
The Federal Constitution, the highest law of the land, provides that criminal law will fall under the jurisdiction of the federal powers, while syariah law can be created by the states’ own legislative assembly.
The Ninth Schedule, List I, Paragraph 4 places crime-related laws under the authority of Parliament (Federal). The Ninth Schedule, List II, Paragraph 1 provides that the state government does not have the power to create any criminal law.
The addition of clause 1A to Article 121 of the Federal Constitution had effectively granted jurisdictional independence to the syariah courts by protecting them against interference by the civil courts. However, with the newly-gained powers, syariah state enactments similar to the Syariah Criminal Offences (Federal Territories) Act 1997, have incorporated the criminal offence of liwat, to be tried by the syariah court, when another genuinely identical criminal offence is already specified under Section 377A of the Penal Code. [Lagi]