{"id":813817,"date":"2024-12-22T00:25:57","date_gmt":"2024-12-22T06:25:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2024\/12\/22\/good-sense-must-prevail-over-halal-certification-controversy-says-business-group\/"},"modified":"2024-12-22T00:25:57","modified_gmt":"2024-12-22T06:25:57","slug":"good-sense-must-prevail-over-halal-certification-controversy-says-business-group","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2024\/12\/22\/good-sense-must-prevail-over-halal-certification-controversy-says-business-group\/","title":{"rendered":"Good sense must prevail over halal certification controversy, says business group"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n \"K.
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\n K. Kabilan<\/a>
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\n Updated 3 months ago \u00b7
\n Published on 13 Sep 2024 5:20PM \u00b7<\/p>\n

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The Johor Indian Business Association says the decision to apply for halal certification should be made by eatery operators, not the Islamic development department. \u2013 The Malaysian Insight file pic, September 13, 2024. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

THE decision to apply for halal certification should be made by eatery operators, not the Islamic development department (Jakim), said a business group.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Johor Indian Business Association president P. Sivakumar said his organisation did not agree with any move to make\u00a0it mandatory for non-Muslim eateries to obtain halal certification.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201cWe hope good sense prevails and any decision taken is only done after a meeting with all stakeholders.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cJakim must hold dialogues with all the stakeholders before they submit to cabinet approval before making it compulsory for any mandatory halal certification for\u00a0non-Muslim eateries.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe also think Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim must also get involved to ensure the right to apply for such a certificate is actually for the eateries to make,\u201d Sivakumar told The Malaysian Insight.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He added that political leaders should not be criticised or investigated for commenting on current issues.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He was referring to Seputeh MP Teresa Kok who had come under fire from Umno and Bersatu leaders for saying halal certification should not be made mandatory.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Anwar had said he was not pleased with Kok\u2019s remarks, adding that the matter should have been internally discussed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kok is also facing a police investigation after 50 reports were lodged against her.<\/p>\n

On September 5,\u00a0Minister in the Prime Minister\u2019s Department (Religious Affairs) Mohd Na\u2019im Mokhtar\u00a0reportedly said Jakim\u00a0was considering a proposal to make halal certification mandatory for restaurants and food companies that did not serve pork and alcohol.<\/p>\n

The issue sparked controversy when Kok responded by saying the implementation of halal certification should be voluntary to allow operators to make decisions based on market demand.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In response to Kok\u2019s statement, Umno Youth chief Akmal Saleh, who is also the Merlimau assemblyman, called Kok \u201cNyonya tua\u201d and said the government should paste a \u201cnon-halal logo\u201d on her forehead.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

This led to Kok issuing a legal notice demanding RM25 million in damages from Akmal over his allegedly defamatory statement.\u00a0<\/p>\n

To escalate matters, Akmal said he was unfazed by the potential legal action and that he was ready to meet Kok in court.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Yesterday, Kok said she had sorted out the misunderstanding with Jakim over the issue.<\/p>\n

However, Urimai chairman P. Ramasamy, who previously defended Kok over\u00a0the issue, questioned if there really was a misunderstanding over the proposal.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cSince there is an open admission on the part of Kok and Jakim officials that the halal certification controversy was a result of misunderstanding, is the former agreeable to change her earlier stand?\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cDoes she still maintain her stand that halal certification might be harsh on non-Malay and small and medium Malay restaurants?\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cSince there is admission that both Kok and Jakim might have erred in the matter of halal certification, are the police willing to drop the investigation and advise the AG accordingly?\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere might have been misunderstanding between both parties, but such misunderstanding does not invalidate the argument of Kok,\u201d he said in a statement.<\/p>\n

The former Penang deputy chief minister said the\u00a0introduction of mandatory halal certification might create undue problems for non-Malay and small and medium Malay restaurants. \u2013 September 13, 2024. \u00a0<\/p>\n

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K. Kabilan Updated 3 months ago \u00b7 Published on 13 Sep 2024 5:20PM \u00b7 The Johor Indian Business Association says the decision to apply for halal certification should be made by eatery operators, not the Islamic development department. \u2013 The Malaysian Insight file pic, September 13, 2024. THE decision to apply for halal certification should<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":813818,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35405,22106],"tags":[97273,11786],"class_list":["post-813817","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-prevail","category-sense","tag-prevail","tag-sense"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/813817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=813817"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/813817\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/813818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=813817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=813817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=813817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}