If a government body is funded by taxpayers’ money, then it must be prepared to accept public scrutiny and provide details of its accounts and processes when they are demanded by the public.

Any director-general who denies access to the public and threatens any member of the rakyat who demands transparency and accountability is acting suspiciously. He could be hiding a wrongdoing, abusing public funds or mis-managing the government agency, or perhaps, all three.

For three decades, the Malaysian Islamic Development Department (Jakim) ruled supreme. It acted like God’s right-hand man, but in recent years, one could be fooled into thinking that Jakim had taken to acting God himself. Today, Jakim is behaving like a wounded beast, with its pride dented, and forced onto the defensive to justify its existence.