While civil society applauds the government's efforts to amend the Federal Constitution to grant citizenship to children born overseas to Malaysian mothers, the proposed amendments include unexpected changes that could exacerbate Malaysia's statelessness issue.
How will these proposed amendments impact the people on the ground, and do they truly have the best interests of the children at heart?
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How will these proposed amendments impact the people on the ground, and do they truly have the best interests of the children at heart?
Video produced by @TheFourth
WATCH MORE: https://thestartv.com/c/news
SUBSCRIBE: https://cutt.ly/TheStar
LIKE: https://fb.com/TheStarOnline
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NewsTranscript
00:00 When my picture and Syed Shaddiq's picture were posted on social media,
00:03 people thought YB wanted to introduce her to her fiancé or girlfriend.
00:07 But it's actually not.
00:08 I went to meet Syed Shaddiq to ask for help on my IC.
00:12 After years of campaigning by civil society,
00:15 the government is in the process of amending the federal constitution
00:18 to grant citizenship to children born overseas to Malaysian mothers.
00:22 However, the government's proposed amendments
00:24 include unexpected changes that have sparked concerns.
00:28 There are several categories of children
00:30 who are going to suffer a great deal because of these amendments.
00:34 And I think that's heartless.
00:36 We try to assist stateless persons' acquisition towards citizenship.
00:40 And the law is what we have.
00:42 And when the law itself is being amended for worse,
00:46 it definitely shakes the entire ecosystem that we have.
00:49 If the proposed amendments are passed,
00:52 I think we, as stateless, have no hope.
00:55 (Train horn)
00:57 (Train rumbling)
01:00 I work as a crew cafe at Bukit Bintang.
01:09 I seek work from a lot of places.
01:12 They say, "Oh, cannot.
01:14 At least you need to have a green card."
01:16 That time there is a person, she helped me because she knows my conditions.
01:20 She said, "It's okay, I pay you, you work with me."
01:23 Akasha was born in Malaysia to a Malaysian father and Indonesian mother.
01:27 Since her parents' marriage was only registered overseas
01:30 and her mother abandoned the family, Akasha is stateless.
01:35 I have a younger brother.
01:37 He's scared of the outside world.
01:40 And he's scared because he's stateless too.
01:42 And I need to, like, support him.
01:46 And actually I'm also scared to get sick very, very much
01:50 because we cannot go to hospitals.
01:52 As a stateless, we can go to clinic, but we need money, like, maybe expensive.
01:56 (Train horn)
01:58 Even though I'm just trying to buy my own SIM card,
02:01 I just want to go to jalan-jalan, everything is, like, forbidden things to do.
02:06 The stateless being like, you're a ghost.
02:09 It's not a ghost that people can't see, but people can see you.
02:14 Development of human resources for rural areas, or DRA,
02:17 has identified over 16,000 stateless individuals in peninsular Malaysia alone.
02:23 DRA worked to assist individuals in acquiring Malaysian citizenship.
02:27 I think broadly people assume just having a Malaysian parent
02:31 is enough for you to get automatic citizenship, but that's not the case.
02:35 Akasha's father and her mother did not legally register their marriage.
02:41 And because of that, and in accordance to Section 17 of the federal constitution,
02:45 a child that is born out of legal wedlock to a Malaysian father
02:49 cannot automatically acquire the father's citizenship.
02:52 Throughout the world, there's only two countries that practice this discriminatory law,
02:57 which does not allow a child to acquire a citizenship
03:00 because of the status of being born out of wedlock.
03:03 And that's Malaysia and Barbados.
03:05 There is another provision that addresses this loophole
03:08 by allowing anyone born in Malaysia without citizenship in another country
03:12 to become a Malaysian citizen automatically.
03:15 But it is not being implemented,
03:17 forcing people like Wong Kwan Hui to fight through the court.
03:22 The law does allow the minister considerable discretion.
03:26 The only problem is this.
03:27 This discretion is exercised in such a way that people have to wait decades,
03:35 not two or three years, decades.
03:37 Between 2017 and 2021, only 6 to 8% applications
03:43 for registration and naturalization were successful.
03:47 So that means 90 plus percent of the applications were unsuccessful.
03:52 So the law is there.
03:54 The minister or the ministry can embrace these victimized, helpless people.
04:04 But they do not do it.
