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=29748:fiddling-while-the-state-burns&catid=22:the-corridors-of-power&Itemid=100085

  25. #25 by Suckkars on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 8:49 pm

    Please don’t blame this old man, Bakuthir, as his period in this world is pretty near. Let him blah whatever he want to blah out from all his gaps illogically and insensibly!!! Either he is infecting Parkinson disease or Alzheimer disease!!!

    It is terribly and horrifically to see and hear that Malaysia Number 1 man, Number 2 and Home Minister are overseas. This shows that BN/UMNO government is absolutely irresponsible and incompetent!!

    Only Malaysia has this type of government with their PM and DPM, and the other chap, left for overseas without caring. In other nations, both cannot leave for overseas at the same time. ONLY Malaysia BOLEH!

    Malaysia tentu-lah BOLEH! Makan Angin is their pleasures and relaxations. They care only for themselves…..

  26. #26 by donplaypuks on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 8:50 pm

    Whatever the reasons and whoever committed it, there are no excuses for torching suraus and mosques just as there are none for torching churches or temples!

    Civilized men and women do not indulge in these kind of no-win provocative action. The perpertrators must be apprehended quickly and punished severely!

    dpp
    We are all of 1 race, the Human Race

  27. #27 by Dap man on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 8:54 pm

    11 CHURCHES = minor abberation

    The government is treating this diabolical activities in a lackadaisical manner and so we have more arson attacks.

  28. #28 by Suckkars on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 8:57 pm

    It is useless to convince this bunch of baboons to understand what is human race, peace or merit systems and etc…

    (deleted)

    [Being downright offensive can be no substitute for rational arguments. – Admin]

  29. #29 by Suckkars on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 9:06 pm

    Foreign investments are going to be wiped out and scared away with this bunch of Baboon government and leaders leading the nation to nowhere!!! Probably, zero investment figures, or worse off, negative!!! There isn’t growth % in 2010 with huge imports and small % of exports. Balance of trades is unfavorable to Malaysia….

    Rayakat are going to suffer, and the baboon leaders keep proposing new projects and models or talk garbages for their own advantages, in term of huge corruptions and so on….

  30. #30 by AhPek on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 9:13 pm

  31. #31 by johnnypok on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 9:42 pm

    Just leave it to almighty ala to punish them. However, the Christian God is always very forgiving. You can burn all the churches down, but God will still bless you. However, your own conscience will eventually kill you. Some Chinese Gods are more fierce, and will curse you with bad luck, if you were to do something bad. For example, there was a case where two young men playfully kicked and destroyed a roadside altar, and upon reaching home, were shocked to find that their house was burnt down. So don’t play-play with Chinese God. [deleted]

  32. #32 by wanderer on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 9:47 pm

    I am beginning to adopt Tun’s line of thinking…could be self-inflicted?
    Anyway, take heart…the State govt will
    be more than generous to foot the repair
    bills…perhaps, a timely opportunity to
    upgrade the premises.

  33. #33 by gofortruth on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 10:06 pm

    NAjib said the torching of 11 CHURCHES is minor abberation. Is he encouraging things to turn nasty and hoping to see people get killed?

    Now 2 suraus in Johor, a stronghold of UMNO. Will these UMNO Malays retaliate ??????????

    I have just called my in-laws & families in Muar to stay in and avoid going to shopping complexes.

    Some how I just feel pity for our Malay friends that they really have been taken for a ride by UMNO all these years.

  34. #34 by passerby on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 10:12 pm

    Why is the Gov still reluctant to control the whole situation before it degenerate into another anti-chinese conflict? The 5/13 happened during Tun Razak’s time and let us hope this will not happen during his son’s time.

  35. #35 by mauriyaII on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 10:27 pm

    Let us all condemn vehemently this senseless and despicable act. Any place of worship is sacred. Only fellows with baboon mentality would even think of doing such a sacrilegious thing.

    When we have people (deleted) who justifies his silly hallucinations as visions of grandeur (remember the crooked bridge) I am not surprised that he thinks 9/11 and the holocaust were staged.

    UMNOputras willingly would give him the benefit of the doubt to his ravings as he was the one who gave the idea to UMNO to appeal against the court’s judgement in favour of the Christians. He as usual jumped into the fray and declared that courts cannot decide about religious faiths and the usage of Allah.

    What he failed to realize was the Syariah courts in the country rule and decide on all matters pertaining to Islam.

  36. #36 by riversandlakes on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 11:06 pm

    SAY NO TO TERRORISM!

    The incompetence of the Barang Naik government is tearing apart our fragile fabric of our society!

  37. #37 by Winston on Thursday, 21 January 2010 - 11:50 pm

    All these events could be a precursor to Emergency Rule.
    A convenient way to wrest power from the opposition!

  38. #38 by monsterball on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 12:15 am

    Mahathir said….”We are blessed with the comfort able to eat 24 hours and don’t feel threatened like the Palestinians”
    This dirty sick .. corrupted thick skinned old man always uses countries that are less fortunate than us.
    He keep trying to fool Malaysians.
    Why don’t he compare Malaysia with South Korea….Singapore or Taiwan.
    Is he hinting Malaysians..are such fortunate people under his leadership for 22 years also?
    Yes….Mahathir is not sick nor senile.
    He is truly the devil reincarnated..still alive to do the devil’s work in our country.
    He further said…he will not sue Barry Wain…because …waste of time.
    Leave it to all UMNO crooks to talk like him…so nice fellas…never sue anyone to protect their sparkling clean reputations.

