The intention of the Federal government requiring potential Muslim converts to declared their choice to their family as announced by the Prime Minister is laudable and a pre-emptive step to address incidents of body-snatching and other related issues.
I would like to further enhance my earlier comment on the need of a fool-proof law to ensure the declaration will not be challenged by any parties in later years.
The cases of body-snatching that were widely reported in the media in recent years focuses on non-Muslims converting to Islam without informing their immediate families. Hence, these causes unnecessary heart breaks to the deceased convert family, headaches to the authorities and brewing tension amongst the Muslims and non-Muslims.
On the other hand, did the media highlighted cases of conversion amongst the non-Muslims namely those were converted at their death bed from one non-Muslim religion to another? Have we not heard or come across cases of "vultures of death" seeking out potential candidates to be converted to their religion in hospitals while the critically ill patient is most vulnerable and unable to think wisely and with reason?
Have we not heard children who has converted to another religion tries to convert their parents without the knowledge of their other siblings. When the parents died, a tussled develops between siblings of different non-Muslim religion on the method of the last rites for the deceased funeral. There was even an incident some years ago of opposing siblings of different religion physically fought it out to ensure funeral rites for their deceased father are conducted as per their respective religious choice!
To do the right thing right at the right time, the Federal Government are urged to deliberate further on the need to require all types of conversion, non-Muslims to Islam; Hindu to Christianity; Buddhist to Hindu; Christianity to Buddhist etc. requires a declaration and written consent from the parents, guardian or next-of-kin before the conversion of the individual is considered valid.
Although the need of consent might be taken as impeding the individual's freedom of religious practice and personal liberty, a challenging decision need to be taken to address challenging circumstances. The decision can be implimented by enacting a new law, let's say the "Religion Consent Act" which spelt out the requirements to be fulfilled for a non-Muslim person to convert to another religion.
To ensure this Religion Consent Act applies to all, the government will need to look into amending the Article 11 Clause (1) and Article 12 Clause (3 & 4) of the Federal Constitution.
