PUTRAJAYA – A teary Loh Siew Hong has a message for the Perlis religious authorities: “I really want MAIPs to leave me and my kids alone and don’t disturb us again.”
“I have suffered, not for four days but for four years. I couldn’t sleep because of this case. Today is my day… I want to thank the public and my team of lawyers for their support.
“Without them, I will not be here,” she said at the Palace of Justice here after the Federal Court threw out the Perlis Islamic Religion and Malay Customs Council’s (MAIPs) bid to challenge the Court of Appeal overturning her three children’s unilateral conversion to Islam.
Loh, who is a single mother, also expressed her gratitude to former Penang deputy chief minister II P. Ramasamy for his support over the years.
Earlier today, MAIPs failed to obtain leave to appeal against the decision by the appellate court, which dismissed the unilateral conversion of Loh’s three children to Islam.
It was a unanimous decision by the bench, led by Chief Justice Tun Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat. Sitting in were Tan Sri Nallini Pathmanathan and Datuk Abu Bakar Jais.
Joining MAIPs’ bid were the Perlis government, the Registrar of Converts, and the state mufti.
On January 10, the Court of Appeal ruled that the issue of Loh’s kids’ unilateral conversion was bound by the decision of Indira Gandhi’s case, which held that the consent of both parents must be obtained before minor children can be converted to another religion.
The legal battle involving Loh’s kids began in 2022 when she filed a suit naming MAIPs, the Perlis government, the Registrar of Converts and the state’s mufti as defendants.
The suit was filed at the high court following Loh’s three kids’ unilateral conversion to Islam in 2019 by her Muslim convert former husband Muhammad Nagahswaran Muniandy.
In the suit, she also sought for the court to declare the children’s conversion as void and unconstitutional, as her former husband did not have the legal capacity to convert their kids without her consent. – May 14, 2024