NRD says no to 'Anak Malaysia'

(Malaysiakini) Despite calls from civil society and opposition parties to accept 'Anak Malaysia' as an official ethnicity, the National Registration Department (NRD) refused to budge, stressing that the race of children must follow their parents.

“This department would like to inform that the ethnicity of a child is determined according to the ethnicity of the child's mother or father.

“This department cannot register a certain ethnicity other than that of either the child's mother or father,” said a statement released by NRD today.

The statement was issued by NRD's corporate communication officer Jainisah Mohd Noor in response to a Malaysiakini report yesterday.

It had been reported that Subang Jaya assemblyperson Hannah Yeoh and her husband Ramachandran Muniandy attempted to register their daughter's race as 'Anak Malaysia'.

However, this was rejected by NRD, saying that the couple can only choose either Chinese or Indian.

Yeoh eventually chose Chinese, but decided to write to both Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak and the NRD to appeal.

The DAP lawmaker later shared the experience through her micro-blogging website Twitter and received strong support from both netizens and opposition politicians.

Puchong MP Gobind Singh, who is also from DAP, even suggested on Twitter that they should bring the matter to court.

Meanwhile, NGO Saya Anak Bangsa Malaysia (SABM) lent its support to Yeoh, urging Najib to immediately order the NRD to accept and register all children whose parents request that they be registered as 'Anak Malaysia'.

'Ethnicity' in all official forms

"We unreservedly support the right of the parents to determine the identity of their beloved child.

"We wholeheartedly commend Hannah (right) and Rama for the courage to stand by their principles.

"Their stand to remind us of our common identity as human beings, and as members of this collective called Malaysia, deserves the highest accolade,” said SABM in a statement today.

It pointed that two years ago, the government had announced that it was reviewing the need for the category 'ethnicity' in all official forms.

“We wonder as to the status of this review exercise. Obviously the NRD has not acted on this decision yet.

“In this era of information technology, the NRD's reason that their system is not designed to capture a new 'identity' can only be considered lame.”

SABM said that Najib should take immediate action to show that the government is sincere about actualising its vision of 1Malaysia.

“We, as a people, need to consciously reject the ethnic silos created by politicians and bureaucrats alike.

“We call upon all Malaysians to stand with Hannah and Rama in this noble struggle to challenge the anachronistic paradigm of governance premised on 'ethnicity',” read the statement.