The unanswered question: Were they abused?

On December 18th last year, a Malaysian Tourism official in Stockholm, Azizul Raheem Awaluddin and his wife, a teacher on unpaid leave, Salwati Nurshall were arrested by police for allegedly abusing their children. [Read Swedish news in English in The Local here.]

It became news in Malaysia in the middle of January when mainstream media headlined it as parents arrested for spanking children refusing to pray. It is a practise in traditional Malay households to judiciously spank kids above 9 years old for refusing to do their five times a day.

The concern had been for the children welfare. The Malay Muslims were concerned of the children placed with a non-Muslim Swedish foster family. There is rumour going around of the existence of syndicate in Sweden taking away children of Muslim families by detaining the parents for investigation under child abuse.

Datin Rosmah openly expressed willingness to meet the Queen of Sweden to get the children back. However, the foreign office, and welfare department successfully engaged the Swedish authority to get the children back to return and live with their auntie in Kelantan. Upon arrival, they were taken to the Prime Minister's residence for lunch.

Media reported government giving all necessary support but a question remained unanswered from the day the news broke. Was it merely a spanking or real abuse done on the four children; Aishah, 14, Ammar, 12; Adam, 11 and Arif, 7.


AFP report here claimed local media reported that the couple had "allegedly scolded and hit their youngest son on the arm for not performing his prayers".

The Local wrote:

Malaysian newspaper The Star reported that the police report stems from an incident in which the Muslim couple struck their 12-year-old son on the hands for refusing to perform his prayers.

The boy told his teachers in Stockholm about the incident, which was then passed along to the school's counselors, who in turn notified police. It has been illegal in Sweden for parents physically punish their children since the late 1970s.

A day later, authorities arrested the parents and placed the children in foster care while their parents await trial, The Star reported.

NST reported;

It was reported that a Swedish Court had extended the remand order against the children’s father, Azizul Raheem Awalludin, who is Tourism Malaysia officer in Sweden, to facilitate probe into the allegation.

The remand order against Azizul, which was the fourth time since his arrest on Dec 18, was extended to another 11 days until February 10.

The Swedish Court had also obtained a remand order against Azizul’s wife, Salwati Norshal, until February 10.

AFP also reported that a Facebook page, titled "Bring Shal and Family Home" was established to lobby for the parents' release. It received more than 17,000 "likes".

Nevertheless, Dato Najib was right to express concern for the welfare of the three children. Their welfare should be the foremost consideration.

Welfare Department


In a Bernama report here, the Welfare Department (JKM) spokesperson, Dr Noorul Aini explained that the welfare of the children as stipulated by article 3 and 20 on the Convention on the Rights of the Child as rectified by both Malaysia and Sweden in 1995 enabled their return.

JKM will also provide counseling for the children 

Having personally gone through the ordeal of a child abuse case in Malaysia, we reserve our comment and judgement of the Swede till the matter of whether child abuse and not merely a warning spank is established.

JKM and their interpretation and practise of the child protection law and regulation practices systematically failed to protect abused children.

In our experience, the Welfare Department made a serious misjudgement for buying into the father's simplistic words of family quarrel without taking into considering the children welfare and upbringing as of utmost importance.

The children with deceased mother returned to the abusive father instead of giving the guardianship to either the two grandmothers or the willing aunties of their deceased mother.

The father's erratic burst of temper and abusive tendency remained. As recent as last year, the teenaged daughter is slapped for merely beng persistent to seek permission to join the school camping trip.

His poor parenting skills and improper supervision already resulted in two of the three children failure at secondary education level. The third child is scholastically capable and entered a hostel but is now being denied quality education. Forget about proper parental care and guidance.

In our view and perhaps the view of family members in the know too, the rather paranoid attitude of Swedish authority is more welcoming than the "tidak apa" and prejudicial attitude of JKM, In an incident in the past, the government hospital had a pre-conception in their enquiry and was obviously bias and one sided.  


The couple may look loving and pious.

The fact that the mother is a school teacher indicate no similarity in the background with our case. However, similar to our case, looks can be deceiving. The public exterior of a person may be hiding the demon in them. Quite often, religiously strict parents can be unnecessarily stern. 

Still we are not passing judgement on the children's parents.

From the Prime Minister's statement, the government is giving the couple legal support. It is probably part of Tourism Malaysia's renumeration package for their staff posted abroad.

If there is none since it is a personal offense, our government is confident of the case and willing to support the couple legally. Is the government judgement based on the view of JKM officers sent overseas?

Hopefully, their judgement is better now than 14 years ago because we are still feeling the misery,  agony and frustration of their failed analysis and recommendation to a Magistrate in Kajang.


According to The Local, the couple are being held on remand on suspicion of gross violation of integrity for incidences that took place between June 2011 and December 2013. There is a lot of material to be made into a legal case.

Our acknowledged prejudice mind towards JKM is thinking that the JKM officials that went to Sweden could be sentimentally swayed by media headline that children were hit for missing prayers.

They could be possibly bias to save their fellow government officer and teacher rather than be more concerned for the children. Same like in our case of them being sentimental swayed by the father's hocus pocus family conspiracy concocted.

Safeguard for children


If found guilty, the couple run the risk of being sentenced up to 10 years in Swedish prison.

In their website here, Astro AWANI’s Magazine Editor, Zan Azlee was reported to have been told by a Chief Judge and lawyer in their recent trip to Sweden that out of 10,000 cases, the chances of the children returning to their abusive parents is 10%.

The case has not started and is still under investigation. Malaysians should not be emotional on this issue till the matter is understood.

There have been demonstration and memorandum letter sent to the Swedish Embassy. The point have to be understood. If it is the law of their land, it has to be respected accordingly. Without diplomatic passport, they should know and understand the law and practices of the country.

This is something our embassy should do to assist Malaysian abroad but they don't. Having been abroad before, our Embassies noticeably staffed by mediocre who are more interested to use the overseas opportunity to save their overseas allowance.

Being away from the bosses eyes, they take things easy and are hardly much assistance to Malaysians in dire needs abroad. My youngest brother had to assist Malaysian in Canada during 911 because our Ottawa Embassy are plain lazy!

To our human right activists, be reminded that Sweden is a country that is far more embracing of human rights than Malaysia. If it sounds draconian for keeping child abusers behind bar, then so be it. They have a good basis to put a law in place to safeguard children

Ignore them our human rights activists. They are not so genuinely concerned for human rights but are usually politically motivated and partisan.

In the pursuit of political mileage, the likes of Latheefa Koya and N Surendran are more concerned with defending known criminals and murderers than public safety at large. Let alone the rights, welfare and safety of children.

Through this Swedish ordeal, JKM should learn a thing or two on how much concern and importance that country gave to the welfare and safety of their children. It is more important than the personal liberty of the parents or alleged abuser.

Not like our case of the JKM officer that wanted to believe the concocted family conspiracy ploy and easily returned the children back to the abusive father.

Till the court commence sometime in February, there is nothing to affirm abuse had taken place. Be it Malaysia or Sweden, let the law takes it's course.