We are a charitable organization who is fervent, resilient, resolute and absolutely determined in championing the rights of a historically sidelined, marginalized and neglected segment in Malaysian society which are single mothers to handicapped children – these are oppressed single mothers who were robbed in family courts of their rightful entitlement to marital assets by corrupt conduit lawyers and unscrupulous judges whom are recipients of bribes. Most of these unfortunate single mothers have neurodivergent children on the autism spectrum and/or children who are physically handicapped, which exacerbates these poor single mothers’ plight and suffering. 

Upholding rule of law and implementing an egalitarian system in Malaysia’s family courts, legislation and landscape is actually possible in view that our principles and advocacy for legislative reform in obliterating the legal/statutory loopholes in Malaysia’s civil family laws definitely do not contravene the “3R” (race, religion, royalty) sensitivities, prohibition or taboo in Malaysia as this solely pertains to only non-Muslim marriages and divorces in civil family courts.

For the uninitiated, the below are Fast Facts to Understand about Malaysian Family Law before we delve just a little bit deeper (not too deep as we understand that most of our readers are laymen) into the cause we are advocating for -

• Although the Law Reform (Marriage and Divorce) Act 1976 (“Act”) only applies to non-Muslims, natives of East Malaysia and aborigines of Peninsular Malaysia who elects to marry under this Act, this Act will also apply to people who had registered their marriage under this Act but who have converted to Islam;
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• Family law is predicated upon common sense, justice, equity and conscience and is not rocket science, so it is imperative for the common layman in Malaysia to be well aware of his or her rights and not be deterred or misled by any judge or lawyer claiming that the ex-wife or the ex-husband’s doubts and suspicions about the judge’s rulings or decisions are “unfounded” as the ex-wives or ex-husbands are so-called “laymen” and family law issues are supposedly “too technical” and should be left to “professionals (judges)” to decide; 
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• In actual fact, if any judgment is an affront to common sense to even the common layman on the street, the judgment cannot be said to have made sense and it is thus, questionable as to whether such judgment is made in accordance with sound principles;
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• Prenuptial agreements are not enforceable;
  
  

• Assets division – this means which spouse gets how much assets or how the assets are divided in a divorce – this depends on contributions made by each party in money, property or work towards the acquiring of the assets or payment of expenses for the benefit of the family, contribution in kind (non-monetary contribution) in the form of looking after the home or caring for the family, any debts owing by either party which were contracted for their joint benefit, the needs of the minor children of the marriage and the duration of the marriage ("Contribution").
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• Please note that assets division is 100% a purely objective matter which only takes into account objective and factual matters as outlined in the Contribution paragraph above and does not depend upon subjective matters like whether anyone is at fault for the breakdown of the marriage, whether this be unreasonable behavior, adultery or otherwise;
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• Wife maintenance – the quantum awarded by the court depends on the duration of the marriage, the qualifications and occupations of the parties (if the wife is a housewife and has been depending upon the husband’s maintenance for a living all along, the likelihood of her being awarded wife maintenance is higher), the wife's health and medical needs, financial means of the husband and the means and needs of the parties. If the husband can give extremely strong proof that the wife has been unfaithful or is at fault for the breakdown of the marriage, the wife maintenance awarded will be reduced by a percentage determined by the court. Whereas the court will only ask the wife to pay the husband “husband maintenance” provided that the husband is mentally or physically handicapped or has ill-health until he is unable to work, and provided also that the wife is able to financially support the husband;
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• Child maintenance depends upon the children being able to enjoy the same standard of living as they did during the existence of the marriage (tuition fees, extracurricular activities such as piano, gymnastics/dance/arts classes, schooling fees, groceries, medical/educational insurance policy premiums and clothes) having regard to the means and needs of the parties. Although each parent should be paying for child maintenance, the husband has the primary obligation as opposed to the wife; and
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• The Sessions Court judges or the High Court judges are able to decide on family law matters under the Act. The family court at the Sessions Court is only comprised of one sole person to make the decision and the same goes for the High Court.
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As per the above, Malaysia’s assets division mechanism in family courts is based solely upon contribution in kind and in monetary terms, both of which are purely factual, mechanical and are based upon mathematical considerations, wherein the division of the matrimonial home and assets can very well wholly be done and be implemented through fully computerized systems as opposed to the current status now where all matters pertaining to assets division unjustifiably and unnecessarily lies in the sole and unfettered discretion of the sole family court judge in Malaysia’s family courts – it may be risky and is actually a system full of loopholes which are susceptible and vulnerable to abuse as the sole family court judge gets to have sole discretion in determining all matters in relation to family law down from the identification of matrimonial assets, amendment or expungement of pleadings, admissibility of evidence and down to issuance of the judgement order – such wide discretionary powers may be misused as “absolute power corrupts absolutely”.  

