A 14-year old girl in Seremban gave birth to a 3kg baby last week.
The police have since detained her 19-year old boyfriend. He has been remanded for a week to assist with investigations under section 376 of the Penal Code for rape.
The girl, who has just completed Form 2, and her baby are reportedly doing fine.
Her family is in shock, as they had no idea she was pregnant.
There is a disturbing
epidemic of rape cases against minors in Malaysia involving girls as young as six. Out of a 37,263 rape cases reported from 2000 to 2015, 16, 265 victims were between the ages of 13 and 15. That’s more than half.
Malaysian laws have also come under fire as being insufficient to
protect victims.
For example, earlier this year Ahmad Shukri Yusuf, 28, managed to avoid his sentence for statutory rape – an offense that carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in jail and whipping, when he married his victim.
She was 14 years old at the time of the incident. The judge discharged the case after she was presented with the marriage certificate in court.
According to Malaysia’s civil law, the legal minimum age for marriage is 18, and under Islamic law, it is 16 for girls. However, Muslim girls below the age of 16 can marry if they obtain permission from Islamic courts. Girls aged 16 to 18 can also marry with the consent of their state’s chief minister.
Women’s groups have slammed the court’s decision, stating that these laws in fact permit and legalise statutory rape, giving predators legal access to children. Indeed it can be argued that girls below 16 are definitely still children, and cannot consent to sex, married or not.
Datuk Fatimah Abdullah, Minister of Welfare, Women and Community Wellbeing says that among the
many challenges faced by her ministry in addressing teenage pregnancies is when the pregnant teenager’s parents want her to get married to the accused.
“By right it is statutory rape, but usually the parents do not want to charge the perpetrator because he will go to jail and their daughter will have no husband, while their grandchild will have no father. So that becomes an issue,” she explained.
