KUALA LUMPUR: Stateless children should not be deprived of their right to an education.
Making the call, Malaysian Human Rights Commission children's commissioner Prof Datuk Noor Aziah Mohd Awal said that special schools ought to be established for such undocumented children.
"I know there are some private schools with only 12 students but with eight teachers.
"And yet we have more children wanting to go to school. This is unbelievable.
"Education is the only way to uplift the underserved communities, which include the stateless children," she said at a panel discussion on 'Status of Undocumented Persons in Malaysia' at the German ambassador's residence in Jalan Langgak Golf recently.
The event, held in conjunction with International Human Rights Day, was moderated by independent broadcast journalist Tehmina Kaoosji.
The panellists were Noor Aziah, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Malaysian representative Thomas Albrecht and Family Frontiers president Suri Kempe.
German ambassador Dr Peter Blomeyer introduced them to the audience who included ambassadors, social activists and human rights practitioners.
The discussion was preceded by a short film screening of 'Aku Mau Skola' (I want to go to school) ,by the young local award filmmaker Putri Purnama Sugua, which highlighted the issues of statelessness and access to education in Sandakan, Sabah.
Noor Aziah hoped the government, particularly the Education Ministry, could pay greater attention to the matter.
"There are many schools around and the government annually approves of a budget for sufficient funds for education.
"Hence, it is ironic to see these children being neglected and not given the opportunity to school.
"I hope our concerns will arouse public interest," she said.
Tehmina highlighted how the Education Ministry reported that 21,316 students quit school between March 2020 and July this year, while Parliament records showed 445 of these resulted in child marriages.
She questioned who was in charge of the issue and in ensuring a better future for the affected children, especially considering RM52.6 billion was allocated for education under Budget 2022.
"There's often a perspective that undocumented persons are a drain on sovereign nations resources," Tehmina said.
Albrecht highlighted the great challenge of conveying preventive measures on the Covid-19 pandemic and vaccination initiatives to the undocumented persons or refugees, in different languages and channels.
He was also asked on stateless children's healthcare, loss of livelihood, rise of child abuse cases, mental health issues, orphaned children and families pushed into poverty.
"Fortunately, we managed to obtain assistance from the various civil societies and non-governmental organisations.
"We hope to be better equipped to handle such a task," he said.
Suri spoke on the hassle of obtaining citizenship for children born overseas to Malaysian women who married foreign spouses owing to inequalities in Malaysia's citizenship laws.
"The pressure from social media and society plays an important role in affecting the government's decision on amending laws to facilitate the issue.
"I am optimistic on the efforts in fighting for equal rights, to automatically confer citizenship on overseas-born children to Malaysian mothers," she said.
Suri recounted how strong public opinion put pressure on the government to withdraw their appeal on a High Court case involving a Malaysian mother and her child fathered by a foreigner.
"There must be greater pressure from the public opinion for the government to pay attention to the matter, like with the court case that reversed the injustice by granting mothers equal rights as fathers to grant citizenship," said Suri.
The panellists also discussed issues related with the stateless children's healthcare, loss of livelihood, gender discrimination, children's lack of access to education and healthcare, rise of child abuse cases, mental health issues, orphaned children and families pushed into poverty, travel separation from family and partners, the voicelessness of undocumented persons and the media's stilted coverage on the issue.