The Catholic Church has filed an application for leave to appeal to the
Federal Court the decision of the Court of Appeal which had allowed the
government's appeal to ban its weekly publication the Herald from using
the word "Allah" to refer to God.
Benjamin Dawson, one of
the counsels representing the church, said they had filed the
application at the Federal Court registry on Monday.
"The
church has raised 26 questions of-law in the leave application to appeal
to the Federal Court," he told Bernama when contacted Tuesday.
Dawson said the legal questions involve three areas namely
constitutional questions, administrative issues and whether the court
can decide on comparative religious issues.
He elaborated
that the salient questions included on whether Islam, being the religion
of the federation, would impinge the fundamental liberties in Part II
of the Federal Constitution in particular the right to profess and
practice the religion of those in the religious minority group.
Dawson said the other important constitutional question was whether
the state could interfere with the rights of a religious group to manage
its own affairs.
Another question, he said was whether the
alleged confusion by a certain religious group was a ground to restrict
the right to freedom of another religious group.
He said the
question on administrative law centred on the home minister's power
namely whether the decision of the home minister on grounds of threat to
national security and public order could be reviewed by the court.
The other question, he said, was whether the court of appeal could
embark on an Internet research and come to certain conclusion on
comparative religious issues.
Dawson said the Catholic Church
would serve the leave application to the Attorney-General's chambers on
behalf of the home minister and government and various state religious
bodies.
He (Dawson) said it was expected that a case
management would be fixed and thereafter a hearing date to hear the
church's leave for the appeal application would be set.
On
Oct 14, the Court of Appeal's three-member panel led by Federal Court
judge Datuk Seri Mohamed Apandi Ali unanimously allowed the government's
appeal to ban Herald from using the word "Allah".
The court had set aside the decision of a High Court in 2009 which had allowed the publication to use of the word "Allah".
On Feb 16, 2010, the Roman Catholic church led by Archbishop Murphy
Pakiam, filed a judicial review application naming the Home Ministry and
the government as respondents, seeking, among others, a declaration
that the Home Ministry's decision to prohibit the use of the word
"Allah" in the Herald publication was illegal.
The weekly,
published in four languages, has been using the word "Allah" to refer to
"God" in the Herald Malay-language section, specially to cater for the
people in Sabah and Sarawak.
On Dec 31, 2009, the High Court
declared the decision by the Home Ministry prohibiting the Herald from
using the word "Allah" was illegal, null and void.