KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 10 — Putrajaya will likely table the Child Sexual Crime Act for the first and second reading in Parliament in March next year, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Azalina Othman has said.
The Star quoted Azalina as saying that the Cabinet had agreed to set up a special court to deal with offences under the new law as it would help to solve sexual crime cases involving children within a short period.
“Sexual crimes against young children usually happened at home and involved family members, thus, it will be hard for us to process evidence for such cases.
“Home should be the safest place for children and not a place of torment,” she was quoted saying.
Complaints of sexual crime was said to have been on the rise judging from the number of police reports lodged but the number of cases charged in court was comparably smaller.
This is likely due to insufficient evidence as that victims were usually children aged three and four years, Azalina said.
The long time taken to solve such cases have made it hard for victims to recall the traumatising incidents while some were ashamed to speak about the crime perpetrated on them when they were younger, she added.
“We hope to solve such cases faster with the setting up of this special court and the initiative is also one of the reasons why we formed a task force to look at this issue as a whole.
“We have conducted meetings on this matter and the proposed Act has also been presented in Cabinet,” she said.
The Attorney-Genera’s office is currently preparing the draft for the terms of the Bill, the minister said.
