I refer to the Malaysiakini report Disruption of 'conversion' forum a black mark.

What a disappointing weekend it was for all those looking forward to some enlightened resolution to the sufferings of numerous families torn apart on account of religion.

The verbal abuses that were hurled such as babi, balik Cina, 'traitors' and 'you Chinese and Indians go to hell' were unbecoming of the entities and image the protesters claimed to represent.

That the Bar Council had unwittingly chosen a wrong date to hold the forum, ie, before the upcoming Permatang Pauh by-election, has probably not escaped the thoughts of many.

The council should know better that matters concerning the Malays and Islam are vital ingredients in garnering the support of the huge Malay electorate in the Permatang Pauh constituency and Saturday's brute thuggery by the three political parties and its nominee NGOs were in effect a crude display of vote-fishing.

It is patently clear that Umno had deliberately abused its control over the mainstream media by misleading the citizenry on the objectives of the forum. The forum was not about sanctioning apostasy. It was not even about apostasy per se.

It was all about finding just solutions to practical problems faced by non-Muslim families arising out of conversion of individuals to Islam and in most instances problems seem to arise in only two situations viz.

(1) where the convert was previously married to a non-Muslim and

(2) a convert dies without the family knowing of his religious status.

Finding solutions to such problems could only bring good – to the families, the convert and the religion concerned. The panel of speakers appeared balanced with representatives from Jawi and Ikim as well.

Sadly, what the citizenry could expect in the near future is a nation divided along racial and religious lines. The PKR MP for Kulim Bahru, Zulkifli Nordin, who played a lead role in bringing a loutish closure to the forum in his capacity as a Muslim lawyer, states quite impertinently that 95% of the participants were non-Muslims.

He could have ensured a more balanced participation if he and his comrades took up the invitation of the Bar Council to participate in the forum. He has added salt to injury by stating that a Muslim should head the Bar Council, a professional body where merit and members' support should rightly determine leadership.

Even Umno has not suggested this to-date.

This puts paid to the speculation that the post-Anwar Ibrahim/Syed Husin Ali era, PR, specifically PKR, lacks that fine element of leadership that could unite all Malaysians.

Malaysia is a nation with a 40% minority. We are indeed blessed for having progressed this far with relative peace compared to the Philippines, Bangladesh, or Sri Lanka, all of which have a far smaller percentage of minority citizens and have regrettably descended into civil war.

These situations have risen due to the unchecked majoritarianism practised by their governments.

Whereas there are many notions of what a democracy entails, there are two principles that any definition of democracy should contain:

(1) every citizen should have equal access to political power and participation and

(2) every citizen should enjoy universally recognised freedom and liberty.

Not surprisingly, we fail on both counts. Umno's notion of democracy is that of the 'tyranny of the majority'. We definitely expect better from Pakatan Rakyat.