STATELESS children in the country can now enrol in government schools beginning next year by merely producing their birth certificate, said Deputy Education Minister Teo Nie Ching.

Undocumented children could still enrol themselves but they have two years to produce the necessary documents, she said in Kuching today.

Apart from birth certificates, these children could produce either their adoption certificate if they are adopted or any court order, Teo told reporters at SMJK Kuching High.

Earlier in her address, she said “being in school is the right place for the children”.

Teo said it is thought there are about 300,000 stateless children under the age of 18 in the country. This is from the figure that was given to her in parliament in 2016 by the then home minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.

“In the past, it’s quite troublesome for them to enrol in government schools but in a meeting last week, we decided to simplify the process.

“If they have the birth certificate, adoption certificate, a court order or one of their parents is a Malaysian, they will be able to use that to enrol.

“Any one of these documents is good enough.”

Teo said the new policy also applies to them continuing their studies in secondary schools.

“We will allow them to take public exams, the PT3, SPM, STPM, as well.”

The figure released in 2016 by the task force set up by the National Registration Department showed there were “at least 2,000” of these stateless children in Sarawak, almost all in rural areas where obtaining proper documents like birth certificates or MyKad is a serious problem.

The most common causes for these children to be classified as stateless in Sarawak are unregistered marriages, unable to trace parents, mothers without proper documents, and difficulty for rural folks to travel to the nearest National Registration Department offices to register births. – October 12, 2018.