HUDUD: Between Dogma And Reality - by Dr. Chandra Muzaffar

Dogma trumped justice and reason in the Kelantan State Assembly on the 19^th of March 2015.

When dogma overwhelms one’s outlook, reality is often set aside. By tabling the Syariah Criminal Code 11 1993 (Amendment 2015) or Hudud Bill at a time when the people of Kelantan are still struggling to overcome the devastating consequences of one of the most severe floods the state has known, the PAS government has deliberately given greater emphasis to modes of punishment than to the dire needs of the masses. Reason and justice demand that restoring the shattered lives of the tens of thousands of flood victims take precedence over every other task.

In fact, if both state and federal governments addressed the underlying causes of the floods, they would discover that the failure to uphold environmental standards --- a cherished principle in Islam --- was one of the contributory factors. It is adhering faithfully to fundamental principles of this sort rather than remaining fixated on penalties and prohibitions that is the true essence of Islam. Similarly, a criminal code that concentrates upon modes of punishment will not solve the root causes of the many social ills that afflict Kelantan from drug-abuse to HIV/AIDS. What is needed is a determined effort to tackle the sociological and economic dimensions of these ills.

This inability to come to terms with the realities that confront them is also reflected in the reluctance of the proponents of hudud to examine the actual situation in the few countries that have implemented hudud. Nearly all of them are authoritarian, adopt a literal approach to laws and religious precepts, marginalise non-Muslim minorities and subordinate women. From the perspective of human dignity and social justice, not one of them is worthy of emulation.

Hudud proponents have also refused to consider the position of a number of important Muslim countries that have chosen not to implement hudud. The world’s largest Muslim nation, Indonesia, has, since its founding in 1945 remained committed to Panca Sila as its national ideology. Panca Sila whose first principle is the Oneness of God makes no mention of hudud. It is significant that on the 11^th of February 2015 all major Islamic movements in Indonesia, including Muhammadiyah and NahdatulUlama with millions of members reiterated their endorsement of the Panca Sila in the Yogyakarta Statement.

Turkey, another country with an overwhelming Muslim majority and led by a party with an Islamic root is unambiguous in its choice of secular law as the basis of its system of governance. Neither the Freedom and Justice Party in Egypt, an appendage of the Muslim Brotherhood, nor the An-Nahda of Tunisia, with its Islamic image, incorporated hudud into its manifesto when it sought power in the post- 2011 scenario following the Arab uprisings. Indeed, in the Arab uprisings as a whole which adopted freedom, dignity and justice as their battle-cry hudud was not a goal.

Why have hudud proponents in Malaysia ignored realities in Kelantan and in the Muslim world and persisted in adopting a dogmatic approach towards hudud? Part of the explanation lies in their narrow, superficial notion of Islamic identity. Like ultra-conservative groups elsewhere, they regard hudud as the defining characteristic of an Islamic state and identity when in reality punitive laws constitute a minute fraction of the Quran. What defines the identity of the Quran and Islam is a profound commitment to human dignity and social justice rooted in God-Consciousness.

In Malaysia, a hudud-centred religious identity has been reinforced by the intimate link between Islam and Malay ethnicity which has strengthened identity consciousness as a whole in a situation where the Malay-Muslim populace has always perceived the large, economically stronger Chinese community as a challenge  to its own position in what is historically a Malay  land. It is this notion of identity shaped by these forces which clings on tenaciously to hudud and other such exclusive, distinctive dimensions of Islam in the hope of asserting the religion’s power and authority.

The protection of identity along these lines has in turn spawned an irrational fear of discourse and debate within the Muslim community. This is why hudud as the inherited legacy of the jurists in Muslim history remains unexamined and under-evaluated. It is seldom highlighted by Islamic scholars in Malaysia for instance that the Kelantan Hudud Bill includes punishments for liquor consumption and apostasy which do not appear in the Quran. In the case of apostasy in particular the Quran does not provide for temporal punishment and only alludes to punishment in the hereafter.

What is even more significant, hudud (or hadd in its singular form) is not used in the Quran in relation to punishment per se. As Islamic jurists have pointed out, the term that is employed in the Quran is Hudd Allah which occurs 14 times in the sacred text to signify limits --- limits in the general sense. This general concept of limits or boundaries in human behaviour is an idea of tremendous value which is eternally and universally applicable. It is because discourse on Islamic concepts and ideas is frowned upon in Malaysia that there has been no attempt to understand this deeper philosophical meaning of hudud. Instead the Malaysian Muslim mind has remained trapped in a penal code view of hudud which focuses upon punishments and penalties.

