The Experience of Malaysian Wife – Umm Ubadah

A certain level of interaction should be established before it’s fair for us to narrate stories related to the ethics and behaviours of others. As reported from the leader of the Muslims, Umar Ibn Al Khattab, the following criterias must be found before you recommend or discommend a person, such as:

1) Being neighbours with someone. Because neighbours are supposedly more knowledgeable about the person living next to his or her home.

2) Having a traveling experience with someone, for traveling and being away from home reveals a man’s true essence.

3) Having experience being engaged in a business transaction with someone, because dealing with money reveals the true personality of a person.

Today we are witnessing a time when waves of hate speech, unspeakable writings, and inhumane descriptions being hurled towards the Rohingya Muslims community. They ran away from the brutal massacres in their homeland and are now seeking refuge in our country for a temporary period of time. These are the same people whom we have previously treated with all human dignity and mercy.

However, recently many Malaysians are fuelling hate in the social medias based on some unjustified accusations against the whole community due to wrongdoings of a few individuals. This unbecoming activities are devastating and obliterating every members of the targeted community with all immoral and inhumane derogatory terms. This may wipe all our previous noble records we have done towards our fellow human beings and might distort our beautiful image in the eyes of the world.

The waves of hate doesn’t stop there, it has gone beyond imagination that spilled over to attacking their ethics, behaviours, even raised suspicions and doubts on established historical facts regarding the Rohingya which was accepted by whole world.

Everyone are issuing judgmental statement based on widespread social media comments without being backed by concrete evidence and proof. Such irresponsible move definitely will not increase anything except for unrest and disharmonious situations among the public.

There’s a saying: “Never judge someone’s character based on the words of another. Instead, study the motives behind the words of the person casting the bad judgment.”

In fact, through a very simple observation I came to conclude that most of the said columnist, writers, and netizens have not had any personal interaction with anyone from the Rohingya community, even worse is that some anti-Rohingya videos were actually produced by Hindu terrorist in India! The scripts were rewritten and twisted in making these hate articles, which in itself is really shocking and unacceptable.

Dear fellow Malaysians, particularly Muslim brothers and sisters, I feel that I must respond to such false contents to defend my country’s image and then stand up in the defence of innocent human beings accused of immorality.

I believe we have to differentiate between behaviours that surfaced due to unfavourable conditions forced upon people and the behaviours due to the traditional culture of the people. Many didn’t realise that Rohingyas’ apparent backwardness is imposed on them by the Buddhist government of Myanmar, in fact, they have been systematically stripped off from their rights for basic education, faced continuous process of de-legitimisation, institutionalized persecution and discriminations in all aspects of life for 58 years.

In the other hand, you may find some Rohingyas who have the privilege to live abroad, those who had the opportunity to a proper education. As a result, they have proven to really excel in their respective fields, such as the late Sheikh Dr. Muhammad Ayyub Muhammad Yusuf, the former imam of Masjidil Nabawi in Madinah, Dr. Anita, a neurosurgeon in Switzerland, Mr. Yasir Arafat, a nuclear scientist in USA, and Dr Hussien Johar, a professor at Curtin University Australia, and many others.

Even in Myanmar before the 1982 Act (discriminatory citizenship law amendments) which deprives Rohingya Muslims from Burmese citizenship, there were hundreds of Rohingya, highly qualified university lecturers and professors who were serving in both state and union levels, however most of them ended up their lives in Buddhist jails or under gun fire of the Junta or in forced exile.

Closer to home, let me share my own experience with an educated Rohingya whom I been with for more than 6 years now, and blessed with 2 beautiful children, alhmadulillah. Through him I have been privileged to get to know many other Rohingya in his family who also possess similar qualities.

1) He is a devoted family man, very filial towards his parents and elders, a loving, caring, and responsible husband and father.

2) He is very caring and concerned towards his extended relatives, friends, neighbours, and others living back home. He’s an important and respected figure his extended family members looks up to.

3) He is a sociable, charitable, hospitable, and a religious personality who brings ease and joy to whomever who knows him.

4) Has high regards towards our country, our people, and our government. He strives to become a constructive, positive and productive contributor to the society even though he’s not a citizen, even I feel guilty of being any less productive than him.

6) His being a regular traveller I always find him promoting Malaysia every were he goes, and often prefer to choose Malaysia over anywhere else in the world.

6) As a business man, 85% of his staff are Malaysians, and some of them have been working with him from the last 6 years, as they enjoy working with him and their welfare are well looked after.

7) He is a trustworthy and principled man, and in his line of work his work he deals with people from all major races in the country. In fact among his suppliers are Chinese and Indian companies but you can feel their genuine fondness with each other in their daily business interactions.

This is only the tip of the iceberg, just to give you an idea of how a Rohingya could deserve our respect and honour. If these qualities wasn’t inherited from his customs, traditions and deep religious faith he was raised upon, what was then? I have also experienced the richness of the Rohingya culture and heritage, such as their hospitality towards strangers and guests, generosity, pure heartedness, hardworking, piety, and cooperation in social activities. Of course, we also faced some highs and lows in our marital life just like any other couple, but we dealt with our own issues by saying “alhamdulillah”.

This uprooted community fled to us with only their faith and the clothes on their backs, away from certain death sponsored by Myanmar Buddhist terrorists. Such a merciless and miserable inhumane conditions we have witnessed from 2012 till today. Don’t they deserve to have at least the rights to be judged by facts and concrete evidence? Please think before you write a remark about a fellow human being and share and spread false news about them.

Alhamdulillah our country has its rules of law. If there are any crimes or wrongdoings committed by any individuals from any community whom are residing within it, let the authority deal with it accordingly. Fair and square.

Finally, I would like to leave you with few hadith (the sayings of our Prophet Muhammad peace and blessings be upon him) to ponder upon in this month of Ramadhan. He said:

1- The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, “Whoever removes a worldly grief from a believer, Allah will remove from him one of the griefs of the Day of Resurrection. And whoever alleviates the need of a needy person, Allah will alleviate his needs in this world and the Hereafter. Whoever shields [or hides the misdeeds of] a Muslim, Allah will shield him in this world and the Hereafter. And Allah will aid His slave so long as he aids his brother.” (Muslim)

2- “It was said to the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ): ‘Which of the people is best?’ He said: ‘Everyone who is pure of heart and sincere in speech.’ They said: ‘Sincere in speech, we know what this is, but what is pure of heart?’ He said: ‘It is (the heart) that is pious and pure, with no sin, injustice, rancor or envy in it.”(Ibn Majah)

3- The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said, “The believer who mixes with the people and endures their harm has a greater reward than one who does not mix the people nor endures their harm.”(Musnad Aḥmad)

My dear fellow Malaysians, grab this opportunity to serve the humanity and succeed with the pleasure of Allah The Almighty.

May Allah guide us all and Allah Knows Best.

Sister Umm Ubadah Dahlia Binti Kamaruddin, is a Malaysian citizen and housewife, has turned into an Author during ongoing MCO, had graduated with MBA degree from Management and Science University (Malaysia).

NB: The article is solely the writer’s opinion. It doesn’t represent Rohingya Vision’s editorial policy.