In December 2020, the advocacy group together with six Malaysian women married to foreigners with children born outside the country had filed a constitutional challenge with the Kuala Lumpur High Court, seeking their children’s right to Malaysian citizenship.
They sought a court order for all relevant government agencies, including the National Registration Department, Immigration Department and Malaysian diplomatic missions to issue citizenship documents to children born abroad to Malaysian women married to foreigners.
On Sep 9, 2021, the Kuala Lumpur High Court ruled in their favour, declaring that Malaysian mothers have equal rights as Malaysian fathers to automatically confer citizenship on their overseas-born children.
However, in August 2022, the Court of Appeal overturned the High Court’s decision in a 2-1 ruling. The Federal Court then allowed Family Frontiers to pursue its appeal in December 2022, local media reported.
While their appeal was ongoing, the Malaysian government on Mar 25, 2024, began tabling a proposed law in Parliament, with the aim of changing the Federal Constitution’s citizenship laws to enable Malaysian mothers’ overseas-born children to automatically be granted Malaysian citizenship.
On Monday, Gurdial Singh Nijar – who is the lead lawyer representing the mothers – informed the Federal Court that the government and his clients had agreed to maintain the decision handed down by the High Court in 2021.
Speaking to the media after the court proceedings, Gurdial said that the settlement was a “great gift” for Malaysian women.
“It is a historic judgement, a conclusion to crack decades-long discrimination,” he said, as quoted by The Edge Malaysia.
According to the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), Malaysia is one out of 25 countries that prevents women from conferring citizenship rights to their children born overseas on an equal basis as men.
In their manifestos for the 15th general election in 2022, both Pakatan Harapan and Barisan Nasional – now partners in the unity government led by Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim – pledged to amend the Federal Constitution to give mothers that same right.
