Beyond GISBH: Unravelling Malaysia’s child protection nightmare

Over the years, we have had numerous wake-up calls for improving our child protection services – children dying in child care centres (pengasuh), children abused in government and religious schools and children abused in government run welfare homes.

Now we hear of the travesty of 402 children abused in 20 Global Ikhwan Services and Business Holdings (GISBH) welfare homes in Selangor and Negeri Sembilan.

This is not just a failure by the staff in the homes, but also of our child protection services. The horrific sexual and physical abuse that has been reported is a major wake-up call. It demands that we re-evaluate the quality and scope of our child protection services.

As civil society and advocates for child protection, we need to ask the important questions and we need answers – honest and real ones. Some of the critical questions that need to be answered are listed below.

Question 1: How many of these GISBH centres are registered and known to the Welfare Department? Has there been a regular time-based registration renewal after an evaluation for those centres registered?

Question 2: For the GISBH centres registered or known to the Welfare Department, how many of them have received visits for an inspection and monitoring? Knowing how many visits were paid to these centres over the years would be useful.

Question 3: The police statement notes that 41 police reports had been lodged against GISBH from 2011 to 2024. How many of these were related to child care or abuse? What action was taken? Did the police notify the Welfare Department if any child care issues or abuse was suspected (as is a mandated requirement under the Child Act 2001)?

Question 4: What is the capacity of the Welfare Department to support these 402 children who are abused, in terms of providing them a safe location and the extensive psychological support they need? Note that the children’s homes run by our Welfare Department (RKK) are overloaded and understaffed, with poor psychosocial support.

Question 5: The horrific abuse is just coming to light now but these GISBH homes have been operating for years. How many hundreds of other children have gone through their hands over time? What is being done to identify and support them? How many other GISBH homes in the country need to be evaluated?

Question 6: In working with the Welfare Department, we noticed a reluctance to monitor and enforce child protection policies in religious institutions. Is religion an excuse to not enforce the Child Act? Are child care facilities registered under Religious Department and the Ministry of Education exempt from the Child Act and the Welfare Department’s purview? The Child Act is clear – it covers all children and the Welfare Department are the designated protectors of all children in the country.

Question 7: We are aware that the Welfare Department is short-staffed. Why is the Welfare Department reluctant to use civil society organisations to support child protection services?

We are distressed with the lack of significant growth in the child protection services under the Welfare Department over many years. How many abused children will it take before we act? The time must come when we draw a line in the sand and say enough is enough. The time is long overdue for an extensive revamp of the Welfare Department.

We cannot keep running child protection services with staff who are learning on the job. Would you like your children to go to school and be taught by people who are learning on the job? Would you like to go to a hospital and be treated by staff who have no formal training in healthcare?

We need professionals, trained social workers, to take over and run qualified and effective child protection services – where children are given real protection and child care facilities monitored effectively.

We urgently need answers to these questions to be made public. There is a serious trust deficit and we cannot continue to deny our children the child protection services they require. We appeal to our elected representatives, our MPs, to help us obtain these answers and inform the public of the situation.

Remember this is the tip of the iceberg. There are numerous children’s homes in the country, some registered and most poorly monitored, if at all. There are confinement centres, child minders, schools and resident care homes that also need to be registered and monitored. We have barely begun.

Unless the legally designated child protectors admit to failure and their limitations, we cannot acknowledge the crisis of services.

We recognise that the Welfare Department is grossly understaffed. The solution is not to take in more untrained individuals but to push very hard to employ trained social workers. This also means making a concerted effort to expand social worker training in the country.

We need minimum standards of care for all children in care situations.

Finally, we need mandatory licensing and monitoring of all child care facilities.

Signatories:

1. Dato’ Dr Amar-Singh HSS, consultant paediatrician, child-disability activist
2. Yayasan Chow Kit
3. Ramesh Patel, Pusat Jagaan Kanak Kanak Vivekananda Rembau
4. Yap Sook Yee, child-disability advocate, mother to a child with disability
5. Jeannie Low, chief operations director, Play Unlimited
6. Childline Foundation
7. Toy Libraries Malaysia
8. Aisha Zanariah Abdullah, child advocate
9. Anisa Ahmad, child activist
10. National Early Childhood Intervention Council (NECIC)
11. Host International Foundation Malaysia
12. Lim Mei Yek, president, Kuching Association of Talent Development and Welfare of Special Needs (KATSN)
13. Asha Singh, social worker
14. Dr Wong Woan Yiing, consultant paediatrician
15. Wong Hui Min, president, National Early Childhood Intervention Council
16. Sin Tiew Cheo, chairperson, Spices Early Intervention Centre
17. Dr Ng Su Fang, consultant paediatrician
18. Gill Raja, social work lecturer
19. Department of Education, University of Swinburne Sarawak
20. Prof Dr Toh Teck Hock, consultant paediatrician
21. Sarawak Women for Women Society
22. Asia Community Service
23. World Vision Malaysia
24. Amy Bala, Malaysian Association of Social Workers
25. Ng Lai-Thin, project lead, National Early Childhood Intervention Council (NECIC)
26. Kong Lan Lee, director, Persatuan Kanak-Kanak Istimewa Kajang
27. Dr Mastura Ibrahim, consultant paediatrician
28. Dr Norhafizah Ahmad, consultant paediatrician
29. Michelle Lai, chairperson, New Horizons Society
30. Women’s Centre for Change (WCC)
31. Dr Ling How Kee, social work educator and child rights activist
32. Agnes Suganthi, consultant paediatrician
33. Global Shepherds
34. Vanguards4Change
35. Purple Lily Social Association Kuching
36. Persatuan Sahabat Wanita Selangor
37. Wilhelmina Mowe
38. Azira Aziz, lawyer

The views expressed in Aliran's media statements and the NGO statements we have endorsed reflect Aliran's official stand. Views and opinions expressed in other pieces published here do not necessarily reflect Aliran's official position.

AGENDA RAKYAT - Lima perkara utama

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3. Raikan kerencaman dan keterangkuman
4. Selamatkan demokrasi dan angkatkan keluhuran undang-undang
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