There is a third reason why many Malaysian Muslims are fixated on hudud. For more than three decades now, the question of hudud has been sucked into inter-party political rivalry. PAS, especially after 1982, has invariably presented itself as the champion of hudud. The UMNO leadership in the past sought to diminish Pas’s claim by arguing that PAS’s hudud lacked legitimacy since it was at variance with certain Quranic principles. Since 2008 however when the UMNO-Barisan Nasional (BN) government lost its two-third majority in the Federal Parliament and Malay support began to wane, some UMNO leaders have sought to project the party’s Islamic credentials by also playing the hudud card.

Sensing that hudud is an almost insurmountable barrier separating PAS from its partner, the DAP, UMNO has attempted to exploit this difference in order to weaken the Pakatan Rakyat (PR). Some in UMNO may even see hudud as a way of strengthening ties with PAS. As a result of all this politicking, hudud has become more entrenched in the political landscape.

This brings us to the consequences of the hudud controversy for Malaysian politics and society. As we have seen, it threatens to split the PR. If either PAS or DAP leaves the PR, the PR will have less appeal in the electorally mixed constituencies which are vital in determining who is in power at the Federal level. On the other hand, this may also compel the PR parties to stick together in an uneasy, opportunistic alliance.

The hudud controversy will also impact adversely upon the BN. If UMNO is perceived to be colluding with PAS, the non-Malay, non-Muslim parties in the coalition will become even weaker vis-a-vis their base. This possibility could have a disastrous effect upon the BN’s ability to rule from Putrajaya since a substantial chunk of its electoral support comes the indigenous non-Muslim communities of Sarawak and Sabah. It is important to emphasise that it is not only the indigenous, non-Muslim parties in the two states that would eschew any UMNO-PAS collusion; even the indigenous Muslim parties would reject any such move, given the social ethos in Sarawak and Sabah.

What this means is that intra and inter-religious relations would deteriorate under the weight of hudud politics. Muslim opinion would become even more fractured. The Muslim non-Muslim chasm would widen. This deterioration could become even more pronounced if other Muslim majority states in the Federation also seek to follow Kelantan’s example and try to introduce hudud with the blessings of the Federal government.  The temptation to do so would increase especially if the imposition of hudud enhances one’s electoral standing.

Since hudud is not just a set of laws but a reflection of a certain approach to Islam, it is not inconceivable that as an ultra-conservative understanding of the religion becomes more widespread, alternative views on various Islamic issues will be marginalised and de-legitimised. A particular interpretation of Islam associated with the religious elites will become so dominant that differences of opinion will not be tolerated. Conservative religious authoritarianism impacting upon society as a whole may well become the order of the day.

This has to be checked immediately. One hopes that if the Kelantan Hudud Bill comes up to Parliament, the MPs will vote according to their conscience and not yield to a notion of Islam which does not represent the essence of the faith. The judiciary if it is called upon to exercise its wisdom in this matter should also rise to the occasion and protect the integrity of the Constitution. Most of all, the people should come out in defence of justice and reason and not submit blindly to dogma.

How To Create Your Own 1-Acre, Self-Sustaining Homestead - Earthporm.com

There are endless ways to create your own self-sustaining homestead using 1-acre of land. Some people prefer to keep cows, goats, pigs and hens, while others prefer to keep animal livestock to a minimum, or none at all. With or without livestock, your home can provide you with most of your everyday needs.

Here’s a brief overview how you can turn one-acre of land into a self-sustaining homestead.

How To Raise A Dairy Cow

There are a multitude of pros and cons to keeping a cow on your self-sustaining homestead, although mostly pros if you are willing to put in the extra work. Cows can provide milk, meat and their rich manure makes a great natural fertilizer.

Fresh, all natural cow milk is healthy for you and your family, and it also benefits other livestock such as pigs and poultry. Cow manure will also promote better soil fertility so that your garden continually produces more delicious produce each year.

Still, a cow is an annual expense that can tally near a few hundred dollars each year, or more. If you can afford the original bill for keeping happy, healthy cows, you will make your money back with everything a cow has to offer.

