By Debra Chong
KUALA LUMPUR: The Home Ministry today filed a notice of its appeal at the Court of Appeal against a High Court ruling that allowed the Catholic paper Herald to use the word “Allah” to describe the Christian God in its Bahasa Malaysia edition.

It will also file an appeal to stay the execution of the Dec 31 court decision that has angered many Muslim Malaysians who feel it can confuse them and affect their faith.

Senior federal counsel Datuk Kamaludin Md Said confirmed with The Malaysian Insider that the notice was filed at the Court of Appeal in Putrajaya at about 4pm today.

But the case will have to wait its turn for hearing at the Court of Appeal.

“We have to wait for the judge to give her written judgment first,” Kamaludin explained.

High Court judge, Datuk Lau Bee Lan, had on Dec 31, overturned the home minister’s ban on the Herald, Malaysia’s only Catholic paper, publishing the word “Allah” to refer to God outside the Muslim context.

The ministry controls giving out the annual publishing permit, which is required under the Publishing and Printing Presses Act.

The Roman Catholic Church has been cautious and quiet since winning their case against the Home Ministry’s ruling first made in 2007.

Malaysia’s 27 million population is predominantly Muslim with some 850,000 Catholics.

Most Christians in the East Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak pray in the national language with Bibles from Indonesia.

The authorities have seized more than 15,000 Bibles that refer to God as “Allah” in 2009, including some 10,000 Bibles from Indonesia confiscated on Sept. 11, Rev. Hermen Shastri, general secretary of the Council of Churches of Malaysia, said last year.

Courtesy: TheMalaysianInsider