00:10Hi, welcome back to Consider This. Let's continue our discussion about child
00:14marriage. But now let's turn to the national picture. Because beyond Sarawatt, child marriage
00:20remains legally permissible for Muslims under certain condition. This is because Malaysia's
00:26dual legal system means different rules govern marriage, including exceptions allowing minors
00:32to marry. Joining me on the show now is Rosana Issa, who is the Executive Director of CIS Forum
00:38Malaysia. Rosana, good to have you on the show. Talk to me about the national picture. When
00:45you look at child marriage among Muslims in Malaysia today, what trends are you seeing?
00:50Are we making any progress in addressing the issue among Muslim children?
00:55Thank you so much, Melissa, and consider this for having CIS on board to chime in on this
01:01issue. So child marriage is still a concern in Malaysia, not just amongst Muslim children,
01:07but also non-Muslim children, because effectively, no laws have been changed. With the exception
01:13of Selangor that had increased the minimum age of marriage to 18 for women. And also, we know
01:26that KEDA has also passed the provision, but we're not so sure in terms of how, whether the law has
01:37actually been implemented. Now, I think one of the concerns that we have to know what the trend
01:44is, unfortunately, we aren't able to get statistics from, the only statistics that we would be able to get
01:55is if we were to raise them in parliament to ask what are the, what's the data on child marriage.
02:04And for want
02:05of a better, you know, for the big picture is, it is still happening. It is still happening quite
02:12rampantly. And to curb the marriage from happening, I would like to highlight actually that Malaysia has
02:23actually, the government had launched a national policy on children and its action plan last year,
02:31at the end of last year, in conjunction, I think, with the World Children's Day. And while, you know,
02:39there are some, what do you call this, steps that have actually been put into the action plan to say
02:47that, you know, there will be certain actions taken, the issue to kind of like make it better known
03:00to parents, you know, what are the, what do you call this, the harms. However, as a policy itself,
03:09it doesn't spell out that, you know, that the national policy has a specific policy to end child
03:20marriage in Malaysia per se. So this is where, you know, they're wanting to address some of the impacts,
03:28the harmful impacts of child marriage, but not addressing child marriage itself. And I think this is where,
03:35you know, while it's great that we have a national child policy and very specific action plans,
03:43however, I think the approach, the mindset that we are coming to the issue of child marriage is still a
03:50big gap.
03:50Meaning, you know, when it's not particularly mentioned in this national action plan that child
03:57marriage is harmful for children in Malaysia, that means we are taking the approach that it is not
04:04harmful. So that's where the big gap is. Rosanna, can you elaborate? What do you mean when you say to
04:10explicitly specify a policy to end child marriage? Do you mean to have, to state numerically a minimum age
04:20for marriage? Is that what you're referring to?
04:22Well, so I'm referring to, you know, the specific aspects of protection of children is laid out in
04:31objective two and keutamaan strategic empat, yeah, in the national action children, national
04:38children's policy and action plan. So objective two talks about memperkukuh aspek
04:42perlindungan kanak-kanak daripada sebarang bentuk keganasan, eksploitasi, penderaan,
04:48pengabayan, termasuklah pemerdagangan orang dan seterusnya diberi rehabilitasi dan diintegrasi
04:54ke dalam keluarga dan masyarakat. And the strategic priorities would be to memperkukuh
05:01mekanisme pelindungan melalui pencegahan, pengesanan, proses rujukan dan intervensi terhadap
05:07kanak-kanak yang telah menjadi mangsa bagi penderaan, pengabayan, penganiayaan, eksploitasi
05:13serta keganasan rumah tangga. So the harmful effects of, you know, how children can be
05:21exploited and the violence that, you know, they potentially may experience as a result of just
05:28being, you know, married young, you know, they're exploiting, sorry, they're addressing
05:35it in that way, but they're not mentioning specifically, you know, this whole objective
05:41to end child marriage in Malaysia. So that's where, that's where, you know, we're not saying
05:46it very, very specifically. Yeah.
05:49Talk to me about that. Why aren't we saying it at a national policy level? Why aren't we
05:55saying it explicitly? What are you hearing about? Why there's still resistance to talking
06:01about this front and centre?
06:05Actually, I think this is a great question to pose to the people who had made this policy
06:11because, but I'm wondering also, I mean, from the past experiences of CIS doing the advocacy
06:18on the issue of child marriage, you know, there's a lot of angst with regards to the
06:24legal framework, you know, our legal framework, one of the things that has come out of this
06:30whole thing is that we've just, Malaysia has just finished reporting to the committee on
06:38the Convention of Rights of the Child, the CRC, and the concluding observations have come up.
06:44And one of the big issues that, you know, the committee had highlighted is how we've not
06:50effectively addressed, you know, harmful practices, one of which is child marriage.
06:55And again, sorry, coming back to this whole thing of the past experience, I think one of
07:00the things, you know, as per the question you had, you know, what is it about, you know,
07:05Muslim children, Sharia, Islamic family law. And I think the angst that we have as Malaysians
07:13because we have this plural legal systems. We have the civil law and reform, sorry, law and
07:22marriage reform act 1976 for non-Muslim community. We have the Islamic family law in all states for
07:31the Muslim community, and then also the native law for Sabah and Sarawak, and perhaps even in
07:38Semenanjong as well. When it comes to the definition of children, and again, the committee
07:43had highlighted this, that, you know, we have not landed on what is the definition of a child
07:50in Malaysia, you know, and that's where the big gap is. You know, we've not, you know, a lot of
07:57the
07:58laws that we have, some of it, the definition is, you know, below 18, you know, 16 and below.
08:04Some of the acts also, even perhaps, you know, maybe 12 and so on. So I think there's a lot
08:11of
08:11laws that have actually not been, you know, we need to look at all these laws comprehensively
08:18and to say, you know, really Malaysia, how do we define children, right? And if we are saying,
08:25you know, those below, I mean, the most clearest universally, most people, you know, countries
08:30would say children, definition of children, anyone below the age of 18. And therefore, you know,
08:36they, any laws that we come up with as a country, regardless of whether it's, you know, we have
08:45different plural legal systems, you know, should actually land on this whole issue of anyone below
08:5018 are children, should be regarded as children and afforded the kinds of protections that children
08:56deserve. And I think when it comes to Islamic family law, you know, it's also the definition of,
09:01you know, the age of puberty, you know, Sudha Akhil Balik and, and the age of maturity. And I think
09:08these
09:09are the angles that we really need to come and close these gaps and have an understanding that, you know,
09:17even if, you know, within Islamic family law, you know, there is that definition of the age of
09:24puberty. But I think, you know, when it comes to protection of the children, I think it does not go
09:32against Islam to afford children, the kind of protection that they deserve, including, you know,
09:38being married off at a young age. Rosanna, thank you so much for helping us put this into
09:45the national context. I appreciate your time. Rosanna Issa from CIS Forum Malaysia there. We're
09:50going to take another quick break. We'll be back with more on this topic. Stay tuned.
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