.jpg "Tengku Maimun and six other judges decided that the evidence showed that Rosliza was born illegitimate and that the facts do not show her as being a Muslim. — Picture by Yusof Mat Isa")
KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 5 — A Malaysian woman who was born to a Muslim man and a Buddhist woman out of wedlock finally won her five-year-long legal battle to be declared a non-Muslim, after a majority of the judges decided that both she and her mother were never Muslims.
A nine-judge panel at the Federal Court headed by Chief Justice Tun Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat unanimously decided that 39-year-old Selangor resident Rosliza Ibrahim had won her appeal.
As part of the decision, Tengku Maimun and six other judges on the panel decided that the court will grant all the court orders sought by Rosliza, after having decided that the evidence showed that she was born illegitimate and that the facts do not show her as being a Muslim.
The three court orders sought by Rosliza include a declaration that she is illegitimate and that the late Buddhist woman Yap Ah Mooi is her mother, as well as a declaration that she is not a person professing the religion of Islam and that all Selangor state laws for Muslims do not apply to her and that Selangor Shariah courts do not have jurisdiction over her.
The six other judges who agreed with Tengku Maimun are President of Court of Appeal Tan Sri Rohana Yusuf, and Federal Court judges Datuk Nallini Pathmanathan, Datuk Abdul Rahman Sebli, Datuk Zabariah Mohd Yusof, Datuk Mary Lim Thiam Suan and Datuk Rhodzariah Bujang.
Two judges on the panel, Chief Judge of Malaya Tan Sri Azahar Mohamed and Datuk Seri Hasnah Mohammed Hashim, both allowed the appeal, but differed slightly in not granting two of the court orders sought by Rosliza.
Previously at the High Court, Rosliza had shown proof that the Islamic religious authorities of the Federal Territories and 11 states (Selangor, Johor, Kedah, Kelantan, Melaka, Negri Sembilan, Pahang, Penang, Perak, Perlis and Terengganu) do not have any records of her mother converting to Islam or of her biological parents entering into a Muslim marriage, as well as provided the court with her late mother’s October 8, 2008 statutory declaration of not being married to Rosliza’s father when she was born.
MORE TO COME