A new book by controversial Muslim author and activist Irshad Manji was banned in Malaysia this week. Copies of Manji’s new book, Allah, Liberty, and Love, were confiscated from a Kuala Lumpur bookshop by the Federal Territory Islamic Affairs Department (JAWI). Deputy Home Minister Datuk Abu Seman Yusop condemned the book for being blasphemous to Islam and Prophet Muhammad in a statement released yesterday. The Minister said the ban was made in accordance with the Printing Presses and Publication Act 1984, which allows books to be banned for causing “disturbance to the public”. The Malaysian publishers of the book believe that the confiscations were illegal, since it took place without a court order.
Manji, who advocates for progressive reforms in Islam, first rose to fame with her book The Trouble with Islam Today, which is also banned in Malaysia. The 2003 book sparked much criticism of the openly gay writer, who reportedly faced death threats and harassment for her calls for the incorporation of more liberal values into modern Islam.
Manji is currently on tour with her new book, and also faced harassment in the neighbouring Indonesia earlier this month, where demonstrations forced authorities to shut down parts of her tour. Religious extremists eventually attacked a book discussion with the author, and beat a colleague of Manji with a metal bar.
Manji took to Twitter to release a statement about the country’s decision to ban and confiscate the book:
Next week is set to be one of the most gripping yet in the Leveson Inquiry into press standards.
Monday has been reserved for former prime minister Tony Blair, who will likely be questioned about his close relationship with media mogul Rupert Murdoch, whose tabloid the Sun famously switched its long-standing Conservative allegiance to back the Labour party ahead of the 1997 general election.
Business secretary Vince Cable is scheduled to appear on Wednesday. It is likely he will be quizzed about News Corp’s £8bn bid for the takeover of satellite broadcaster BSkyB, particularly his admission that he had “declared war” on the Murdoch-owned company, which led to his being stripped of responsibility for the bid.
But the highlight will surely come from Thursday’s sole witness, culture secretary Jeremy Hunt, who is fighting for his political life after the revelation of a November 2010 memo he sent to David Cameron in support of News Corp’s £8bn bid for control of the satellite broadcaster one month before he was handed the task of adjudicating the bid.
In the memo Hunt emphasised to Cameron that it would be “totally wrong to cave in” to the bid’s opponents, and that Cable’s decision to refer the bid to regulator Ofcom could leave the government “on the wrong side of media policy”.
The memo has further weakened Hunt’s grip on power, already in doubt after last month’s revelations that his department gave News Corp advance feedback of the government’s scrutiny of the BSkyB bid. Evidence shown to the Inquiry yesterday during News Corp lobbyist Frédéric Michel‘s appearance showed over than 1000 text messages had been sent between the corporation and Hunt’s department, along with 191 phone calls and 158 emails.
The Labour party has since upped the volume on its calls for Hunt to resign, arguing he was not the “impartial arbiter” he was required to be.
Hunt has maintained he acted properly and within the ministerial code, while David Cameron said today he does not regret handing the bid to Hunt, stressing he acted “impartially”.
Follow Index on Censorship’s coverage of the Leveson Inquiry on Twitter – @IndexLeveson
Last week I was on phone with Maung Ni Oo, Burmese poet, performance artist and one of the directors of Mandalay Contemporary Art Centre (MCAC).
He explained that he and Suu Myint Thein — another performance artist and director of MCAC — had recently returned from a performance exchange programme in Kuala Lumpur and planned to recreate part of the programme in downtown Mandalay, as part of the performance festival Beyond Pressure.
Maung Ni Oo’s decision followed a dramatic series of events in Mandalay two days ago, as protesters demanded more electricity supplies in Mandalay division in the biggest street protest in Burma since 2007. Special police questioned more than 50 demonstrators for a few hours including writer Nyi Pu Lay from MCAC, and then halted the movement until the new government offered a reaction.
Maung Ni Oo was concerned about doing the street performance. I worried for them too. I know how difficult it is to do street performance in Burma. I was questioned for five days after participating in a street performance with artist Chaw Ei Thein in Yangon in May 2005.
Yesterday afternoon I heard that Maung Ni Oo, Suu Myint Thein and Moe Satt were arrested and questioned during their morning performance, along with a number of other foreign performance artists (three Malaysian, one Australian).
I called their mobiles, but I couldn’t reach them.
Eventually, I got in touch with Maung Ni Oo at 5pm (GMT) and he confirmed they were all released after a few hours.
Their morning performance began at 8am near the moat on the east side of the palace and they planned to move to U Bein Bridge in the afternoon. They only did an hour or two’s performance in the morning and big crowds gathered to watch. They did not have permission for a street performance, which is difficult to apply for in Burma. The District Police Chief interviewed Moe Satt, another performance artist and director of Beyond Pressure Festival.
Similarly to when I was arrested, the police asked questions about the foreign artists. They asked about performance art so the artists explained what they did and showed the police officers their websites. The Chief Police Officer called the immigration officer and ordered the deportation of the foreign artists. The immigration officer refused, which is unusual. He said the artists were doing nothing wrong according to immigration procedures. So in the end the police released them all, but Maung Ni Oo, Suu Myint Thein and Moe Satt had to sign a document to say they wouldn’t participate in any further street performance.
The artists were also recorded videos of the questioning, so perhaps they will use this is in a future artwork? If they do, I think they will do it in Mingun, Suu Myint Thein’s hometown.
As we head towards one more Eurovision final, will a spotlight also be shone onto the serious human rights abuses in Azerbaijan, this year’s host? Or will the Azerbaijani government succeed in burnishing their image and hiding the reality of violence, repression and an increasingly hostile environment for journalists, bloggers, academics, activists and others? (more…)
