27 SEPTEMBER 2022
Last Sunday’s gathering of nationwide WANITA KEADILAN grassroots featured a Town Hall presentation by key experts such as Professor Dr Fatimah Kari (on multidimensional poverty), Prof Dr Haslinda Abdullah (on mental health issue and the well being of the youth) and Dr Lai Wan Teng (gender equality) to urgently address the silent socioeconomic explosion affecting women and children, especially among vulnerable segments across Malaysia.
The last two years have made apparent how severely lacking social protection is in Malaysia. Existing structural inequalities have left women more exposed than ever, especially women or single headed households.
Khazanah Research Institute’s report also highlights the need to protect what they call “the missing middle”, in other words the segments who do not fall within the B40 of official “poverty” threshold, yet are still in need of and lacking access to social security.
As we had earlier stated, the findings unearthed by the panel of experts have reinforced the party’s commitment towards addressing the gaping socioeconomic gaps left in the wake of the pandemic.
We can have inclusive social security by passing of the Social Work Profession Bill to recognise and regulate social workers in Malaysia to ensure the quality of the service delivered, and to ensure vulnerable segments are able to be sufficiently protected.
We can introduce community child care systems, to allow women the flexibility to work and participate in public life.
We should also ensure access to fair judicial processes via the civil and syariah courts, especially in cases pertaining to domestic violence.
This pathway to due process and care includes kids who have lost their opportunities for schooling and women who form the majority of students in universities but are not assured appropriate or quality employment based on their respective degrees.
Indeed, in the realm of education equity, the rate of female participation in universities is worth celebrating—more women than men enrolled in all universities in Malaysia. However, participation alone does not translate to equitable opportunities.
We can create more dignified jobs to target high-skilled female graduates, with starting salaries that match their qualifications and skills. Today, high-skilled female graduates are still disproportionately unemployed in the workforce compared to men.
Education equity therefore requires a more comprehensive industrial policy and social support systems, and not just the creation of female-only universities.
Further still, we can ramp up our child protection policies – especially to protect children from falling victim to sexual predators online.
As of now, Malaysia still does not mandate internet service providers to take down explicit material involving children.
Malaysian women also have an equal right to citizenship. Recently, MPs from both sides of the political divide showed solidarity to the equal citizenship movement by collectively proposing a motion to amend the Federal Constitution to recognise women as equally deserving of passing down citizenship to their children.
In the realms of poverty alleviation, there are efforts the government can take to address multidimensional poverty faced by the B40 segment – especially (female) single headed households who have borne the brunt of the pandemic’s devastating impacts on society. Our measures of poverty via the use of a multidimensional poverty index must be holistic, and take into account the adverse impacts of climate change that is making its presence felt with a force on our shores through intense flooding events.
We can implement gender based budgeting across all ministries and agencies to ensure that any policies made take into account the unique needs of both genders.
Lastly, we can address the gaps left behind on the lost generation of children during the pandemic by prioritising the TVET generation.
KEADILAN will focus on the ones left behind during COVID, and the plight of the missing middle – a process that begins with the move to mainstream gender in policy making and governance.
NURUL IZZAH ANWAR
FADHLINA SIDDIQ
