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KAPIT: Health Department and Welfare Department statistics show that a 12-year-old is among Kapit’s underage mothers this year. The girl from Sungai Asap, Belaga was just 11 years and 11 months old when she became pregnant earlier in the year.
On average, Kapit Division has an alarming rate of 250 to 300 cases of pregnancies involving those aged 19 and below every year – the highest in the state at 14.9 per cent of all cases.
“Whether married or unmarried, it’s a social problem such as infants born underweight, difficult to care for and support, mother’s emotional and mental readiness, family support, financial means, no family,” said Kapit Health Clinic family medicine specialist Dr Jusoh Awang Senik during a discussion on the issue on Wednesday.
“Each time they come to the clinic, they’re not happy, they cry. Forced into ‘express marriages’ allowed under the Majlis Adat Istiadat Sarawak, where the Resident has the power to sign marriage certificates for 14- or 15-year-olds and two or three years later they divorce.”
He said government agencies must pool resources to address this serious issue.
“Unless there’s a change in mindset, under the law, having sex with a teenager under 16 years old is statutory rape and can be charged and jailed up to 20 years and caned. But here there’s ‘express marriages’ and divorce later because of many contributing factors,” he said, adding there must be better education programmes to reduce the figure.