Photo Credit: mslizot.wordpress.com

It’s not difficult to milk a cow once you learn how, and it can be done in as little as 8 minutes. Cow’s milk can be used to make everything from cream, cheese and a delicious glass of milk.

It is not impossible to maintain a self-sustaining homestead without a cow, but it’s much easier to do so with a cow. If you plan to add a dairy cow to your yard, you will need to milk her regularly and if you plan to go out of town you will need someone experienced to take over while you are gone.

Pasture For Dairy Cow + Crop Rotation

If you choose to keep a cow you can assume that half of your acre will be dedicated to pasture, which you may never plow, or you can plow every four-years if you plan to rotate crops.

It is recommended to rotate crops in strips of a quarter of the half-acre, resulting in freshly sown pasture that varies in age. If you have freshly sown pasture that is 2-years-old, 3-years-old, and 4-years-old, you will have the most productive land usage.

Illustration by: Dorling Kindersley

How To Manage Grazing

If grass becomes overgrazed you need to remove cows from the area right away. Rotational grazing is key in order to keep the grass healthy, as grass does best when it has plenty of time to fully grow before being grazed or cut down. It is so important to carefully manage grazing in order to prevent your entire pasture from turning to dust.

A half-acre of grass should keep a little Jersey cow plump all summer. It is unlikely you will have any leftover grass, but if you do it can be used to make hay. In order to prevent overgrazing, your cow will need a place to stay inside for the winter, but will still require some fresh air every day.

Edible Gardens

The other half of your one-acre will be farmed as a garden. Ideally, you will separate this land into four sections so that annual crops grow in a strict crop rotation.

Example of an ideal crop rotation:

–Grass (four years)

–Plot 1: Potatoes

–Plot 2: Legumes (pea and bean family)

–Plot 3: Brassicas (cabbage family)

–Plot 4:Root Vegetables (carrots, beets, etc.)

Photo Credit: Pinterest

Over time, your 1-acre farm can become more productive than a 10-acre farm built using commercial lines.

Photo Credit: ehow.com

A goat is a great asset for times when cow milk runs dry. In fact, all farm animals will provide their own unique benefits.

Different animals require different living conditions, but all require some sort of indoor shelter for at least part of the year. Bedding for indoor stalls is something you must factor into your budget.

Animals will consume any food you do not; in fact you won’t need a compost pile with animals around.

Photo Credit: Motherearthnews.com

Even if you only have a very small amount of space to work with, you can still develop a self-sufficient home.

Photo Credit: Lamar Alexander

This information was taken from The Self-Sufficient Life and How To Live It, written by the late John Seymour. The treasured classic is now available as a 400-page illustrated masterpiece. If you are truly interested in starting your own self-sufficient homestead it’s a beneficial read!

One Twin Exercises, the Other Doesn’t By Gretchen Reynolds - The New York Times

Identical twins in Finland who shared the same sports and other physical activities as youngsters but different exercise habits as adults soon developed quite different bodies and brains, according to a fascinating new study that highlights the extent to which exercise shapes our health, even in people who have identical genes and nurturing.

Determining the precise, long-term effects of exercise is surprisingly difficult. Most large-scale exercise studies rely on questionnaires or interviews and medical records to establish the role of exercise. But these epidemiological studies, while important and persuasive, cannot prove that exercise causes health changes, only that people who exercise tend to be healthier than those who do not.

To prove that exercise directly causes a change in people’s bodies, scientists must mount randomized controlled trials, during which one group of people works out while a control group does not. But these experiments are complicated and costly and, even in the best circumstances, cannot control for volunteers’ genetics and backgrounds.

And genetics and upbringing matter when it comes to exercise. Genes affect our innate endurance capacity, how well we respond to different types of exercise, and whether we enjoy working out at all. Childhood environment also influences all of this, muddying the results of even well-conducted exercise experiments.

All of this makes identical twins so valuable. By definition, these pairs have the same DNA. If they were raised in the same household, they also had similar upbringing. So they can provide a way to study the effects of changes in lifestyle among people with the same genes and pasts.

Some past studies had found that older identical twins whose workout habits had diverged over the years tended to age differently, with greater risks of poor health and early death among the sedentary twin.

