Ikatan Muslimin Malaysia (Isma) president Abdullah Zaik Abdul Rahman has claimed a conspiracy to to remove the status of race, religion and the Malay patronym of 'bin' and 'binti' from the MyKad.

abdullah zaik pembela seminar on islam under seige According to a Berita Harian report today, Abdullah ( left ) said this was perpetrated by "certain quarters" in a "subtle and organised" manner.

"This Western idea (of removing such statuses) supposedly will solve the problems of differences in race, descent and religion.

"But the effect is that children born out of wedlock would be legally registered and will destroy family institutions and the faith of Muslims in this country," he was quoted as saying.

He added, in the report, that there were those who demanded for the statuses to be removed when registering their children for birth certificates and MyKad.

Abdullah said what was more worrying as some six million youths including Malay Muslims are influenced by such liberal ideas that would "destroy the country's identity", according to the Malay daily.

Only Muslims are required to have their religion stated on their MyKad. However it has sometimes become a contentious issue.

The most prominent case was the one of Muslim-born Azlina Jailani, more popularly known as Lina Joy who converted to Christianity and sought to change her religion on her identity card.

She lost her protracted legal battle to have her identity card amended in 2007.