An application to relocate an Anglican church to Taman Bukit Mewah, Kajang, has been rejected by the local municipal council (MPKj) following objections by residents.

The church, built almost a century ago in the early 1900s, had applied to convert a residential land in the housing estate to be used as a house of worship following a decision by property developer Serba Sentosa Bhd to reclaim the land where the church is currently located

The developer wants the turn the land in the Kajang town into a commercial area.

However protests by mostly Muslim-Malay residents in and around Phase 8A, a housing project, of Taman Bukit Mewah in February rendered uncertain the application by Anglican Diocese of West Malaysia to convert a targeted plot of land from 'residential' to church.

"We rejected that application because the status of the land is residential and the area a residential one," said an MPKj spokesperson.

"The church was not included in the area's layout regulations," he said when contacted.

The official admitted, however, that the rejection of the application was also "due to the protests by local residents" who were represented by 'eight parties'.

These include a representative of a ' surau ' (place of prayer for Muslims) amongst other bodies, he said further.

He did not specify the date of the decision, nor the identity of the people on the committee that had deliberated on the application or that of the parties who had filed the objections.

Parishioner express relief

Earlier, malaysiakini had reported that more than 1,000 Muslims from Phase 8A are said to have signed a petition opposing the church relocation to the area and registered their protest in a memorandum to MPKj.

Osman Suboh, who heads a local surau and who had organised the petition, said the objections were not meant to curtail anybody's freedom to religious worship, but questioned the relocation of a Christian place of worship in an area that was allegedly predominated by Malay Muslims.

When contacted, a parishoner of the church expressed relief that the church did not, for the time being, have to move.

"Most church members would prefer not to move at all. We're quite happy to be where we are," said the parishioner, who declined to be named.

The parishioner repeated, however, an earlier assertion that the Anglican community in Kajang would abide by the decision of MPKj as well as the office of the Anglican Bishop for West Malaysia.

"Whether we are to relocate to an alternative area or not and where that alternative area is, that is completely up to the headquarters. We will abide by what they say," added the parishioner.

The bishop could not be reached for comments as he is currently overseas.