In view of the increase in incest cases in Sarawak, the state government is looking at castrating rape offenders.
The state government will discuss a proposal to include castration to be imposed against rapists, according to Sarawak welfare, community well-being, women and family development minister Datuk Seri Fatimah Abdullah.
She said a high-level meeting on the matter will be held on Monday and that the proposal has received support from concerned citizens over the rise of incest cases after she posted about it on her Facebook page.
“We will look at this proposal at our third state women and family council meeting tomorrow,” she told reporters yesterday.
Fatimah said the meeting, which she called, will also be attended by representatives from her ministry, police, non-governmental organisations and medical department.
She agreed that the proposal would involve amending the Penal Code, which at present does not provide castration as a form of penalty against rape offenders.
“There seem to be more incest cases reported this year when compared to last year,” Fatimah said, adding that there could be more cases which remained unreported because of the unwillingness of the victims or close relatives to file reports with the police due to various reasons.
She said her ministry will get the latest number of the incest cases from the briefing by the police at the meeting.
The media has reported at least five cases of incest in Sarawak in the last two months.
Related report: Sep 7, Nine Incest Cases in Two Months, Five of Them in Sarawak