Now that Dr Mahathir Mohamad is scheduled to visit the Pope on June 7, it is perhaps timely to remind the PM of the many grave injustices his Barisan Nasional government has been perpetrating on Malaysian Christians, including the Catholics, since the 1980s when Malaysia embarked on a rigorous policy of Islamisation.

These injustices, which continue even today, have been conveniently ignored and swept under the carpet by the sycophantic mainstream local media which has only good things to say about Mahathir's Papal visit. The Utusan Malaysia, Berita Harian, New Straits Times, The Star and others want to further strengthen his already enhanced position as an autocrat vis-a-vis his political opponents in the light of the Sept 11 incident.

If Mahathir has a clear conscience in the presence of Pope John Paul II when trying to project his image as a moderate Muslim leader who is fair to non-Muslims in his country, then he must undo all the measures that the Umno-led BN government has done to undermine and stifle the development of Christianity in Malaysia which had been guaranteed by his predecessor, the first prime minister, Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra.

To begin with, Mahathir must first of all resolve the nagging problem of the proposed Catholic church in Shah Alam which has yet to be constructed despite its plans being approved more than 20 years ago. I believe the proposed Shah Alam church controversy constitutes only the tip of the iceberg of a nationwide problem, where bigoted Malay religious officials and bureaucrats supporting Umno who want to outbid PAS to see who is more Islamic, exert pressure on the government not to allow the construction of new churches to cater to a growing Christian population on the absurd grounds that it contravened the sanctity of Islam.

Because many of these officials/bureaucrats appear unreasonable and downright intimidating, many church officials are afraid to pursue their cases and quietly resign themselves to the fact that they cannot build new churches, and must do with existing ones, cramped though these may be, in practising their religion.

In the case of the proposed Shah Alam church, the religious officials have even conveniently ignored the 'approval' of the late king, the then Sultan of Selangor, who in the 1980s allowed the proposed Catholic church in Shah Alam to be built as he was sad that the Selangor state government had only given permission for mosques, and not temples or churches, to be constructed.

But all construction work on the proposed church in Shah Alam which had been going on following the late Agong's 'directive' was stopped by the then MB, Muhd Muhd Taib in the 1990s because of strong protests from Muslim extremists. Since then the local mainstream media have been 'silent' on the issue.

If Mahathir is sincere in upholding religious diversity in multi-racial Malaysia, he must tell the bigoted religious officials straight to their face that the construction of new churches (and also temples) does not , and will not offend Islamic sensitivities in any way, but on the contrary, like what the late king said, upholds the tenets of a multi-racial and multi-religious society like Malaysia. Mahathir should allow proposed churches not only in Shah Alam, but also nationwide, to be built.

Mahathir has also to attend to the problem of the mission schools. Once the pride of Malaysia's English-medium education system prior to the 1969 KL racial riots, where they produced some of the best students in the country, an overwhelming majority of these mission schools — Christian brothers and convent schools — have deteriorated to such a sorry sight that one can consider them the crust of the Malay-medium educational system today, with record-low passes in school examinations.

As partially-assisted schools, they had been 'taken over' by the government in the aftermath of the 1969 KL racial riots and underwent a rigorous process of conversion to "national schools". Subsequently their Christian heritage has completely disappeared so that today they are no different (except in name) from the hundreds of Malay-medium national schools throughout the country. Catechism classes have been banned and Christian symbols like the crucifixes and pictures of Catholic saints have been removed from their premises. To add insult to injury, the only religious features in these converted mission schools are prayer areas for Muslims!

In Penang, where a huge cross on the steeple of a chapel in a prominent convent school had been 'accidentally' dislodged by a Malay contractor recently, no attempts had been made to restore it to its original position despite repeated reminders by the headmistress. The sordid sight to which the mission schools have degenerated has made old boys of such schools like myself ashamed to have nostalgic reunions because we can't associate ourselves with our alma mater any more. Will Mahathir work towards restoring the Christian heritage of the mission schools?