04:06 In the process of proposing a constitutional amendment
04:09 to allow children born overseas to Malaysian mothers to acquire citizenship,
04:13 the government is also proposing that Section 1(e)
04:16 is changed from "by operation of law" to "by registration".
04:21 The government would have control over approving your citizenship.
04:25 While on automatic, they can't say no to you.
04:28 As long as you qualify, you can get a citizenship.
04:30 However, if it's by registration,
04:32 even if you do have a complete set of the right set of documents and etc,
04:36 you don't necessarily will get approval.
04:38 This is just one of the proposed amendments
04:40 that threatens to make statelessness in Malaysia worse.
04:43 When KDN's research team actually conducted the Taklimat,
04:48 we knew five particular objections that we were not happy.
04:54 We approached the Ministry of Home Affairs of Malaysia for comment,
05:00 but they stated they were unavailable during the production period.
05:04 News reports show that the government identified the amendments
05:07 based on findings through research analysis, engagement sessions,
05:10 comparative studies of other countries' legislation,
05:13 as well as discussions in cabinet committee meetings and the technical committee.
05:17 KDN has also stated that they aim to clear the backlog of citizenship applications.
05:22 They say they have received 150,000 applications
05:26 and aim to process at least 10,000 this year.
05:29 Meanwhile, for stateless individuals like Melissa,
05:32 the challenges are constant.
05:35 -Do you need a passport? -Yes, I do.
05:39 The police stopped us and asked, "Where are you from?"
05:42 "From a shooting."
05:43 So, people didn't seem to believe us.
05:45 We explained to them and they said, "Oh, okay. Do you need an IC?"
05:49 So, I had to say, "I don't have an IC."
05:52 "How can you not have an IC?"
05:53 So, I gave them my birth certificate.
05:55 The same thing all over again.
05:57 And then the police said, "It's okay, Miss. Just go back."
06:02 That is lucky. If it's not lucky, they would ask for money.
06:06 It's actually very hurtful for me because
06:09 I'm a Malaysian citizen by rights, but no one would trust.
06:12 Recently, I got offered to act in a drama, 40 episodes, in Sarawak.
06:22 And I couldn't go.
06:24 So, I had to turn down.
06:25 So, many times, if I wanted to shoot anywhere,
06:28 they would confirm that I would be flying.
06:30 I didn't have an IC. How could I fly?
06:32 "Good girl. Good girl."
06:39 "You can sit here."
06:42 "Sit here."
06:43 So, I hope that this amendment is not that cruel.
06:48 I hope so because it's not like we don't have ambitions.
06:53 We don't have a goal.
06:54 I had a dream when I was a kid.
06:57 I wanted to be a police.
06:59 Allah.
07:03 But now, all those things that we've been dreaming of
07:09 are fading away.
07:11 Our ambition as Stateless is to become a Malaysian citizen.
07:17 Malaysia is our place.
07:19 Malaysia is our country, actually.
07:21 We were born here. We were raised here.
07:23 We are familiar with the culture in Malaysia.
07:26 So, where else would we want to go?
07:29 It's all parents' fault.
07:32 They continue to punish us for things that we didn't do.
07:40 There's no need to adopt the attitude that,
07:42 "Look, this is a whole package deal. Take it or leave it."
07:45 Malaysian mothers giving birth abroad
07:47 cannot pass their citizenship to their kids.
07:50 Yes, I think that's a very beautiful aspect of the amendment procedures
07:55 that mothers and fathers will hopefully now be treated on par.
08:01 I think we should go ahead with these right away.
08:03 But the other amendments,
08:05 we need to have democratic consultation with affected interests
08:10 and civic-minded citizens.
08:12 And Parliament must play a greater role
08:14 by appointing a special committee of Parliament
08:18 to examine these proposals.
08:23 If I get to be a Malaysian,
08:25 first thing I want to open my bank account,
08:28 a license,
08:29 because I want to drive a motorcycle.
08:32 I want to drive a car.
08:34 I want to find a job.
08:35 I want to do all, actually.
08:37 And I want to buy my own SIM card with my own IC.
08:40 I don't have that.
08:41 Can I borrow your IC to buy my SIM card?
08:44 No, I want to buy my own SIM card.
08:46 Even though it's not a big thing to others,
08:49 but this statement is meaningful.
08:52 It's like we come back to life again.
08:55 [MUSIC PLAYING]