THE new government must fulfil its promise of raising the marriageable age of all Malaysians to 18 years and ban child marriage in the country immediately, said Malaysia-based civil society groups Asian Pacific Resource and Research Centre for Women (Arrow) and Sisters in Islam (SIS) today. 

Ahead of a global meeting on child marriage – Girls Not Brides – in Kuala Lumpur next week, the two groups have together launched a national report on child marriage in Malaysia.

The study, Child Marriage: Its Relationship with Religion, Culture and Patriarchy, a National Report on Malaysia, found that religious conservatism, patriarchal beliefs, and reasons of sexual impropriety were the main drivers of child marriage in Malaysia.   

The report by SIS, in cooperation with Arrow, also found that nearly 153,000 persons below the age of 19 were married in Malaysia and were mostly from the Malay Muslim community. Of this, 80,000 were girls and the remaining were boys.

Sivananthi Thanenthiran, executive director of Arrow, a regional group that champions sexual and reproductive health and rights of women and young people, says that it is an alarming number, especially since it is from the 2010 Population and Housing Census.

She said it was also a matter of concern that this data has been withheld from the public for so long.

“As one of its immediate priorities, the new government should release updated data to understand the extent of the problem, and disaggregate the data, as a first step to understanding how to end child marriage,” said Sivananthini. 

The report also found that child marriages were most prevalent in the state of Sarawak with about 1,745 recorded, followed by Johor with 999, and Selangor with 687 – based on data from the Home Affairs Ministry from 2000 to 2014.

However, the data available is “irregular, inconsistent, limited, and at times contradictory”, which gives average Malaysians the impression that child marriage is not a problem in our country. At the regional and global level, child marriage is closely interrelated with poverty, and access to education is seen as a proven intervention. However, in Malaysia, according to the United Nations, poverty levels are lower and school enrollment levels are high.  

Rozana Isa, executive director of SIS, says that while poverty is usually the reason for child marriage in many countries, culture, tradition, and a low tolerance for young children engaging with the opposite sex are the reasons for child marriage in Malaysia.

“The solution must be a total ban on child marriage through reform of legislation. The minimum age of marriage must be raised to 18 for both genders, regardless of faith and ethnicity, with no exceptions,” said Rozana.

Malaysia has a dual legal system which practices a civil legal system and an Islamic (shariah) legal system. It is argued that in Islam, a girl is allowed to marry once she reaches puberty, thus no law that sets a minimum age of marriage can apply to Muslims.

The Islamic Family Law (Federal Territory) Act 1984 (IFLA) sets this at 16 years for girls and 18 for boys. But exceptions are allowed with the permission of the shariah court.

The National Fatwa Council in 2014 discouraged such practices, though it did not explicitly reject or label it as haram (prohibited). The Council’s fatwa declared that child marriage was not obligatory and that it was not a “healthy” practice. It is neither mandatory (wajib) nor encouraged (sunat).

Given the prevalence of religious conservatism in the country, Rozana says that reforms must include strong outreach and public education campaigns, which demonstrate the irreparable social and economic damage caused by of child marriage in order to significantly changing mindsets.

There is also an urgent need for comprehensive sexuality education in Malaysia to combat the issues of teenage pregnancy and HIV transmission amongst adolescents and young people, and ensure young people are better equipped to access information and critical sexual and reproductive health services.

The Girls Not Brides Global Meeting will take place in Kuala Lumpur from June 25-27 and is an excellent opportunity for Malaysia and governments in our region to act on their commitments to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women.

The National Report on Malaysia, Child Marriage: Its Relationship with Religion, Culture and Patriarchy, a National Report on Malaysia, can be downloaded here.

* The Asian-Pacific Resource and Research Centre for Women is a regional non-profit women’s organisation based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

* Sisters in Islam is a civil society organisation working towards advancing the rights of Muslim women in Malaysia within the framework of Islam, universal human rights principles, constitutional guarantees, as well as lived realities and experiences of women.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.