KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 19 — Wanita MCA backed the Malaysian Trades Union Congress (MTUC) today in calling for legislation that prohibits employers from asking job candidates if they are pregnant, after a woman’s award for damages was drastically cut in a landmark gender discrimination case.

Wanita MCA chief Datuk Heng Seai Kie said that legislation protecting expecting women was important as it was the Barisan Nasional (BN) government’s vision to increase women’s participation in the workforce.

“We recall that the Minister of Women, Family and Community Development Datuk Seri Rohani Abdul Karim in August 2014 had informed that her ministry aims to raise female participation rate to 55 per cent by 31 December 2015.

“In October 2015, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak had also expressed that Malaysia plans to boost female participation in the workforce from 54 per cent in 2014 to 59 per cent by 2020,” Heng said in a statement.

Malay Mail Online reported that Shah Alam High Court judicial commissioner Datuk Azimah Omar reduced Monday the awarded damages for Noorfadilla Ahmad Saikin by 90 per cent to RM30,000, after finding the original sum of RM300,000 to be inappropriate and tantamount to a “handsome profit” for the 34-year-old.

The original RM300,000 awarded in 2014 was damages for breach of Noorfadilla’s constitutional right to gender equality, after she won a lawsuit in 2011 against the government for revoking her appointment as a temporary teacher back in 2009 when she was three months’ pregnant.

Noorfadilla was not asked at the job interview in Hulu Langat if she was pregnant, but she was posed the question at a briefing two weeks later and her appointment was immediately revoked when she revealed her pregnancy.

Heng said today that such discrimination cannot be tolerated as it violates women’s reproductive rights.

“One of the most effective initiative(s) in this endeavour is to enact laws to protect women who will soon go into labour,” said the head of the women’s wing of the Barisan Nasional (BN) component party.

“Pregnancy is a fundamental right of women in addition to a human right. Society at large, especially employers must respect the special biological ability and obligation entrusted to women by God; If women do not get pregnant, there would not be any mankind in existence,” Heng added.