I am outraged and so very angry to hear about women and children being violently gang raped and murdered almost daily in the news. As a parent and a husband, I cannot but feel a deep sadness for the parents and loved ones of the victims of these violent crimes. The most recent cases being the rape and murder of the hairstylist in Ipoh and another young Utar student.

When is the government going to get really serious about this? Obviously, something is very wrong in Malaysia when we hear about women and children being violently raped and many brutally murdered by criminals almost daily. It's about time the government take a serious look at how they are dealing with these rapists and why our current laws are not enough to prevent

such violent crimes from increasing at a worrying rate.

They should hire real professionals to find out the root cause of why these crimes are on the increase, and please (double please) don't just ask the politicians or some religious guys to make some uneducated conclusions - they are just not qualified.

In Malaysia, you hear of these rape cum murders almost daily, and then we would sometimes hear about the suspects arrested but that's probably the end of it. Occasionally, we hear about a short jail term for the convicted rapists but more often than not, you'll never hear about it again in the mainstream media. How then is anyone - especially would-be rapists - going to be deterred from acting on their violent sexual urges?

We must show these 'animals' the extreme consequences of such violent crimes so that they will think really, really hard before they commit such crimes. The government and the media are just not doing enough to prevent these crimes from happening.

I believe that rapists need to be publicly paraded, caned and shamed. Then put them behind bars for life and severely cane them even more. Those who are also convicted of murdering their victims should be executed by hanging. Publicise these executions so that would-be rapists see the consequences of their violent crimes.

I believe that only by shaming, severe caning and execution will the message get across to these criminals in the open and this would be an effective method of prevention.

In addition, the government should organise and conduct community training classes on self- defense while enhancing the security in all high-risk places. It's time to act and protect our women and children. Enough is enough. It's time to act and the government needs to step up and do something about this.