KUALA LUMPUR, July 17 — Kedah Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Azizan Abdul Razak has revoked the controversial ban on entertainment outlets but will set operational conditions during Ramadan, just after his aide insisted yesterday that the ruling would remain.
Umno-owned Utusan Malaysia’s weekend edition today reported Azizan (picture) as saying that the PAS state government has been instructed to find a solution that will please everyone.
“I think we have found a solution, like setting certain conditions with the entertainment outlet owners to prohibit Muslims from patronising their premises,” Azizan was quoted as saying in Mingguan Malaysia.
“All this will be decided during discussions between the state administration and the affected businessmen later...in a day or two,” he said, adding that the matter was now resolved.
DAP advisor Lim Kit Siang had urged the state government to withdraw the ban on 13 types of entertainment outlets from operating in the state during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.
The PAS national leadership has also asked its Kedah chapter to explain the ban at a meeting today.
MCA had accused the Islamist party of violating human rights with the ban. But Azizan’s political secretary, Muhammad Sanusi Md Nor, had issued a strongly-worded statement yesterday that the state government will not withdraw the ruling despite opposition, saying the government was just enforcing a 1997 law.
“Ustaz Azizan will not back down! That is his stand on this issue,” said Sanusi in the statement carried by PAS website Harakahdaily.
DAP publicity chief Tony Pua later suggested that his party pull out from the three-year-old Pakatan Rakyat (PR) pact of PKR and PAS, ostensibly over the ban.
Azizan refused to comment on DAP’s pleas to revoke the ban, which covers businesses such as karaoke centres and discos as well as live performances in readily accessible locations such as bars, hotels and restaurants.
Only cybercafés, bowling alleys and snooker centres are exempted from the ruling.
“I am considered an old-timer in politics and the DAP are also old-timers. Let this be resolved in the spirit of Pakatan. No need for us to bring it to the press. The media is not meant to be an avenue for solutions,” said Azizan.
“Whatever they (DAP) want to say, let them say...I don’t want to say anything,” he added.
PAS secretary-general Datuk Mustafa Ali told The Malaysian Insider last night that Azizan will send a representative to attend today’s meeting with the PAS national leadership, as the mentri besar would not be able to go.