It is also of relevance and is pertinent to set out here that Malaysia had removed the jury system since 1 January 1995, which is unfortunate, as this paved the way for no checks and balances to be made at all, on curtailing or monitoring the absolute discretion of family court judges.

To further exacerbate the problem, it is of grave concern to note that at the moment, not only are existing legislation in Malaysia grossly insufficient in protecting the rights of the fatherless and oppressed, even the financial provisions and social benefits for the mentally, intellectually and/or physically challenged people are also grossly inadequate with even stringent qualification criteria and preposterous prerequisites imposed for obtaining social benefits for handicapped people and legal aid (complimentary or free legal fees) for financially challenged single parents which are largely unattainable.

And it is pertinent to note that the majority of the people in Malaysia, especially women, are unable to afford even median range legal fees for a typical contested divorce petition as these can range anywhere between MYR150,000-00 to MYR350,000-00, which is quite a high figure for many who are living below the poverty line. As a concrete example, to qualify for legal aid, your monthly income (after deduction of monthly expenses) must not exceed: -

(a)         MYR 500 – for a single person; or

(b)         MYR 900 – for a married couple.

Additionally, you must not own property or have savings exceeding:

i.            MYR 45,000.00 – house;

ii.           MYR 10,000.00 – car;

iii.          MYR   4,500.00 – motorcycle; and/or

iv.           MYR   5,000.00 – savings.

In addition, we have to also understand that dissolving or ending a marriage through a proper document or certificate is a completely separate thing altogether from assets division.

Notwithstanding that both are completely separate issues, it is of concern to note that in Malaysia currently, both assets division and dissolvement of marriage have to occur at the same time; which unduly burdens estranged couples as they are not able to move on with a new marriage until and unless the lengthy and arduous ventilation of assets division issues get sorted out and decided by the Family Court judge.  

To explain further, what the sole judge in a family court will always do, is to make a judgement that; for a marriage which has been determined by the judge to have irretrievably broken down; the “decree nisi” (order by a court of law stating the date on which a marriage will end unless a good reason not to grant a divorce is produced) is made absolute immediately or within a period of time stipulated by the judge and at the same time, will specify exactly how the assets should be divided between the ex-husband and ex-wife.

In view that dissolving a marriage, determining who gets the custody of the children, ascertaining how much child maintenance should be awarded and making an order for assets division have to all be completed for the judge to arrive at its family court decision, the divorce proceedings will usually take years to ventilate & conclude a myriad of issues spawning highly technical areas of law pertaining to assets division, child maintenance, wife maintenance and damages for adultery – such protracted time in the parties setting out their petition, replies, pleadings, counter claims, taking the witness stand, being cross-examined, preparing witness statements, identifying which parts of the bundle of documents should be classified as purely authentic, undisputed or otherwise and etc. will inevitably and unjustifiably take an adverse toll on the couple’s finances, time costs and administrative costs.

Our Reforms and our App are able to solve all of the above-mentioned social maladies and hardship caused by protraction of divorce proceedings; as assets division can be expediently implemented and the apportioned monies are able to be effectively and speedily transmitted to the accounts of the relevant ex husband  or ex wife, without the need to wait for the divorce to be finalized. 

Our App in effect, also effectively solves the rampant and pervasive problem of deviant and errant spouses who deny the other spouse's rightful entitlements by refusing to adhere to maintenance orders or assets division orders issued by the courts in both Malaysia and other worldwide countries. 

It is apparent that Malaysia’s family court system is highly inefficient, cumbersome and not practicable and user friendly to the common layman, making divorce proceedings a truly treacherous journey for couples who are divorcing, especially those who are from lower income level groups like the B40 and M40 categories of people.

In addition, what exacerbates the couple’s suffering is the fact that highly technical litigation in court is definitely not for the laymen and can be quite punitive if you happen to engage incompetent lawyers who fail to plead important issues and are precluded from raising the said omitted facts as there are objections on afterthoughts made by the adverse party’s lawyers. There are even real-life allegations by ex-wives and ex-husbands that their respective lawyers are in cahoots with the counter party’s lawyers and that their very own lawyers’ conduct is vitiated and compromised after taking bribes.

