The Malaysian Insight

LIFE outside a welfare shelter was not the bed of roses that two women expected, as their lack of identification documents have denied them the opportunities and public services that most people take for granted.

Mira (not her real name) is now a 27-year-old mother of two in Penang.  

She was placed in a shelter when she was three years old because of neglect. She has a birth certificate, but the citizenship column is left blank. It is believed that she is of Indian ancestry.

Mira was released from the shelter when she turned 18, and looked forward to getting a job and leading an independent life in Kuantan.

“When the shelter released me, it was difficult to get a job. At first, I used the RM2,000 that the Welfare Department provided me. I saved and used that money to rent a room.

“Most people didn’t want to hire me because I didn’t have an IC. Thankfully, a ‘foster mother’ let me stay at her house for 5 months. She was a ward of the Welfare Department, too,” said Mira.

“When I was 19, I went to study at a pondok school in Sungai Petani, Kedah. I became a Muslim and tried to live on my own means.”

For a person with an undocumented past, the present was precarious and the future looked bleak.

Muhammad Khairul Hafiz, president of the Welfare and Social Association of Malaysia (Perbak), said more than 1,000 people who were under the protection of the Welfare Department as children did not have Malaysian citizenship.

The group urged the ministry to look into issues involving former wards of the Welfare Department.

Cards were issued to those released from welfare homes upon reaching 18, which would enable them to get jobs and education, but many are still without proper identification documents.

“I did a lot of odd jobs. I worked at a petrol station that paid by the day. If I didn’t work, I wouldn’t get paid. I’ve been cheated a few times when they didn’t pay me.”

She got married to a cleaner when she was 23 in Kuantan. But married life didn’t work out for her, too, and Mira is now getting a divorce.

“I now have a job as a saleswoman in Penang. When my finances are stable, I want to take care of my kids. Right now, my mother-in-law is taking care of the children,” Mira said, but declined to go into the specifics of her marital problems.

She said being hauled up by an enforcement officer over suspicion of being an illegal foreigner was a constant fear.

Mira relies on a card issued by religious authorities upon her conversion to Islam and a letter from the Welfare Department certifying that she was formerly their ward to avoid enforcement action.

Mira was recently in Putrajaya to apply for a special card by the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry for former wards of the Welfare Department who are stateless.

Living in fear

Nisha (not her real name), a 27-year-old from Perlis, has been living in fear since 2010, two years after she left the shelter in Arau, when the National Registration Department confiscated her identity card over suspected identity theft.

“My father sent me to a children’s shelter when I was four years old. I have a birth certificate, but two years after I left the shelter, my MyKad was confiscated. They accused me of using my sister’s identity.

“If it was true that that was not my birth certificate, why didn’t the authorities detect this earlier? I want my IC back.

“I feel victimised without my IC. In a factory, other workers will get paid RM900, but I will get only RM500,” said Nisha, who now works at a telephone shop in Kajang.

Attempts to get help from the Welfare Department ended in frustration when Nisha was told she was no longer their responsibility when she turned 18.

“The department just issued me a letter. Even that has an expiration date. How long do I have to live in fear,” she told The Malaysian Insight.

Nisha related how she was virtually a slave when, at the age of 18, she was placed in the care of a foster family.

“They treated me like a maid. I was told to clean up after the dog. All sorts of things. I just obeyed because I didn’t have anywhere else to go if they threw me out.

“I put up with them for two years before I asked them to send me back to the shelter,”

Hard to convert

At the shelter, Nisha was influenced by the Islamic way of life and wanted to convert to Islam. But her path to becoming a Muslim was blocked because she didn’t have any identity documents.

“I seriously want to convert to Islam, I am not playing around. I had lived in a shelter since I was little. When I went to Jawi (the Federal Territory Islamic Religious Department), an office told me, ‘You can convert, but without identity documents it will be difficult’.

“Several of my Indian friends converted to Islam when they left the Welfare Department shelter. I can’t even speak Tamil. I had a Malay and Islamic upbringing (at the shelter),” she said.

Khairul of Perbak claims that these two cases are examples of the Welfare Department’s negligence.

He said Mira’s case happened because welfare officers failed to process and register her citizenship status, while Nisha’s case was because an officer failed to verify her birth certificate.

It is understood that the ministry is now identifying former wards of the Welfare Department who don’t have records of their identity.

The Malaysian Insight is seeking comment from the ministry on the status of these stateless former wards, and the details of the special card that the ministry announced. – October 7, 2017.