Jan 2, 2022
The Importance of the Anti-Sexual Harassment Bill in Malaysia
TW: This article mentions sexual harassment and rape.
Sexual harassment is still a pressing issue in Malaysia affecting many communities. Currently, the lack of legislation has resulted in severe injustice for many survivors in this nation. One of the few laws against sexual harassment lies in the Employment Act 1955. According to Section 2 of the Act, sexual harassment is defined as “any unwanted conduct of a sexual nature, whether verbal, non-verbal, visual, gestural or physical, directed at a person which is offensive or humiliating or is a threat to his well-being, arising out of and in the course of his employment.” However, the law is limited and it cannot be applied to other circumstances outside of the workplace. Some sections in the Penal Code, namely those which provide for rape and assault with intentions of insulting modesty, have also been utilised to fight against this issue. Yet, the burden of proof has led many cases to fail, as sufficient evidence is usually difficult to gather on the survivor’s end.
Thus, there are plenty of sexual harassment cases that are not brought to light and which have gone unreported for several years. This is detrimental for the survivors as they are unable to achieve justice while their abusers get away with their heinous crimes. According to YouGov, only about half of those who have faced sexual harassment report their incidents or at least told someone about it, which is an alarming number of unreported cases. This is why it is essential for Malaysia to pass the anti-sexual harassment bill that will hopefully catalyse the decrease of sexual harassment cases from occurring in the near future.
The Necessity of the Bill
The long awaited anti sexual harassment bill has finally been tabled for its first reading on 15th December 2021. It was first read by Datuk Siti Zailah Mohd Yusoff, Deputy Minister of Women, Family and Community Development. According to Datuk Siti Zailah Mohd Yusoff, this bill will have a wider application of the law. Unlike the previous ones, survivors will be provided remedies regardless of the location of the offence. Although the bill has not officially been passed, Datuk Siti Zailah hopes this recent reading can help raise awareness of sexual harassment and prevent the public from normalising it, and as a result, create a safer environment for society where people can walk around without the fear of harassment by others.
Despite little progression from the parliament in regards to the sexual harassment cases, why did it take so long for us to realise the dangers of it in the first place? In fact there weren’t many laws available at all to combat sexual harassment before 2012. In countries such as Australia and the New Zealand laws against sexual harassment have already been established way before the 21st century. Both these countries have similar definitions to what sexual harassment is and recognises sexual harassment does actually happen outside of the workplace.
Moreover, it is no surprise that Malaysia still has a heavy culture of victim blaming instead of shifting the actual blame to the abusers. We have seen countless reports of people, especially women of all ages, being harassed or raped, broadcasted on many news outlets. Although it seems obvious who we should accuse for their wrongdoings in these situations, there are still some who immediately go “why was she alone?”, “what was she wearing?”, “she was asking for it.” in many other statements which perpetuates this culture of victim blaming. Rape culture is also a major problem we are still facing in this country.
What makes this worse is grown adults, specifically educators, acting on this. Earlier this year we saw how a student called out her teacher for making rape jokes in class laughing it off as nothing but a mere joke. However, that was not the only educator who made such remarks regarding sexual harassment. A lecturer at MRSM openly talked about the causes of rape crimes which all point fingers at the survivor instead of holding the offenders accountable. These people are supposed to teach and help lead the next generation. If this continues, the cycle of victim blaming and rape culture will be never ending. People are still ashamed and afraid to speak up about their abuse because of the judgemental and victim blaming society we still live in. The mere fact that the bill has been delayed for so long shows that the issue of rape has to be voiced out more in Malaysia in order to make people realise the seriousness of it.
The Push for the Bill
In 1985, a coalition called the Joint Action Group for Gender Equality (JAG) was first established with the aim of campaigning for women’s rights. Within this coalition are several prominent women NGO’s, one of which is Women’s Centre for Change, or WCC (previously known as Women’s Crisis Centre), who spearheaded the campaign to lobby for an anti-sexual harassment law alongside other advocacy groups. The draft bill was also put up on WCC’s website for public viewing.
Various other organisations have given their support for the anti-sexual harassment bill, one of them being AWAM. For more than 20 years, AWAM has been working with many NGOs to draft and purpose the bill, in the hopes that it will provide a safe environment far from sexual harassment, whether in public or private for everyone actively supporting the bill. The Women’s Aid Organisation is also in support of this initiative. The organisation has provided extensive information and suggestions on what the bill should include. They have also talked about how the bill should be survivor focused and provide a clear and expansive definition for sexual harassment which includes all areas of it.
Sexual assault is still a widespread problem in Malaysia. Although the bill can help curb future sexual violence from happening, it is also important for us to educate ourselves and raise awareness to others on this issue. We must stop the victim blaming culture and actually provide aid for these survivors and punish the actual offenders. Breaking this generational cycle of rape culture and victim blaming is the key to preventing sexual crimes. It makes us recognise and teach the next generation that it is unacceptable in any place for people to act however they want to another person without consent.
Written by: Anne Rose. Edited by: Suhana Kabeer.
