Islamic political rivalry 'hurting' Malay women

Kuala Lumpur: Despite its economic progress, Malaysia is becoming more conservative, the daughter of former premier Mahathir Mohamad said yesterday, claiming that the country's two rival parties are in a race to become more Islamic.

Marina Mahathir, an outspoken social activist, said interpretation of Sharia laws has become more austere and were eroding rights of Muslim women as the ruling United Malays National Organisation, or UMNO, and rival Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party, or PAS, vie to win Muslim votes.

She was commenting on remarks in her fortnightly column that will be published today in the country's largest English daily, The Star, where she equates the lot of Muslim women in Malaysia to that of South African blacks under apartheid.

Marina said the government's move last year to pass contentious legislation that promote polygamy and discriminate against Muslim women in matrimonial issues was an indication of the rivalry between the two political parties.

UMNO is the lynchpin of Malaysia's coalition government, while opposition party PAS rules one of Malaysia's 13 states.

"It's all politics. There's a kind of race to see who is more Islamic. It's unfortunate because the more conservative voice has become louder while the progressive ones find it harder to speak. It's scary," she said.

Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi later agreed to review the Islamic Family Law bill, which only applies to Muslims, after it drew flak from rights groups and women's organisations.

Marina said the Bill, which lets Muslim men unilaterally divorce their wives yet end up with a greater share of the couple's property, contradicts the Islamic Hadhari, or progressive Islam concept espoused by Abdullah.

"As non-Muslim women catch up with women in the rest of the world, Muslim women here are only going backwards ... only in Malaysia are Muslim women regressing," she wrote in her column.