The Deputy Law Minister, Mas Ermieyati Samsudin said that there have been nearly 140 divorces filed a day since March 2020 to August 2021.
She said this during the Dewan Rakyat yesterday (12 October), adding that there were a total of 66,440 divorces being filed by Muslim couples with the shariah courts through the e-shariah system during the 18-month period.
“This means that there is an average of 18 divorce applications are filed by non-Muslim couples a day while 121 Muslim couples file for divorce a day.”
“This works out to an average of five divorce applications per hour.”
“Even as we speak now, there are couples who are filing for divorce.” she was quoted saying by The Star.
Meanwhile, she also revealed that Selangor recorded the highest divorce rate among Muslims with 12,479, followed by Johor (7,558), Kedah (5,985), Kelantan (5,982), Perak (5,921), Terengganu (5,098), Pahang (5,058), Sabah (4,010), the Federal Territories (3,854), Negeri Sembilan (3,473), Penang (2,978), Melaka (2,402), Perlis (1,081) and Sarawak (561).
As for the non-Muslims, there were 10,346 divorces were filed from March 2020 to August 2021, with Selangor the highest again with 3,160 applications.
Following which were Kuala Lumpur (2,893), Perak (1,209), Johor (1,197), Negeri Sembilan (861), Melaka (449), Pahang (386), Kedah (76), Kelantan (45), Perlis (41) and Terengganu (29).
“Isn’t this very worrying?” Mas Ermieyati said in response to a question by Kangar Member of Parliament (MP), Noor Amin Ahmad, who had asked for statistics on divorces from March 2020, when the movement control order was first implemented, until now.
Nonetheless, she explained that the figures among Muslims only involved those who applied for divorce with the shariah courts, but it does not mean that all were approved and would end in divorce.
“We are of course unhappy whenever couples decide to go ahead with their divorce.” she added.
She also suggested that a holistic approach should be taken to address the issue which includes counselling for those affected by divorce.
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