PUTRAJAYA: Perikatan Nasional will support the unity government if it wants to amend the Federal Constitution to avoid syariah criminal codes in the country being challenged and voided in the courts.
Pas deputy president Datuk Seri Tuan Ibrahim Tuan Man said the matter needed to be decided upon by the government immediately.
"Before this, we could not bring it (to Parliament) because we didn't have two-thirds majority, but now there is and PN will support it wholeheartedly if they want to immediately amend the constitution.
"This has to be a holistic thing, we can't do it piece by piece," he said after the Save the Syariah gathering in front of the Palace of Justice where the Federal Court was hearing a constitutional challenge to the Kelantan Syariah Criminal Code.
Lawyer Nik Elin Zurina Nik Abdul Rashid and her daughter Tengku Yasmin Nastasha Tengku Abdul Rahman had challenged 20 points in the Kelantan Criminal Code Enactment (I) 2019.
Tuan Ibrahim also urged the Council of Malay Rulers to immediately act on the efforts of "certain quarters" whom he claimed were trying to threaten the status of the Syariah Court in Malaysia.
Apart from that, he said, the people should take heed of the orders of the Sultan of Selangor Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah that a special committee needed to be set up immediately to study the competency of the various state legislative assemblies in enacting Islamic legislation as well as the powers of the Syariah Court.
Tuan Ibrahim said if efforts were not taken to prevent legal challenges to syariah criminal codes, it would happen again and again and this would threaten Muslims.
"Today, 20 enactments have been challenged and I am certain that it will not only happen in Kelantan, but in all the states.
"It is not impossible that such challenges would lead to a loss of function and power for the Syariah Court," he said.