I am shocked beyond words by the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s most cynical, contemptible and hypocritical urging to women to give Barisan Nasional to rule with two-thirds majority if they would like to see the proposed Section 88A introduced in the Law Reform (Marriage and Divorce) Act (LRA).

This is Najib’s second most irresponsible and morally reprehensible action under his premiership after the international 1MDB money-laundering scandal which turned Malaysia overnight into a global kleptocracy.

Section 88A, which would have ended unilateral child conversion, was dropped from the amendments to the LRA that was passed in the last Parliament sitting.

Najib said: “There are things I’d like to do, 88A and all that, but we need a two-thirds majority (in Parliament) to change the constitution… but we don’t have that.

“What we want to do is one thing, what we can do is another.

“But if women give us a two-thirds majority (in the next general election), that’s a different story,” Najib said at a Transformasi Nasional 2050 (TN50) dialogue session with about 1,000 women in Kuala Lumpur today, in conjunction with National Women’s Day.

This is utter bunkum and shows up the irrelevance and meaninglessness of TN50 dialogue sessions which are being held in various parts of the country with various sectors of society. It is clear that these TN50 dialogue sessions are just pre-election gimmickry by the BN government.

This is because BN’s 134 Members of Parliament, together with the committed support of 36 MPs from DAP, Najib had more than two-thirds majority support in Parliament for any such constitutional amendment, although it is the DAP’s contention that a simple legislative enactment will be adequate for the purpose of stopping unilateral conversion with all the sufferings and heart-burns it entailed. This is without taking into account the support from PKR and Amanah Members of Parliament – although PAS with 14 MPs have declared its opposition.

There is sneaky suspicion however whether the 88 UMNO MPs can be trusted to take a united stand to support any constitutional amendment to end unilateral conversions, and if all the UMNO MPs at present cannot be trusted to take a united common stand to amend the Constitution to end unilateral conversions, what is there to guarantee that in any new Parliament, even if Najib and BN are given two-thirds parliamentary majority, all the UMNO MPs can be depended upon to support such a constitutional amendment?

But what really shocked me is the cavalier manner in which Najib had addressed the tragedy of unilateral conversions for eight long years.
Najib had trifled with the human tragedy of Indira Gandhi and her two children which had suffered immensely for the past eight years, and it bespeaks of an administration that has lost all feelings of humanity and moral bearings for the weak and down-trodden in Malaysia.

Will there be any Cabinet Minister who dare to speak up with a sense of moral outrage and righteousness to ask the Cabinet at its meeting tomorrow to end such heartless governance forthwith?