KUALA LUMPUR: Prime Minister's wife Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor has shared Malaysia's experiences in combating child sexual offences head-on at an international meeting organised at the United Nations in New York.
She said Malaysia had achieved much in undertaking this endeavour in a relatively short period of time, which reflected the urgency attached to ending abuse, exploitation, trafficking and all forms of violence and torture against children.
"These problems are real and they are prevalent in all countries. We must address them now before they worsen," she said in a recorded video of her speech shown at the high-level meeting, Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals for Children: Collective Actions and Innovative Solutions, on Monday.
In Malaysia's case, she said, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak in August 2016 took the decisive action in forming a task force to look into all issues related to sexual crimes against children.
"With full political commitment from the top, within six months, the Sexual Offences Against Children Bill was drafted and presented to Parliament in March 2017," Rosmah said.
She said that with overwhelming public support, the bill was unanimously passed and came into force on July 10 this year.
Rosmah said the Malaysian government's seriousness in tackling the problem was also mirrored in the June 2017 launch of the Sexual Offences Against Children Court, to ensure that cases were dealt with effectively within 12 months.
“I believe that it is the first of its kind in Southeast Asia. Under a very experienced presiding judge ... 248 of the 293 registered cases or 84.6% were disposed of within three months. The government is planning to expand this special court to other states in the country,” she said.
Special attention, she explained, was also being given to ensure that victims and their families did not suffer greater physical, emotional and psychological trauma, and eliminate "silos" and outdated work systems.
To this end, Rosmah added that a special committee led by the minister responsible for law had been set up to draft detailed and comprehensive standard operating procedures (SOPs) in dealing with cases in a professional and tactful manner.
The session was graced by the presence of World Childhood Foundation founder Queen Silvia of Sweden, who had invited Rosmah, who is a patron of the Permata Programme, to attend the event.
Rosmah told the meeting that plans were underway to introduce programmes to improve the competency and expertise of judges, prosecutors, legal practitioners, police, counsellors, social workers and health professionals with regards towards sexual crimes against children.
Another initiative was an effort to train sign language interpreters to assist children with special needs to give evidence of sexual abuse.
Moving forward, Rosmah said Malaysia was studying the feasibility of establishing a Children’s Commission and to become a party to the Council of Europe's Lanzarote Convention that requires criminalisation of all kinds of sexual offences against children.
Noting that exploitation and sexual offences and other forms of violence against children did not respect borders, she said Malaysia was proposing an Asean-level seminar on this matter to be hosted by the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry in 2018.
Rosmah further said that a seminar on "Keeping our Women and Children CyberSAFE" would be held on Oct 22 by the National Council of Women and CyberSecurity Malaysia.
"More focus is being given to parental education as children's safety is ultimately their responsibility," the Prime Minister's wife said.
According to one of Malaysia's representatives at the high-level meeting, Prof Tan Sri Dr Sharifah Hapsah Syed Hasan Shahabudin, Rosmah's speech had been well received and many delegates congratulated Malaysia's achievements in such a short period of time.
Dr Sharifah Hapsah said Queen Silvia had asked her to convey Her Majesty's admiration of Malaysia's tremendous progress in addressing child sexual offences to Rosmah. — Bernama
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