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PUTRAJAYA: An eight-year trial for a company director who published a book that is said to go against the Qur’an and the hadith has come to an end.
This follows a Federal Court decision by a three-member court today to reject authorization for an appeal request from Selangor’s religious authorities and the state government.
“This is our unanimous decision. Sorry, we are not with you, ”said the bank’s president, Zaleha Yusof, to Selangor’s deputy legal advisor, Siti Fatimah Talib, who represented the Islamic Religious Department (Jais), its CEO, chief enforcement officer, the head of the Selangor sharia prosecutor’s office and the Selangor government.
This means that the six legal issues raised by the applicants did not cross the threshold of Section 96 of the Judicial Courts Act of 1964, as they were not new.
Zaleha, who sat down with Zabariah Mohd Yusof and Harmindar Singh Dhaliwal, also ordered applicants to pay RM10,000 in costs to company director Ezra Zaid and ZI Publications Sdn Bhd.
Siti Fatimah had previously submitted that Ezra could be prosecuted for any crime allegedly committed by the company under the Selangor Syariah Penal Law.
He said that the company was a “legal person”.
“Section 3 of the Interpretation Law states that ‘person’ includes a body of persons, corporate or unincorporated,” said Siti Fatimah, who was assisted by state legal officer Muhammad Haziq Hashim.
He said permission should be granted for the court to clarify whether customary law applies to Islamic law to lift the corporate veil of a company.
Lawyer Fahri Azzat said that the questions raised had been dealt with in a previous hearing in the Federal Court, as Islamic law only applies to people who profess the religion of Islam.
“A corporation cannot speak Malay or any Malay language and cannot profess Islam,” he said, citing a passage from the case of Kesultanan Pahang v. Sathask Realty Sdn Bhd.
Lead federal attorney Maisarah Juhari, who represented the federal government, said she was not taking a position as she was only a nominal defendant.
Ezra later told reporters that he was relieved after the higher court’s decision to dismiss the license application.
“I feel very good because the judges supported last year’s Court of Appeal ruling in our favor,” said Ezra, son of former justice minister Zaid Ibrahim.
Fahri, who was assisted by lawyers K Shanmuga and Nizam Bashir, said he hoped the sharia prosecutor would drop the criminal charges against Ezra.
He said the High Court would also assess damages payable to Ezra, as ordered by the Court of Appeal.
On September 25, Court of Appeal Judge Umi Kalthum Abdul Majid, who was presiding over a three-member court, accepted Ezra’s appeal, which published “Allah, Kebebasan dan Cinta,” the Malay translation of the Canadian author’s work. Irshad Manji “Allah, Liberty and love”.
Umi had said that the conduct of the state religious authorities would lead to the “law of the jungle and the rule of the ulama.”
Ezra, in his lawsuit, had asked for compensation for mental anguish, agony and torture while under the surveillance of Jais police officers.
On March 7, 2018, the Kuala Lumpur High Court dismissed Ezra’s attempt to challenge the religious authorities’ action against him for publishing the book.
Ezra claimed trial in Syariah Court on March 7, 2013, under Section 16 of the Syariah Penal Law.
In 2012, the Interior Ministry banned Manji’s book, saying it contravened the teachings of the Quran and hadith.
The books were also seized during a Jais raid on Ezra’s publishing house, ZI Publications.
