KUALA LUMPUR – Will the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry step forward and hold itself accountable for the horrific physical and emotional abuse said to have been inflicted upon children under Global Ikhwan Services and Business Holdings’ (GISBH) care?
Helmed by minister Datuk Seri Nancy Shukri, the ministry’s apparent lack of apology for the plight faced by over 500 children rescued from GISBH-linked homes and religious schools has drawn the ire of child’s rights activists.
Child advocacy group Voice of the Children co-founder Sharmila Sekaran asserted that authorities’ failure to take action against GISBH earlier has caused extensive trauma to the child victims recently rescued from its premises, where they are believed to have endured sexual assaults and emotional manipulation.
Sharmila pointed out that the Women Ministry oversees the Children’s Development Department, which was established in September last year to replace the Children’s Division under the Public Welfare Department (JKM) – also parked under the ministry.
“As a child protector, if children were not protected, then you have to say sorry. When you speak with people who have been violated, you’ll find that sometimes all they want is for someone to apologise for what happened to them,” Sharmila said when contacted by Scoop.
“The Women Ministry has failed these children (allegedly victimised by GISBH), (and yet) we have not heard an apology from anyone in the ministry, nor other authorities.
“In other countries, when an incident of this scale happens, the minister would resign, (but) I don’t think we’ve reached that level of integrity yet in Malaysia.”
On September 11, police rescued 402 children aged between one and 17 from 20 welfare homes in Selangor and Negri Sembilan, which the authorities had linked to GISBH, as part of a major interagency operation dubbed Op Global.
Three days later, Nancy said in a statement that her ministry, through JKM, has been involved in the operation “from early on”, providing her assurance that the rescued children are receiving proper care and protection while noting that the ministry will continue to carry out its responsibilities in the children’s best interest.
Phase Four of Op Global, which began on September 21, saw police rescuing another 187 victims, 59 of whom were aged below 5, following raids on 59 premises across the nation.
Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Razarudin Husain previously said that initial health screenings of a number of the children showed that they were beaten, whipped, malnourished and subjected to child grooming as well as child labour and exploitation.
Razarudin had also denied accusations of police delaying action against GISBH, saying that while police had investigated 41 reports on GISBH since 2011, it only made arrests now after receiving credible evidence.
While GISBH has stood out in reports due to its ties with banned deviant sect Al-Arqam, Sharmila pointed out that the ongoing case involving its alleged abuse against children is far from an isolated one.
She referenced the case of British paedophile Richard Huckle, who was in 2016 slapped with 22 life sentences after pleading guilty in a British court to 71 sexual offences against Malaysian children.
Huckle had admitted to molesting children aged between 6 months and 13 years from 2006 to 2014 while he posed as a Christian missionary and a freelance photographer in Malaysia.
“We know very well that there are bad people trying to take advantage of our children, some of whom might have no parental support or a dysfunctional parental background, similar to how some of the children rescued from GISBH are said to not know their parents,” Sharmila said.
“We know this, and yet there is no serious political will on the part of the authorities to say that the government will take responsibility for the wellbeing of our children. Until and unless that happens, similar incidents will keep happening and the public will forget about them after a while.”
She also suggested that the government establish a division under the Children’s Development Department to handle the registration and monitoring of individuals and centres involved in providing care for children.
Such a move, she said, must be coupled with a streamlining of JKM’s role to provide a clearer definition as its officers are currently tasked with overseeing the welfare of not only children but also the elderly and disabled community.
While the Child Care Centre Act 1984 stipulates that such care centres must be registered under JKM, Sharmila said that the presence of the Child Development Department will help to ensure that minors are safeguarded and afforded proper protection.
Expressing similar sentiments, Child Rights Innovation and Betterment Foundation co-chairperson Srividhya Ganapathy said that problems arising from different rules imposed by different agencies – all tasked with overseeing and licensing children care homes – are compounded by the lack of an overarching regulatory body which monitors children’s welfare.
She highlighted how there is no “complete set of requirements” that child carers must abide by, regardless of whether the children are housed in JKM-registered centres or religious schools under the Islamic Development Department (Jakim).
She contended that there is a need for an independent agency to operate as a “team leader” in managing child victims rescued from GISBH, asserting that the Children’s Development Department might face difficulties if it were to assume such a role.
“This case is a landmark incident which we should look at as one which exemplifies our need for an independent supervisory or regulatory agency in charge of children’s welfare,” she told Scoop.
“Some might say that there is no need for one as we have the Children’s Development Department, but will the department be able to tell the police what to do to prevent further harm against the victims? Will the police listen?
“All of the children rescued from GISBH are in need of care and their rights have been violated in some way or another.
“There must be a project head to manage the handling of the victims in an effort to rectify, remedy and rehabilitate all the wrongs imposed on them.”
Stressing that the priority should be to avoid retraumatising the victims after their rescue, Srividhya said the independent agency in question should be afforded the power to “ask questions and issue directions” aimed at safeguarding the children. – September 26, 2024
