PROPERTY
First of all, the legal implication of such an amendment, as I understand it, is that any law or provision of law that discriminates or on implementation has the effect of discriminating onground of sex will be automatically struck down as invalid for contravening the supreme law of the land, the Federal Constitution in reference to article 8(2).
Equality of gender, a western norm, will immediately clash with our Asian mores and religious values. For example, under Islam, the official religion of the country, Muslim men can under the Syariah law take up to four wives. Can a Muslim woman invoke article 8(2), which guarantees gender equality, to be amended to deny the husband of more than one wife?
If she can do it, would it not imply that the husband's right to freedom of religion (and with it the right to four wives) guaranteed by article 11 of the Constitution has been violated? When gender equality conflicts with freedom of religion (both guaranteed by the Constitution) which will prevail?
The problem becomes more 'grey' when it comes to PAS' implementation of Syariah laws and norms in Kelantan and Terengganu. For example, the question of having separate male and female queues in the supermarkets - is that, or the rationale behind it, equality or inequality of gender that is consistent or contravenes the amended article 8(2)?
Religion in general does not accept gays, transsexuals and sexual transvestites or people who have undergone sex change. Can this category of people assert their constitutional right to gender equality to be accepted in all aspects of social, public and religious life?
On the question of benefit to the womenfolk, I ask women to think again. In the first place, even before this proposed constitutional amendment, women have been getting redress when they asked for it. For examples, the amendments were made to the Guardianship of Infants Act that prior to amendment, it unfairly gave all guardianship rights to the father; or the Distribution Act that prior to amendment gave the husband the exclusive right to inheritance of his deceased wife if she left no will but not vice versa.
If women have been getting the amendments they want on laws that are unfair to them, why should they rock the boat and lobby for a constitutional amendment for gender equality that now provides men the constitutional right to strike down as invalid all pre-existing provisions of law that have been favouring women against men?
There are many examples of this, and the most spectacular is our marriage laws (Law Reform Marriage and Divorce) Act as applied to non-Muslims.
The Law Reform Act was promulgated on the assumption that women were generally economically weak, destitute and without gainful employment. Hence in an instance of divorce, it is the husband's obligation to maintain the ex-wife in respective of her financial means for the rest of her life until she dies, remarries or abets adultery by living with a married man. The obligation to maintain the ex-husband is very limited - only in cases where he is so mentally or physically incapacitated that he couldn't make a living. The fact that she is rich and he is poor is not a factor of maintenance.
By the amended Article 8(2), I will, as a man, demand that the maintenance law be declared invalid because gender equality requires that the maintenance obligation be structured according to the 'means' test and not gender status of husband or wife. This effectively means that if the wife is financially better off, as in such times, the wife should maintain the poorer ex-husband.
Alternatively, no husband shall be required to maintain his ex-wife whom he does not love anymore unless the ex-wife is so mentally or physically incapacitated that she couldn't make a living - just like the existing provision governing men!
Children are central to a woman's heart but that does not make them less important to responsible and affectionate fathers who separate from their wives. Under the same Law Reform Act, there is a presumption that when it comes to custody of a child in a fractured family unit, it is good for the child below the age of seven years to be with the mother. I allege again that this presumption is gender-biased and should be struck down by reason of contravention of article 8(2) on gender equality.
The welfare of the child is paramount at all times so that if he or she wishes to be with the father or the father is financially better off, there should not be this presumption that a child below seven needs the mother more than the father when the father has an extended family, a new wife or nanny to take care of the needs of the below-seven-year-old.
All other laws purporting to protect and promote women's welfare will also be called in question by this gender equality amendment. For example, our new sexual harassment law that provides 'ogling' at a woman may constitute sexual harassment in a work place. What about a female employee dressing in short skirts and plunging neckline to get her male boss' attention? Will her suggestive looks at him constitute 'ogling' and harassment of him by her?
In any event, is it gender equality for him to be punished under sexual harassment law for ogling down at her plunging neckline that she voluntarily flaunts? The point made here is that it is blatant gender inequality in contravention of article 8(2) for the harassment law to tolerate a woman's right to flaunt and seduce but not the right of the full-blooded male to respond without being thrown the charge of sexual harassment.
I can go on and on regarding how this constitutional amendment on gender equality can culminate in gender strife, religious confusion and a litigious society.
Whether it serves the ultimate interest of women is really debatable but this amendment will certainly help politicians to canvass for women's votes much needed to counteract PAS' expanding influence; PAS' main weakness being their religious discourse and ideology being structured on very patriarchal values that woman find antithetical.