One rape every 15 minutes but Putrajaya fixating on IS, MP saysf

KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 30 ― Women face a real and present danger of rape and sexual assault yet Putrajaya was more focused on enacting laws to ostensibly target the nebulous threat from the Islamic State (IS), said a DAP MP today.

Citing statistics that show one woman is raped every 15 minutes in Malaysia, Bukit Mertajam MP Steven Sim said there was no urgency in reining in the menace which sees thousands of girls and women fall victim to sexual predators each year.

Sim said that while Putrajaya was willing to rush through laws such as at the National Security Council Bill — which was tabled, debated and passed in a matter of days — legislation for a sexual offenders’ registry remain in limbo almost a decade after being mooted.

“As such I want to urge the prime minister who was former the acting minister for women, family and community development to prioritise the implementation of the Sexual Offenders Registration Act as well as reform the existing legal system to ensure a more effective curbing of sexual crimes.

“Whatever programmes for women empowerment will be rendered meaningless if women constantly live in fear of being victims of sexual crimes,” Sim said in a statement today.

The sexual offenders’ registry was revisited again earlier this year, following cases involving a 60-year-old man who impregnated a minor as well as a MARA scholar who was convicted of child pornography in the UK.

Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar initially said such a registry was redundant, but later stated that the police would implement it if a law was passed on the subject.

The case of convicted child pornographer Nur Fitri Azmeer Nordin, in particular, prompted renewed and urgent calls for a sexual offenders list, although Putrajaya has not indicated that any such law is being prepared for the near future.

In comparison, Putrajaya has since 2012 enacted the Security Offences (Special Measures) Act or SOSMA, the Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA) and, this year, the NSC Bill, all ostensibly to combat the threat of IS and other militant groups.

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