TANAH MERAH: The actions of a woman who 'married' two men came to light after the first husband discovered the woman's second marriage.
Businessman Rahman Mohamed Jaafar, 47, revealed that he married his 32-year-old wife in January 2019 in Narathiwat, Thailand, before she disappeared from home in January this year.
He stated that their marriage was legally recognised under Sharia law by the Tanah Merah Lower Sharia Court on June 6 and registered with the Tanah Merah District Religious Office.
"However, after losing my wife in January, I found out on social media in April that she was going to marry someone else, which was quite surprising because I had never divorced her, and we are still husband and wife.
"After checking, I found that my wife had applied to marry another man, aged 42, at the Besut Religious Office in Terengganu in April, believed to be using a divorce letter before marrying me," he said when interviewed here today.
Further elaborating, Rahman said that upon learning that his wife had 'remarried' without his knowledge, he filed for a faraq nikah claim between his wife and her second husband.
"Following that, the Kota Baru Sharia High Court in August ordered my wife as the first defendant and her second husband as the second defendant to be temporarily separated.
"They are not allowed to live together as husband and wife until our case is resolved," he said.
Earlier, Rahman appeared at the Tanah Merah Lower Sharia Court today for the divorce pronouncement proceedings filed by his wife.
The judge, Ahmad Hariri Mohd Saat, then gave Rahman a 14-day period to make a sworn denial to refute his wife's claims of divorce.
Rahman, represented by lawyer Marzuqi Muhamad, asserted that he had never uttered the divorce pronouncement to his wife as claimed, and as of now, they are still legally married.
"I am deeply disappointed by my wife's actions. We have been married for four years, and I only received a marriage certificate a few months ago, but in the end, I was 'dimadukan.'
"I believe the religious office granted permission for my wife to marry her second husband because our marriage, which took place abroad, was in the process of being validated here," he said.