  39. #39 by monsterball on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 12:52 am

    And the smart MACC chief said those ministers signing approvals on the Port Lang Free Zone scandal have nothing to benefit…personally…so they committed no crime.
    These low class tools of UMNO think such great criminals will be that stupid to expose themselves.
    Yes….MACC will find every little reason to set free the big fishes.
    That’s their main job.
    One can never find one sen extra in Mahathir’s bank accounts too.
    So he is Mr. Clean?

  40. #40 by Onlooker Politics on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 3:11 am

    YB Kit,
    Plain condemnation from all Malaysians is still inadequate for reducing or alleviating the racial tension and religious tension that have been created through the emotional incitement by the extremists who took advantage of the arson attacks on places of worship. An official statement from joint leadership of Pakatan Rakyat calling people to keep calm and not to speculate on the possibility of inter-racial retaliation or inter-religious vengeance is also very imperative at the present tension situation.

    The feedback from some Malay friends of mine indicated that the Johorean Malays had the wrong perception that the Christians already took action to retaliate. Some Johorean Malays suspected the arson attack on 2 suraus in Muar was caused by “tindakan balas dendam” from Christians. It is imperative for the political leaders and the police to issue an official statement to pacify the people in order to alleviate the danger of a possible uprising from the less educated and emotional rural Malays.

    We should not simply fall into the trap of some inciters of racial tension and religious tension. The inciters might want to arouse the inter-racial conflicts and to cause social unrest for serving their malicious intent of achieving the self-interested political advancement or for achieving the financial gains through the speculative economic attacks on the Stock Market Index Future Forward Selling Contracts and Currency Forward Selling Contracts. The Malaysians will be too naive to fall into the trap of the inciters and start to wrongfully suspect that the other race has already taken the violent retaliatory action on the “Allah” religious issue!

  41. #41 by ekompute on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 4:33 am

    I hope the culprits will be apprehended soon to find out who are those behind the burning of the suraus. If they are non-Muslims, they are plain bloody stupid and ought to be shot in the neck and chop to pieces, LOL. But the possibility of Muslims doing it to put the blame on non-Muslims cannot be discounted, although I hope this is extremely unlikely. Plain bloody stupid too if it happens to be true.

  42. #42 by monsterball on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 5:15 am

    It can all be staged… arranged…by UMNO to confuse Malaysians.
    Do not believe everything you read in papers.
    If Mahathir can say the 9/11 can be staged by USA government…after seeing the movie…”AVATAR”….so can UMNO BARU..pull up stunts..to confuse Malaysians.
    Mamak..a famous low class actor..shedding crocodile tears announcing his retirement. Has he really retired?

  43. #43 by garfunky on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 6:57 am

    Even if it was staged by UMNO, even if it was a ploy by Najib, now is not the time to speculate.

    It is also not the time to put blame on anyone, muslims, non-muslims, whoever did it we can come back to it later.

    but NOW is the time for damage control. Use your comments space to condemn these acts, not go on wild rants and speculation.

    Whoever these arsonists are we all hope you choke on your own bile and die alone. Selfish ignorants pricks whose acts would only cause hurt and God-forbid, violence. If anyone gets killed due to racial violence, you arsonists are directly responsible. Good luck staying out of hell assholes.

  44. #44 by ktteokt on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 7:29 am

    Now that 2 more suraus are burnt down, what is the government going to say? Are they going to allocate another few millions for reinstating them? And where did this few millions come from? Who the hell is paying for it? And who the hell suffers now?

  45. #45 by Bigjoe on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 7:37 am

    This is very different from the attack on church. The issue is why are Muslims attacking suraus? Its a total condemnation of UMNOs Islamization policy – it does not work. UMNO/BN is losing control of the people their policies is suppose to control.

    This is about UMNO/BN losing control over its people and machinery…

  46. #46 by MGR1940 on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 7:46 am

    What is next? Police announced they have identified physical attribute of the suspects and it look like Chinese or Indian,
    Yes, it could be Najib or Mamak Mahathir

  47. #47 by chengho on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 7:54 am

    somebody have to talk to this Pakiam guy to publish in Tamil ..

  48. #48 by taiking on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 8:51 am

    By the way what is god in tamil? “Allah” too? Anyone with a copy of the bible in tamil? Enlighten us pls, so that we all can be better informed.

  49. #49 by taiking on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 8:56 am

    Off topic.

    Finally, the silly, senseless and absolutely stupid eusoff chin’s decision in the federal court granting immunity to fraudsters who took away lands belonging to others (by falsifying documents etc) is overturned by another panel of the federal court.

  50. #50 by veddy.lum74 on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 10:59 am

    najis went to india to see bala,to solve the altantuya case,probably paying the balance………

  51. #51 by Motorist on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 11:46 am

    Totally condemn any acts that defile houses of worship.

    There was no reaction from non muslims when churches were burned. Now they’re trying to provoke reactions by doing the same to surau. This is dirty politics at play. Using religion to provoke. Religion is about love; not hate. Religion has no place in politics, for politics will never ever be “clean”.

    Is the mastermind behind all these despicable acts following in the footsteps of Hitler & his Nazi party?

    Hitler (actually Goebbels, his propaganda minister) burned the German parliament (Reichstag) so as to blame the enemy (the Communist) and paved the way for Hitler’s dictatorship with the enactment of a decree “for the Protection of the People and the State,” which dispensed with all constitutional protection of political, personal, and property rights.

  52. #52 by boh-liao on Friday, 22 January 2010 - 12:44 pm

    Maybe business not good, some shops hv large stock of Maggie mee
    Torched some places of worship (followed MMK’s advice, USA-staged disasters)
    2 get ppl panic n start buying n hoarding food, time 4 shops 2 sell outdated food

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