SEPANG — Aug. 16, 2019: The permanent residence status of India-born preacher Zakir Naik can be revoked if his actions are proven to cause harm to this country.
But the government will first wait for the police investigation against the fugitive preacher’s sensitive remarks against Malaysian minorities.
“He (Zakir) has PR status. We can take away the status if he does something that is detrimental to the well-being of the nation.
“At this moment the police are investigating if he is doing that or not. If he is doing it, then it is necessary for us to take away his PR status,” said Prime Minister Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad after a visit to the AirAsia headquarters RedQ here.
Mahathir remarked that there was a need to take action to prevent Zakir from making provocative speeches, which tend to pit different races against each other.
Asked on the Sabah government’s dissatisfaction on the lack of engagement on several issues including the teaching of khat calligraphy in schools, Mahathir replied that the Sabah government did not say anything to the federal government.
He further commented that it was not healthy to think of Sabah for Sabahans, Sarawak for Sarawakians and the peninsula for Peninsularians.
“That is not healthy. We hope that we should only think of ourselves as parts of Malaysia and not as individual territories,” he added. — Bernama