But no studies had looked at young twins and the impacts of different exercise routines on their health. So for the new study, which was published this month in Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, researchers at the University of Jyvaskyla and other institutions in Finland turned to that country’s extensive FinnTwin16 database, which contained twins’ answers to questionnaires about their health and medical conditions, beginning when the pairs were 16 and repeated every few years afterward.

The researchers were looking for young adult identical twins in their early- to mid-20s whose exercise habits had substantially diverged after they had left their childhood homes. These twins were not easy to find. Most of the pairs had maintained remarkably similar exercise routines, despite living apart.

But eventually the researchers homed in on 10 pairs of male identical twins, one of whom regularly exercised, while the other did not, usually because of work or family pressures, the researchers determined.

The dissimilarities in their exercise routines had mostly begun within the past three years, according to their questionnaires.

The scientists invited these twins into the lab and measured each young man’s endurance capacity, body composition and insulin sensitivity, to determine their fitness and metabolic health. The scientists also scanned each twin’s brain.

Then they compared the twins’ results.

It turned out that these genetically identical twins looked surprisingly different beneath the skin and skull. The sedentary twins had lower endurance capacities, higher body fat percentages, and signs of insulin resistance, signaling the onset of metabolic problems. (Interestingly, the twins tended to have very similar diets, whatever their workout routines, so food choices were unlikely to have contributed to health differences.)

The twins’ brains also were unalike. The active twins had significantly more grey matter than the sedentary twins, especially in areas of the brain involved in motor control and coordination.

Presumably, all of these differences in the young men’s bodies and brains had developed during their few, brief years of divergent workouts, underscoring how rapidly and robustly exercising — or not — can affect health, said Dr. Urho Kujala, a professor of sports and exercise medicine at the University of Jyvaskyla who oversaw the study.

Of course, the study was small and not a formal randomized trial, although it involved identical twins.

But Dr. Kujala said he believes that the results strongly imply that the differences in the twin’s exercise habits caused the differences in their bodies.

More subtly, the findings also point out that genetics and environment “do not have to be” destiny when it comes to exercise habits, Dr. Kujala said. For these particular twins, whether their genes and childhoods nudged them toward exercising regularly or slumping on the couch, one of the pair overcame that legacy and did the opposite (for better and worse).

The rest of us can do likewise, Dr. Kujala said. Even if the input from our DNA and upbringing urges us to skip the gym, we can “move more,” he said, and, based on this study, rapidly and substantially improve the condition of our bodies and brains.

Article was taken from The New York Times

Multi-Generational Workforce Study 2015

We are pleased to announce that zubedy is once again conducting our Multi-Generational Workforce Study.  This is our third survey, the first  two surveys was in 2009 and 2012.

Managing multiple generations and top talent retention are key issues in today’s human resource management.  We aim to understand the nature and impact of the various generations working side-by-side in organisations in greater depth.  

We would like to invite you to answer the questionnaire. It will take approximately 15-20 minutes to complete. 

The closing date is 30 April 2015.  The questionnaire is provided through Google Documents (Google Docs) to ensure confidentiality of the respondents.

Multi-Generational Workforce Study 2015 Survey Link

Thank you.

Anas Zubedy

‘World class’ and Malaysia’s Higher Education – PenDaPaT - The Malaysian Insider

PenDaPaT is a registered national society made up of concerned citizens on higher education in Malaysia. We take this opportunity to express our humble thoughts and views about the ongoing debate of whether Malaysia’s higher education is ‘world class’.

We are of the opinion that there are elements in Malaysia’s higher education that can be considered as ‘world class’, but at the same time, we also wish to point out rooms for improvement.

However, there is first a need to consider carefully what we mean by ‘world class’. We believe it is important to recognise and acknowledge that university rankings are merely a benchmark. They are by no means a yardstick of quality. A lot of universities around the world are doing well in whatever they are entrusted by their societies, and this may not always translate into positions on the university rankings.

For example, Sharif University of Technology in Iran has successfully produced their own ‘home-made’ satellite – ‘Sharif-Sat’ – that is about to be launched into space, and its undergraduate programme has been acknowledged by the global engineering fraternity as ‘world class’. Yet, this university was not even ranked among the Top100 in any global university rankings.

