Govt fails in bid to suspend court decision recognising Malaysian mothers’ overseas-born children as citizens

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 15 — The High Court today dismissed the Malaysian government's bid to stay or temporarily suspend an earlier court decision ruling that overseas-born children of Malaysian mothers are entitled to Malaysian citizenship under the law.

The government had sought the stay pending its appeal against the earlier High Court ruling in favour of the Malaysian mothers seeking Malaysian citizenship for their overseas-born children.

The hearing of the stay was conducted online today.

Lawyer for the Malaysian mothers Joshua Andran told Malay Mail when contacted that High Court judge Akhtar Tahir had dismissed the government’s stay application and ordered the defendants to pay costs of RM5,000.

The defendants in this court case are the Malaysian government, home minister and the National Registration Department (NRD) director-general.

According to Joshua, the judge said that the defendants’ position was contradictory, as their argument that a constitutional amendment must first be approved by the Conference of Rulers presupposed that an amendment was necessary when the High Court had already decided that Malaysian mothers have the right under the Federal Constitution in relation to their children’s citizenship status.

Joshua cited the judge as also saying that there would be no question of retracting any documents issued to the mothers as directed by the court if the constitutional amendment goes through, and that the mothers have waited long enough and experienced hardship and cannot wait indefinitely for the appeal process to be over as it would cause them continuing hardship.

Joshua also said the judge had said that hurdles should not be placed in the mothers’ pathway if the defendants intend to amend the Federal Constitution in line with the High Court’s previous decision.

Following the High Court’s previous September 9 decision in favour of advocacy group Family Frontiers and six affected Malaysian mothers with overseas-born children, the Malaysian government and the other two defendants had on September 13 filed an appeal at the Court of Appeal and had also on September 14 filed the stay application — which was heard today — at the High Court.

The part of the High Court’s September 9 decision that the Malaysian government and the two other defendants were seeking for a stay of is where the judge had ordered all the authorities to issue the relevant documentation such as identity cards and passports if citizenship is granted to the overseas-born children of Malaysian mothers.

Others who represented the Malaysian mothers and Family Frontiers are Datuk Gurdial Singh Nijar, Ngeow Chow Ying and Abraham Au, while senior federal counsel Liew Horng Bin appeared for the Malaysian government and two other defendants.

As for the Malaysian government’s appeal on the High Court’s previous September 9 decision in favour of the Malaysian mothers and Family Frontiers, it is scheduled for case management on November 17 at the Court of Appeal.

Previously, Home Minister Datuk Seri Hamzah Zainudin told the Dewan Rakyat on September 22 that his ministry had filed the appeal and also applied for a stay of the High Court decision. 

Hamzah said it was the government would not commit a contempt of court and not breach the Federal Constitution while it seeks to amend the very same constitutional provisions on this matter.

The minister said that the Home Ministry plans to amend the Federal Constitution to make things easier for Malaysian mothers married to foreigners and give birth overseas even as he pointed out that citizenship matters requires consent from the Conference of Rulers in line with the Federal Constitution’s Article 159(5).

Family Frontiers on September 25 said the home minister’s reason for continuing to appeal the court’s decision was baffling.

The group asked if the minister had sought a two-third majority support of MPs to amend the Federal Constitution.

It noted the minister had not given a timeframe for the amendment, and no solution to the long- standing problem in the meantime.

Family Frontiers on October 28 also asked the government for updates on its proposed efforts to ensure equal citizenship rights for Malaysian mothers and their overseas-born children, in light of the government’s latest disclosure that it had only approved 21 of 2,352 citizenship applications made by Malaysian mothers for their children while rejecting 31 of such applications during the 2018 to October 11, 2021 period.