LAWYERS for Liberty today slammed Deputy Prime Minister Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail for statements that appeared to defend the 41-year-old man who married an 11-year-old girl.

The legal rights advocacy group’s executive director, Latheefa Koya, said Wan Azizah was “downplaying” the case by asking for the family’s privacy to be protected and by comparing the public scrutiny to her own experience of her husband’s imprisonment for sodomy.

Wan Azizah, who is also women, family and community development minister, yesterday said the public should not to “lynch” the man and his family on social media. 

She also described the case as an “alleged incident” and that the case was still under investigation by multiple authorities.

Latheefa today tore into the minister’s words, saying it was not an alleged incident, as both man and child bride admitted the marriage.

“The culprit himself has admitted to the marriage and been fined for it. Worse, he has also publicly admitted to lusting after the child victim since she was seven.

“It appears to be another attempt by the DPM to downplay this outrageous case,” she said in a statement today.

“Why defend this self-confessed pervert by claiming that the concerned public are ‘lynching’ him?

Wan Azizah has publicly stated that the government “unequivocally” opposes child marriages and was working towards raising the minimum age for marriage to 18.

But Latheefa, who is also a central committee member of PKR of which Dr Wan Azizah is president, said the slowness in dealing with the matter was an embarrassment.

The head of PKR’s legal bureau also questioned the need for more investigations when the authorities should instead rescue the child from “a self-confessed paedophile” who should be arrested under the Sexual Offences Against Children Act 2017. – July 18, 2018.