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MALAYSIA: Debate on Sex Education Rises with Teen Pregnancies

July 21, 2010 Byeditors

Global Geopolitics & Political Economy / IPS

By Baradan Kuppusamy

KUALA LUMPUR, Jul 21, 2010 (IPS)The prospect of motherhood filled 17-year-old Fatimahs heart with

dread.

This, the Muslim youngster told the magistrate she appeared before in March, is why she left her newborn babyto die in a garbage bag here in the Malaysian capital four months ago. "I feared punishment and condemnation

from my family and teachers in college," said Fatimah (not her real name).

The teenage mother was charged with abandoning her baby a crime in this moderate Muslim-majority countrywhose public has been increasingly worried by a spate of media reports police finding dead or alive newbornbabies in trash bins and public places, including convenience stores.

"I had nowhere to go. I hid the pregnancy by wearing loose clothes," Fatimah told the court when her case cameup for trial in May. In the end, Fatimah, whose relationship with her boyfriend had ended, delivered a baby girl

on the stairs of a shop, alone.

Under Section 317 of Malaysias Penal Code, the crime of intentionally abandoning a child below the age of 12

is punishable by up to seven years imprisonment. But the magistrate took her youth and other mitigating

factors into consideration and placed her on a good behaviour bond.

Based on police reports, over 100 babies were abandoned in 2006, many of them left by teenagers and young

adults, students and desperate foreign migrant workers. This figure could have risen in subsequent years, sincemany such incidents go unreported, police say.

The phenomenon is tragic, activists say, noting that Malaysia has a First-World information infrastructure thatcould be readily harnessed to educate the youth on reproductive and sexual health, especially in secondary

schools.

But religious opposition has stalled the integration of sex education in school curricula.

Echoing the views of the conservative sector, prominent cleric Nik Aziz Nik Mat said that sex education inschools would encourage teenage sexual promiscuity. "The best way to resolve this phenomenon is to instill

greater Islamic values (in young people)," Nik Aziz was quoted as saying in May.

Even former prime minister Mahathir Mohamad has said that sex education was unnecessary because students

are already getting Islamic and moral education. "We keep hearing about newborn babies found in garbage cans

which is a sad matter," Mahathir has said.

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The governments policy on sex education is far from clear. But amid a debate on unwanted teenage

pregnancies, it has formed a committee to look into whether to teach sex education in classes. While someaspects of reproductive system are taught in science classes, there is little or nothing on sex, much less safer sex

The government has also announced plans to set up an interactive portal in schools.

This is part of attempts to educate students about sexuality, abstaining from premarital sex, and the

consequences of unsafe sex, said Shahrizat Abdul Jalil, the minister for Women, Family and Community

Development.

"The portal will also equip them with necessary skills or tips on how to fend off sexual advances," she told IPS.

"The root of problem is that they (teenagers) do not know the risk involved. Most of the cases of abandoned

babies are the result of unwanted pregnancies."

But others point out that a judgemental approach that focuses on penalties, more than a frank, accurate and

educational one, does not really reach young people effectively. Malaysian society is "more focused on

condemning and punishing (sexual behaviour among youth) and not on understanding and helping," lamentedRagunath Kesavan, president of the Malaysian Bar Council.

"Its a severe form of incongruity that we must face up to and resolve teach or to ignore (sex education)," hesaid, because ignorance is behind the number of unplanned pregnancies and abandoned babies.

As a result, young people are turning to their peers or the Internet for information about sexuality. But "such

information is sketchy at best, probably romanticised and does not help young people make the right and safe

decision," lawmaker Chong Eng, who has frequently raised the issue in Parliament, told IPS.

"We cannot to ignore the challenges young people face. We have to teach, guide, and help them to make the

right decisions," he added.

A study by Fatimah Abdullah of the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia shows that young women in their 20s, not

just teenagers, abandon their babies, a fact that reflects the severe lack of knowledge about sexuality evenamong young adults.

Most young mothers did not even know they were pregnant even after they stopped menstruating, she said. Herresearch also showed that some girls could not even distinguish between their urethral and vaginal openings.

The study, the only one available in the country so far, noted that there was no specific policy or programme inplace to help teenagers deal with unwanted pregnancies.

Yet there are clearly implications for the future of girls and young women. "There is a lot of social stigmaagainst unwed mothers that may lead young girls to unsafe abortions, to backdoor practices that can threaten

their lives," said a spokesman for UnitedNations Childrens Fund in Malaysia. "It can have a huge emotionaland psychological impact on a girl who feels she has no other choice but to destroy her baby or give the baby up

at birth."

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