On that note, we believe that there are elements in Malaysian universities that are ‘world class’. The Minister of Education is right to point out, for example Universiti Sains Malaysia is highly ranked in environmental sciences and chemical engineering, and Universiti Putra Malaysia in agricultural sciences. Even in younger universities like Universiti Malaysia Terengganu, there are academics who have managed to publish their work in top tier journals like Nature, and the university is developing a niche in marine science.

Malaysia’s strength in Islamic Banking and the recognition given to four professors in Malaysian public universities by Thomson Reuters ‘World’s Most Influential Scientific Minds 2014’ are accolades given by international bodies.

While we may ‘condemn’ the performance of Malaysian universities for not attaining high positions in university rankings, it is essential to point out that these accolades and global recognitions given to our departments and academics were also from the international bodies that contributed to the data used in the tabulation of rankings.

Apart from rankings, the ‘world class’ debate also involved international student enrolment. Malaysia is ranked 9th most preferred international education destination, even ahead of our down southneighbour, and the five prominent factors influencing international students’ choices to select Malaysia were outlined by international researchers commissioned by UNESCO to provide an independent and objective assessment about our higher education. Indeed the report and statistics by UNESCO indicated we are a preferred destination globally, and many of our foreign students andacademics have returned to their home countries and served in many distinguished capacities.

However, care should be taken to suggest that we are ‘world class’ through these numbers and statistics, or having full time students from developed countries studying in Malaysia.

Instead we should utilise the significant population of international students by making our programmes and universities even more international. This will benefit not only the international students and our universities, but importantly, providing international exposure to Malaysian students studying in our local universities. It is through international exposure and the widening of our students’ worldview that will make Malaysia’s higher education truly ‘world class’.

The debate of ‘world class’ has, inadvertently, also brought up the concern of graduate employability. We would like to take this opportunity to highlight another slippery slope in linking graduate employability to higher education, and specifically pointing the fingers at our universities.

As rightly pointed out by Mr Hafidz Baharom in an article published in the Malaysian Insider, the blame about unemployable graduates is on the students themselves for not mastering the English language and having sucky attitudes. We cannot expect universities and academics to do wonders in transforming students to become employable within three to four years, but instead we are optimistic that the Education Blueprint and upcoming Higher Education Blueprint should address this issue by taking into account the continuum of education from cradle to career.

More importantly, we believe that graduate unemployment and job mismatch are symptoms of a larger structural problem in Malaysia, as well as many countries globally. The Arab Spring began in Tunisia partly because of graduate unemployment. Even in developed countries in Europe and the United Kingdom, unemployment, underemployment and job mismatch among graduates are real issues of concern to policymakers and economic planners.

Pragmatically, it is important to recognise that graduate unemployment and job mismatch can be considered as the implications of rapid growth in higher education that was not accompanied by a parallel pace of structural changes in the economy and labour market. Hence, we caution the tendency of linking employability directly with the debate about ‘world class’ education.

Renowned experts in higher education – Philip Altbach and Jamil Salmi – in their book "The Road to Academic Excellence" outlined three essential criteria of a ‘world class’ university: concentration of talent, favourable governance and abundant resources.

Instead of using university rankings to argue about ‘world class’ university, these criteria are better positioned to help us reflect critically on Malaysian universities, specifically their strengths and rooms for improvement. For instance, we do have globally recognised professors who have contributed to their respective disciplines, as well as talents among our students to compete internationally; but it is important that we do not lose sight of the needs to have a ‘concentration’ of talents that will elevate the quality of our universities.

Attracting, nurturing and retaining talents must continue and intensify. Likewise, although eight public universities have been granted autonomy by the Ministry of Education, much more work is needed to develop supportive regulatory frameworks that promote autonomy and academic freedom.

Furthermore, while some of our departments and professors have carried out research work that is recognised internationally; it is important to acknowledge that funding for research has come predominantly from the State. Continuous funding from the State and other sources is crucial for our universities to move forward. 

We believe that for Malaysia’s higher education and our universities to become ‘world class’, we should put aside political differences and rhetoric. Importantly, we should all come together to contribute constructively in transforming our universities to become a pride of every Malaysian.

* This was written by Dato’ Morshidi Sirat and Wan Chang Da on behalf of Pertubuhan Pembangunan Penyelidikan dan Dasar Pendidikan Tinggi Malaysia (PenDaPaT).

* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insider.

This article was taken from The Malaysian Insider