Baby snatching: Ministry claims stateless mum refused custody

The Women, Family, and Community Development Ministry has issued a denial regarding allegations of ‘baby-snatching’ of stateless infants at the Lahad Datu Hospital in Sabah.

In a statement responding to a Malaysiakini report, the ministry said one specific incident involving a Bajau Laut was an “old case”, which it said had been resolved after the mother turned down an offer to get back custody of her baby.

It did not address the three other cases reported by Malaysiakini, including one in which the mother committed murder-suicide to avoid both losing her child and paying hefty bills, and two other cases in which the mother got back their newborns thanks to intervention from their village chief.

The ministry said in the 2021 case - believed to be referring to a case involving a woman who identified herself as Aimah - the newborn was indeed placed under temporary custody of others.

However, it said this was pending a process to identify the child’s parents or guardians to get back custody of the child.

Aimah previously told Malaysiakini that in September 2021, she unexpectedly delivered her baby at home prematurely and was rushed to the hospital.

Mother and baby, on the brink of death, were warded immediately. Aimah recovered in a few days after a blood transfusion and was asked to go home while her baby recovered in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).

However, the hospital then reportedly claimed she left the child unattended after two months so they called the Welfare Department. The department then deemed Aimah an unfit parent and took the child away.

Within a week, a child protection officer processed the application and the Magistrate’s Court granted the adoptive parents custody of Aimah’s baby.

The Women, Family, and Community Development Ministry, in its version of events, said the baby was left at the hospital for three months.

It said when a woman who claimed to be the birth mother of the child appeared at the hospital to get back custody, the baby had already been given a permanent custody order by the courts.

However, after getting confirmation from the woman’s village chief that the baby was hers, the ministry said child protection officers offered to give the child back to the birth parents.

“However, the birth parents decided to give up the child to the (adopters) through a statutory declaration, willingly,” it said.

The ministry added that the birth mother was not fit to care for children due to financial factors and chronic health issues, and being unable to pay for the baby’s medical costs.

Ministry performs review

Meanwhile, the ministry said a session was held on Sept 19 this year to review whether procedures were followed in the case.

This was four days after Malaysiakini published the baby snatching report.

The Women, Family, and Community Development Ministry said the review found the allegations raised by Malaysiakini to be “untrue”.

It said the case was managed properly according to procedure based on the reports of welfare officers, court orders, police reports, statutory declarations, a request for late birth registration, and reports from the Lahad Datu Hospital.

As such, the ministry said it lodged a police report today to deny the allegations in Malaysiakini’s report.

Aimah, when speaking to Malaysiakini previously, said she hoped to get back her child.

The child protection officer in Aimah’s case and that of two others told Malaysiakini that he generally viewed the stateless community to be unfit parents due to their poverty and deplorable conditions they lived in.

In Aimah’s case specifically, the officer said the Welfare Department and police spent a week looking for her during the adoption procedure, but failed.

“Now she has to prove that the child is hers. What proof does she have?” he had asked.

He claimed Aimah only showed up after the court awarded custody to the adoptive parents.

“We already had an application to adopt the child, so we presented the case in court.

“Why not give the baby to a guardian who is legal?”

Meanwhile, the Women, Family, and Community Development Ministry said today it will not compromise with any party if elements of negligence or misconduct were found in the handling of cases by protection officers and welcomed complaints through its “Talian Kasih” phone line at 15999.

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