Charge Riduan, say syariah lawyers

The Star

PETALING JAYA: Syariah lawyers want the Islamic affairs authorities to act against the 40-year-old man who married a 13-year-old girl he had allegedly raped.

“We urge the syariah authorities to do the necessary to charge the wrongdoer as a lesson that marriage is not a way out for adultery or rape,” said Syariah Lawyers Association secretary-general Moeis Basri.

He said under syariah laws, sexual intercourse outside marriage is considered an act of adultery even if the girl consented to it.

Moeis said the man also needed to get the consent of the girl's legal guardian as well as permission from the Syariah Court before marrying the child as she is below 16 years old.

Moeis hoped the Attorney-General's Chambers would proceed with action against the man, adding that the civil court had better jurisdiction and severe punishment for rape cases.

Riduan Masmud, from Kota Kinabalu, is facing a charge of raping the teenager in a parked car in Inanam on Feb 18.

Sessions Court judge Ummu Khatom Abdul Samad had set July 1 to July 4 to hear the case.

Under the Sabah Syariah Criminal Offences Enactment 1995, a person convicted of committing forbidden sexual intercourse, could be fined a maximum of RM5,000, or jailed up to three years or caned a maximum of six strokes, or a combination thereof.

In Malaysia, the legal age for most people to marry is 18. But non-Muslims between 16 and 18 can marry with the consent of the chief minister or mentri besar of their state.

For Muslim boys under 18 and girls under 16, permission must be sought from the Syariah Court.

Meanwhile, Primary Care Doctors Organisation deputy president Dr M. Mahendran said children's reproductive organs were not mature enough and early coitus could damage the vagina or cause pelvic inflammatory diseases which could lead to infertility.

Lawyer Yasmeen Muhammad Shariff, who sits on the United Nations' Committee of the Rights of the Child, said the man should be charged for statutory rape regardless of whether he had married her.

“The law should be respected. It cannot be based on mutual liking as the girl is young and gullible,” she said.

Several women's groups in Sabah and across the nation had expressed outrage over the man, who already has four children, marrying the teenager purportedly to escape criminal prosecution for statutory rape.