High Court Dismisses Govt's Appeal To Suspend Malaysian Mothers' Citizenship Ruling

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The government had sought to stay the decision in addition to appealing against the court ruling made by the High Court that favoured Malaysian mothers on 9 September.

The hearing of the stay was conducted online today, 15 November.

According to The Vibes, judge Datuk Akhtar Tahir also ordered the government to pay a cost of RM5,000 as their appeal was deemed "unnecessary".

"The judge (Akhtar) in his decision said the defendant's position was contradictory," Joshua said, as quoted by Malaysiakini.

"On the one hand, [the government] said that an amendment to the Federal Constitution to grant mothers this right must be first approved by the Conference of Rulers. This presupposed that the amendment was necessary."

"However, there is no question of an amendment because the court has already decided that the mothers have this right under the Federal Constitution."

According to Malay Mail, Akhtar also said that if the government intends to amend the Federal Constitution in line with the high court's decision, they should not be placing these hurdles in the mothers' pathways.

The High Court judge added that Malaysian mothers have already experienced hardship and waited long enough for this right to be granted; they cannot wait indefinitely again for an appeal process to be over.

The High Court affirmed the right of Malaysian mothers to confer citizenship to their children born abroad after advocacy group Family Frontiers and six affected Malaysian mothers with overseas-born children filed a lawsuit at the High Court in December last year.

However, in less than a week after the decision was made, the government decided to file a notice of appeal to reverse the High Court's decision.

The appeal against the landmark ruling is scheduled to be heard at the Court of Appeal on Wednesday, 17 November.