She said the focus needed to be on raising awareness within communities and among parents on the negative effects of child marriage.
“Marrying at a young age will deny them their rights to health, education, safety and self-development,” she said.
She said the ministry, through the National Population and Family Development Board and other stakeholders, had implemented reproductive health education as an extension to the material already taught in school.
“Through this programme, the children, especially the girls, will better understand their reproductive rights and won’t be drawn into immoral activities that could result in sexually transmitted diseases (STDs),” she said in reply to a question by Maria Chin Abdullah (PH-Petaling Jaya).
Wan Azizah (PH-Pandan) said other ways of preventing underage marriages included eradicating poverty, increasing literacy and upgrading the lives of those in rural areas.
She said improving families’ livelihoods would also allow them to choose not to marry off their children in order to ease their financial burdens.
On raising the minimum marriageable age to 18, Wan Azizah who is also women, family and community development minister, said various ministries as well as state governments were working towards this.
She said this would involve legislation including the Islamic Family Law (Federal Territory) Act 1984, Islamic Family Ordinance Laws in every state, the Law Reform (Marriage and Divorce) Act 1976, as well as native customary laws in Sarawak.
Chin had earlier asked on the number of marriages involving minors in Malaysia and the government’s measures to prevent exploitation.
Wan Azizah said for Muslim couples, a total of 5,362 cases were recorded between 2013 and 2017, while applications for such marriages involving non-Muslims, according to the National Registration Department (NRD), totalled 2,367 cases within the same period.
“For such marriages involving Muslims, permission must be obtained from the shariah judges, and for non-Muslims, from the chief ministers of the respective states.”
Wan Azizah added that the highest numbers of underage marriages were recorded in Sabah, Sarawak and Kelantan.
The debate over child marriages was reignited following reports that a 41-year-old man in Kelantan had married an 11-year-old girl.