A Glimpse at Financial Hardship and Child Support Issues among Divorced

Single Mothers in Malaysia

Zarina Md Nor, PhDUniversiti Sains Malaysia

Silvia Zia Islam, PhDRMIT University Melbourne

Hong Kong Child Support and Maintenance Conference 2015

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Acknowledgement

We would like to express our sincere gratitude to Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) for the travel grant from the

university’s International Conference Fund and also to the organizer of the ‘Recovery of Child Support and Family

Maintenance in Asia Pacific and Worldwide: National and Regional Systems and the Hague 2007 Convention and

Protocol’ conference for sponsoring the conference accommodation in Hong Kong.

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Introduction• Single mothers in Malaysia mostly consist of

widows and divorcees, followed by a small number of permanently separated women.

• The death of husbands remains the main route to single motherhood.

• Marriage is literally the only way of having children as premarital birth is socially and religiously unsupported.

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Motivation of study

The plight of (low income) single mothers and their children is yet to receive wide attention among academia. The absent of regular and/or insufficient payment of child support is a common issue faced by single mothers.

Moreover, published studies on child support topics in Malaysia are very limited.

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Malaysian Family Law

• In Malaysia there are different family law systems for Muslim and non-Muslim

• The Law Reform (Marriage and Divorce) Act 1976 was enforced in 1982 governs the non Muslims whilst the Muslims are governed by the Islamic Law System

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Islamic Family Law

• Provisions from the Malaysian Islamic Family Law dictates that the court has to decide the maintenance amount based on the husband’s ability and the needs of the wife and children.

• This provision is too general and does not specifically define the terms ability and needs used to calculate the maintenance amount.

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Maintenance Amount

• The concept of kifayah (adequacy) and ma‘ruf (kindness) are applied by the judges in Malaysian Sharia Courts.

• The Sharia judges have taken into consideration several criteria in their judgement to clarify and measure the kifayah and ma’ruf concepts which reflects that the modern socio economic conditions.

(Ahmad, Azahari & Rahman 2013)

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Focus of Preliminary Study

Malay Muslim divorced women with children

- Divorce happens in higher rates among Muslim couples compared to the non Muslims

- Custody usually given to mothers and joint custody is yet to be formally implemented

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Preliminary study on Child Support(N=15)

Age at divorce No of children Income (RM) Education level Types of work Shared custody Child supportPayment

38 3 1k-2k High SchoolAccount supervisor

Yes Sometimes

32 1 4k-5k DegreeTeacher

No Sometimes

30 3 1k-2k High SchoolFactory worker

No No

39 2 3k-4k DegreeTeacher

No No

48 More than 3 1k-2k DiplomaTechnician

Yes Yes

36 1 4k-5k DegreeHR officer

No Sometimes

18 2 Less than 1k SecondaryAdmin clerk

No Yes

38 1 More than 5k PhDLecturer

No No

35 1 More than 5k PhDLecturer

Yes No

35 1 More than 5k PhDLecturer

Yes No

39 2 More than 5k PhDLecturer

No Yes

27 2 2k-3k High SchoolAdmin officer

No Sometimes

39 3 2k-3k High SchoolSecretary

No No

36 More than 3 3k-4k DegreeMarketing executive

Yes No

47 3 2k-3k High SchoolMarketing personel

No No

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Summary of Results

Mean age at divorce = 35.8 yearsNumber of children

Shared custody = 33%Child support payment

No of Children Percentages

1 33%

2 27%

3 27%

More than 3 13%

Yes 13%

Sometimes 27%

No 53%

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Conclusion

Non-payment of child support worsen financial hardship faced by single mothers

Single mothers’ income from employment mitigate the effect of non payment of child support by absent fathers

Child support issue needs to be seriously considered by policymaker as it may affects the wellbeing of children in single mothers’ households

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Thank you