Couples will even need to sacrifice the time spent for their children which may include handicapped children in need of intensive attention or care as these couples need to battle each other in family court.

Legal fees will also keep on spiraling high and so will the time spent for judges in family courts to sift through the evidence tendered to determine whether those should be marked as exhibits or not and etc.

At the end of the day, it will be the corrupt conduit lawyers and corrupt recipient judges laughing all the way to the bank at the expense of hapless single parents and their physically/mentally challenged children but all these dire circumstances can end once and for all if we can just make this advocacy movement viral to get the Malaysian government to remove the loophole in Malaysia’s non-Muslim family laws.

To overcome such problems and obstacles which are a major setback to the majority of the rakyat in Malaysia who mostly consist of poor or working-class individuals; solely in respect of assets division, a mobile app that is automated and backed by computerized systems which are linked to the applicable governmental authorities such as the Companies Commission of Malaysia, banks and land offices (“App”) should be developed and the government should enact the corresponding amendments to the Act (“Reforms”) so that –

• relevant information pertaining to full and complete particulars of assets involved in a divorce can be uploaded and verified through real-time checking by the applicable governmental authorities to ensure that full, honest and 100% accurate disclosure has been made;

• the App envisages that all relevant records will be uploaded to the clouds and to the App in view of the Malaysian government's imminent roll-out of the "E-Invoicing" national phase, thus, couples need not go through any hassle of uploading and submitting grocery receipts on the App ; and

• the App is able to help the single parents considerably by completely and effectively avoiding the glaring pitfalls and gross inadequacies of Malaysia’s severely archaic & outdated family court system - before the couple can end the marriage through the family court’s approval for a decree nisi to be made absolute, the App is able to expeditiously and speedily make a just and accurate order for assets division as all entries are already uploaded, verified and computerized beforehand and/or in real time.

Subsequently, this App can even ensure that division orders are effectively and concretely enforced due to the following:

• the land offices will automatically be alerted and prohibit any landed properties to be sold-off unless such sale is in accordance with the division order issued by the App;

• reconciliation of payables resulting from the assets division order can be done through crediting and debiting of bank accounts as the App is routed to the couple’s bank accounts; and

• attachment (deducting money from an employee's pay as the result of a court order or action by an authorized agency) of the couple’s salaries can also be done as the App will be routed to the Employees Provident Fund which enables the current employers of the respective spouses to be identified. The said current employers will then be ordered by the government to attach (debit) the defaulting spouse’s salary to credit to the entitled spouse’s bank account.

The abovementioned measures will definitely be able to effectively implement enforcement of the terms of the assets division order whereas immediate financial redress and urgently needed financial relief can be provided to the couple expeditiously without the couple needing to wait for many years for the family court to painstakingly and laboriously arrive at its decision to decide how the assets are to be divided in addition. This means that without needing to wait for many years for the judge to determine whether the marriage is to be dissolved, whose fault it is for the breakdown of the marriage (to determine wife maintenance), who obtains the custody and visitation rights of the children and how much child maintenance, the assets division can be speedily and promptly carried out beforehand.

Moreover, we need to keep abreast with the technological age we are living in now where RFID (radio frequency identification) at tolls, passport renewal, renewal of road tax, case management in courts and even court hearings are all done electronically now in Malaysia.

We also do not want to burden the family court judge with voluminous documentation to vet and sift through in order to arrive at their decision as this is truly a waste of manpower, time costs and resources.

In this respect, it is of paramount importance to note that the majority of rakyat in Malaysia is either working class or lives below the poverty line and definitely cannot afford the time costs, expensive legal fees (some lawyers even charge their ex-wives and ex-husbands clients exorbitant, excessive and unwarranted legal fees), mileage costs, administrative costs and the hassle of going to and from the family court in any tussle for division of matrimonial assets in family court.

By right, you do not actually need a judge (who may be corrupt for all you know as human hearts are hard to decipher and we are all human and may succumb to temptation of money and favours), to adjudicate upon the assets division matters in any divorce as such assets division matters are highly crucial and vital for single parents’ survival and affects their livelihood, especially for those with special kids.

We should not allow a sole judge have sole and absolute discretion as absolute power corrupts absolutely and these corrupt judges may ruin single parents’ lives and make the already broken family institution suffer even more. As we speak, many single parents and/or their differently abled or neurodivergent kids are going through horrendous hardship and are suffering in silence as they do not have a voice whereas the corrupt judges and corrupt conduit lawyers think they can get away scot-free as these people are defenseless.