THE National Registration Department’s (NRD) latest measures to curb fraud within its ranks over the sale of identification documents to foreign nationals must not worsen the problem of statelessness or punish children whose births are registered late, said a DAP aide.

Syahredzan Johan, who is political secretary to DAP MP Lim Kit Siang, said the NRD should reconsider its move to stop accepting late registrations of births at state level.

“(This) will worsen the problems in obtaining citizenship documents already faced by many people.

“The NRD should reconsider this move to ensure that the measures taken will not punish Malaysian children who deserve to be recognised as citizens,” Syahredzan said in a statement.

The Home Ministry recently announced that state NRD offices would stop accepting the late registration of births to help curb fraud.

Authorities recently broke up a syndicate selling identification documents to Chinese nationals, arresting 20 people, including a state NRD assistant director, on August 19 for their roles as agents, middlemen, sponsors and holders of fake birth certificates, MyKad and passports.

They are on remand for 28 days and are being investigated under the Security Offences (Special Measures) Act 2012 (Sosma).

The syndicate charged foreigners seeking citizenship between RM100,000 and RM600,000 for the documents.

Yesterday, Bandar Kuching MP Kelvin Yii said this move would hurt rural folk the most, because they would now be required to travel to the NRD headquarters in Putrajaya to register the births of their children.

Yii said people in rural areas, and in the interiors of Sabah and Sarawak already had difficulty reaching state NRD offices, and the journey to Putrajaya would cost even more in terms of money and time.

Yii urged the Home Ministry to make exceptions for children born in Sabah and Sarawak’s interior regions, as well as for Orang Asli on the Peninsula who face the same problems.

Syahredzan today said the government still had not solved statelessness issues comprehensively because the NRD was not satisfied with evidence furnished by those who had been born in Malaysia and lived here all their lives.

As such, the sale of documents to foreign nationals was a betrayal of the country and an insult to those who are stateless, he said. – September 24, 2019.