KUALA LUMPUR, June 2 — The Attorney-General's Chambers (AGC) must drop its objections to legal action by two Malaysia-born stateless children to be recognised as Malaysian citizens since there is a new government now, their lawyers said.

PKR lawyers N. Surendran and Latheefa Koya said their two clients were born here and lived in Malaysia for all their lives, noting that one’s father is Malaysian and the other is an orphan adopted by Malaysians.

The lawyers said the two children have suffered the "terrible misfortune” of having the previous Barisan Nasional government "strenuously” objecting through the AGC to the granting of citizenship for them.

With their cases now finally reaching the Federal Court after the High Court and Court of Appeal dismissed their bid in the five-year-long legal battle, the lawyers said: "This is the last hope of these two stateless children.”

"However, we are surprised and disappointed that the Attorney-General's Chambers is still maintaining their objections to citizenship for these two children.

"There is a new PH government elected, which is committed to upholding the rights of all those stateless persons who are entitled and qualified to be citizens by virtue of the constitution. The new government had even specifically included the promise to resolve statelessness in their election manifesto!” the lawyers said in a statement today, referring to the Pakatan Harapan coalition which took over federal government in the 14th general elections.

"The AG's Chambers should therefore not be objecting to the citizenship of the kids in these cases.

"It is really unclear from where the AG's Chambers' are getting their instructions to object, as it runs contrary to the stance of the new government on stateless cases,” the lawyers added, saying the continued objection would increase the suffering and uncertainty experienced by the children and their parents.

"This is the first big test for the new PH Government upon its policy on stateless persons,” they said, urging PH to uphold its election campaign promise by withdrawing court objections to citizenship for the two children.

PH in its election manifesto promised to resolve the stateless problems of the ethnic Indian community in Malaysia within 100 days of winning power.

Surendran and Latheefa are lawyers for both Lim* and T*, who will be aged eight and 20 respectively this year, with the latter no longer a teenager after years of waiting to be recognised as a Malaysian.

The two cases is expected to be heard with three other Malaysia-born stateless persons' citizenship cases at the Federal Court next Monday and Tuesday.

It was initially scheduled to be heard on March 6, but was deferred to April 2 as one of the lawyers in the five cases was ill.

It was further postponed to May 30 and May 31, after the Federal Court did not proceed with hearing the cases and instead requested lawyers to confirm if the cases could be heard together.

The May 30 and May 31 dates were shifted to next week, June 4 and June 5.

*The actual names were not used due to privacy reasons.