GEORGE TOWN, Aug 9 — There is danger in allowing underage marriage as a way to prevent premarital sex among teenagers, Chong Eng (PH – Padang Lalang) said.
The state exco said by allowing underage marriage, an adult can use this to groom a child in matters of sex.
“If you say that a couple must get married after premarital sex, then if a man likes a woman but she doesn’t like him so he forced her to have sex and then offer to marry her, this is wrong too,” she said.
Chong, who is women development, family, gender inclusiveness and non-Muslim affairs committee chairman, stressed that children under 16 years are too young to be married.
“We should not allow small children to be married, the age of marriage must be raised to 18 years, and even at 18 years old, it is considered still young in this era,” she said in her winding-up speech.
Nor Hafizah Othman (BN – Permatang Berangan) then interjected to say that in Islam, this is allowed.
She said if the child has reached puberty, both sides agreed to the marriage and it was approved by the wali, then the marriage is allowed.
She said this is one of the ways to avoid premarital sex among teenagers.
Muhammad Faiz Fadzil (PH – Permatang Pasir) then suggested that if religious schools has “fiqh perkahwinan” (Islamic marriage jurisprudence) then there should be similar classes in normal schools for students.
Chong said marrying teenagers off just to prevent premarital sex is taking the easy way out when they should be educated on this instead.
On whether the state government plans to amend the Islamic Family Law (State of Penang) Enactment 2004, she said the legal advisor is looking into it.
She said the state government will consider the proposal to increase the age of consent for marriage to 18.
