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This study aims to assess the extent of the mandatory and voluntary Shariah compliance disclosure in the Shariah Committee Report of Islamic financial institutions (IFIs) in Malaysia. The study highlights the accountability and transparency of the Shariah Committee members to provide full disclosure of relevant Shariah compliance information to the stakeholders.

The study adopts content analysis to quantify and code the number of sentences in the Shariah Committee Report disclosed in the 2016 annual report of 47 IFIs in Malaysia. The extent of Shariah compliance disclosure in the Shariah Committee Report is measured based on the Standard (S) and Guidance (G) items outlined in the Shariah Governance Framework (SGF) as well as the Financial Reporting for Islamic Banking Institutions and takaful operators guidelines issued by Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) as the reference.

The findings indicate that majority of IFIs complied with the minimum mandatory disclosure requirement based on the Standard (S) items in the Shariah Committee Report as required by the SGF. Highest information on the purpose of Shariah Committee engagement and scope of work performed is disclosed to the stakeholders in almost all IFIs. Only two prominent full-fledged Islamic bank and Islamic banking business in development financial institutions have shown highest accountability to go beyond the minimum disclosure requirement. This includes disclosing higher voluntary information on Shariah governance processes in the Shariah Committee Report of these two IFIs.

This study adopts the SGF (Bank Negara Malaysia, 2010), Financial Reporting for Islamic Banking Institutions (Bank Negara Malaysia, 2016) and Financial Reporting for Takaful Operators (Bank Negara Malaysia, 2015) as the reference to develop the measurement of Shariah compliance disclosure in the Shariah Committee Report. These guidelines issued by BNM are still effective during the period of study, i.e. the year 2016.

The findings contribute towards the relevance for BNM as the regulator to enhance the current disclosure requirement in the Shariah Committee Report as stated in the SGF especially in Islamic windows and takaful operators. The main argument of this paper is that the more information being disclosed in the Shariah Committee Report will lead to better Shariah assurances. The issuance of Shariah Governance Policy Document in 2019 is expected to enhance the credibility, accountability and transparency of the Shariah Committee members concerning their oversight responsibility towards Shariah matters in IFIs’ business operations.

After five years since the issuance of the SGF in 2010, further study on the extent of mandatory and voluntary Shariah compliance disclosure is important to highlight the accountability and transparency on the implementation of the Shariah governance across various types of IFIs in Malaysia.

The purpose of this study is to examine the extent of audit report lag and its association with governance mechanisms in the Islamic banking institutions in Malaysia.

The extent of audit report lag is defined by the number of days from a company’s financial year-end to the signature date on its audit report. The sample of the study comprises 112 observations of Islamic banking institutions’ financial reports for the period 2008-2014. A balanced panel data analysis is performed to analyse the association between the extent of audit report lag and governance mechanisms.

The findings show that the extent of audit report lag for the sample selected ranges from a minimum period of 7 days to a maximum period of 161 days, and the extent of audit report lag is approximately two months on average. A fixed effects analysis indicates that audit committee expertise and audit committee meeting have significant association with the extent of audit report lag. On the other hand, board independence, audit committee size and Shari’ah board expertise have insignificant association with the extent of audit report lag. In addition, one control variable (Islamic bank size) is found to be significantly associated with longer audit report lag.

The findings provide useful feedback for Malaysian policymakers on the past and current practices of financial reports and of governance mechanisms. The findings of the study would help the policymakers in monitoring the Islamic banking institutions’ compliance with financial reports submission requirements. The policymakers perhaps could relook into governance mechanisms that reduce the extent of audit report lag in the Islamic banking institutions and implement regulations to strengthen them.

Unlike the majority of prior studies that investigated the association between the extent of audit report lag and governance mechanisms, this study provides two contributions. First, to the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first piece of research that examined the association between governance mechanisms and the extent of audit report lag in Islamic banking institutions. Second, the study examined the association of new governance variable, namely, Shari’ah committee expertise which has not been previously examined in the literature of audit report lag.

The provision of meals has long been regarded as an essential part of treatment of hospitalized patients complementing medical procedures and nursing management. Today, despite changes in the health-care landscape, which focused on improving the quality and efficiency of hospital care, malnutrition among inpatient was still a common worldwide concern.

This was a multi-centre, randomized study conducted in 21 study sites comprising 21 state and specialist government hospitals under the Ministry of Health, Malaysia. The sample size for this study was calculated with purposive sampling method, followed by proportionate sampling to determine the random sample size of each of the study sites. The total sample size required for this study was 2,759 subjects. A validated data collection form was used in the study.

Only 32.2 % and 37.6 % of subjects achieved adequate energy and protein intake, respectively, during their admission to medical ward. The study result showed that the overall mean energy and protein intake was 794.6 ± 487.8 kcal and 35.2 ± 24.3 g, respectively. The estimated energy (p = 0.001) and protein (p = 0.001) intake of all study sites was significantly lower compared to the adequacy value.

The adequacy intake in this study was only carried out in medical wards, thus reproducible result among other wards in different study sites could not be confirmed. Besides, this study assumed that the portion eaten by subjects during lunch and dinner was the same, and therefore, either one was recorded together with breakfast and either lunch or dinner to represent a subject’s daily intake.

This was the first nationwide study to report the adequacy of energy and protein intake of patients receiving therapeutic diets in the government hospital setting in Malaysia.

This paper aims to view the role of religiosity in moderating the relationship between ego-defensive function of Muslim consumers’ and attitude toward advertising of controversial product. There is a rising concern among Muslim consumers’ with regards to the halal status of many food outlets in Malaysia. This came out because many food operators do not understand what halal really means. Many of them are from Kopitiams food and beverages industry.

Survey method was used for the purpose of data collection in April 2014, and quantitative approach has been used as well. This study applied functional theory of attitudes to support this framework. Respondents consisted of 375 Muslim consumers’ in Malaysia.

The paper provides empirical insights about how religiosity moderates the relationship between ego-defensive function and consumer attitude toward advertising. Consumers with a high level of religiosity are more likely to respond less favorably toward the advertising, while consumers who have a low level of religiosity are more likely to respond more favorably toward the advertisement. In addition, it can be postulated that religiosity reduces negative effects of ego-defensive function.

The fact that religious groups are more organized, equipped and motivated to register their concern, demands better understanding of such groups by marketers. To avoid any controversies, or potential business loss, a better understanding of what could ignite their reaction seems to be an appropriate preventive strategy.

Only a few studies directly examined the influence of religion on marketing communication. The effects of religion on the advertising of controversial products remain largely unstudied to date. Therefore, this paper fills the gap in the research area.