Marriages - Jom Kita Menyusahkan Orang Islam

In my Blog post previous to this I touched on a survey which showed that there are three divorces per hour among Muslim couples in Malaysia. 

There are really serious issues involved here which is destroying the structure of Malay society. The repercussions from all these divorces will be far reaching. Imagine all the single mothers, single parent households as well as broken homes that this will cause.

There has to be some serious thought and action put into this matter. I dont think the Government is the right person to do anything useful here. I dont think the Kementerian Hal Ehwal Wanita is also the right person to handle this responsibility. If divorce rates among Malays have reached three per hour - it shows that the Government has got other things on their mind or they just dont know what to do.

There is another increasing phenomenon which is also causing high divorce rates and social upheavals among Malays. This is the issue of over qualified Malay women marrying men who are much less qualified than them. I am not saying that this is a wrong thing to do. The fact is that among Malays over 70% of university entrants are females. 

We are producing more Malay women graduates than men. These clever girls may not find life partners who are similarly qualified as them. This has repercussions.

One eminent academic said that there are cases of female associate professors marrying drivers. I know of a female university graduate who married a security guard cum manual worker. She has a steady job and earns a steady income while the husband hops from job to job.  Latest news is he has found a job as a cleaner with a shipping services company.  

Again this is not wrong by itself. But these mismatched marriages can cause severe strains because the wife inevitably becomes the bread winner or the support base in the family from Day 1. Once the novelty of a new marriage wears off, it becomes obvious who really wears the pants. Divorce becomes a real option. 

Do not take this lightly because this phenomenon is increasing. There are numerous measures that can be undertaken to overcome this problem. But we must sit down and think about it.

I would like to reproduce here a comment that was sent in by Mr Labu in my previous post about the high divorce rates among Muslim couples. 

Kisah saya yang nak berkawin

1. Kene amik cuti pergi kursus kahwin yang penceramahnya hanya bersemangat bab seks

2. Kene pergi Johor dari KL sebab isteri orang Johor, kene berdaftar berbagai dan paling menyakitkan hati disuruh cari songkok pula, gambar kene bersongkok.... gambar lain tak boleh. Duit lagi

3. Bila da selesai semua, kene pegi Johor lagi sekali amik kad, tiada pos service atau collect di KL. Dah tu sistem tiada pulak computerised, dia tanya balik bila saya daftar. Hadoiii.

4. Kena heret 2 kawan sebagai bukti bujang, tak cukup surat bujang company

5. Isteri pula masalah wali,  sebab ayah kandung meninggal. Tak cukup kakak buktikan alamat dengan bil air dan api. Kene heret pulak wali datang, dah kene ambil cuti. Telefon dan surat pengesahan tak boleh pakai

6. All in, cuti seminggu. kene bawa / menyusahkan 4 orang lain dan ribuan ringgit untuk ulang alik dan urusan admin.

7. Bila tanya kawan non Muslim, bawa IC, daftar tak sampai few hours kerja admin siap. Nampak tak perbezaan?

mrlabu

This is exactly what happens in Malaysia before a Muslim couple can get married. Are we mad? Why do they make it so difficult? And after doing all this, the Muslim divorce rates are still the highest and climbing. 

And this wali hakim thing is not in the Quran. It is entirely a mazhab thing practised by the Shafiee. The Hanafis (majoriti kaum mamak) for example do not have this wali hakim issue.  I once assisted a young girl get married. Her father had died so an uncle - who was in Singapore - had to be the wali hakim. The problem was the uncle was not on talking terms with the family. There was a whole series of lettersm phone calls, surat sumpah etc that had to be arranged between the Majlis Ugama islam Singapura (MUIS) and the Jabatan Agama Wilayah or JAWI before the marriage finally took place.

Kenapa kita suka menyusahkan orang Islam macam ini?  Why make it so difficult for Muslims just to get married? The non Muslims dont have any problems at all. As Mr Labu says above :  Bila tanya kawan non Muslim, bawa IC, daftar tak sampai few hours kerja admin siap. Nampak tak perbezaan?

The non Muslims can get married in just a few hours. The traditional Chinese marriage is even simpler - in Malacca once our neighbours had the tea ceremony and the married couple took photographs to record the wedding. Thats it.  Habis in one afternoon.

The Indian Hindu wedding can be even simpler. The boy and the girl can just go to the temple all by themselves and the boy puts a necklace or the traditional 'thali' chain on the girl. Thats it. They are married. There need not even be a priest present. 

Weddings, just like divorce and religion in general is a private and personal matter. The State should NOT get involved in peoples' personal lives. This is the really, really sick disease that afflicts most Islamic countries. The State wants to get involved in peoples' personal lives and personal choices. 

The net result is they screw things up and make things even more difficult for the Muslims. Nak kahwin pun susah.  All this has an economic impact on the young Malay couples who want to get married.

All these useless procedures and delays cost time and money. As Mr Labu says, since the girl was from Johor, the wali hakim (legal representatives) had to travel to Johor to meet with the religious department guys there to consent to the girls marriage. 

The useless kursus kahwin costs time and money. Everything costs money and impoverishes the Malays. Orang Melayu juga jadi miskin. But what is the return on all this wasted time and money? Malay divorce rates are now the highest in the country and still increasing.

Here is another piece of news from today's Star about young Malay couples' borrowing large amounts of money just to get married.  This is more economic impoverishment. They get into debt from Day 1.

• Worrying trend of Muslim couples taking loans for weddings
• worrying trend of Muslim couples being in debt after taking personal banks loans of between RM50,000 to RM85,000 to get married.
• Harun took a RM85,000 loan to get married early last year.
• “I was determined to take a loan after calculating that the dowry, cash offering and cost of the wedding ceremony and reception amounted to more than RM60,000,” he said
• he had recently graduated and did not save up for his marriage.
• Amran from Johor took a RM50,000 loan to get married five years ago.
• took the loan for lavish wedding reception as his wife was from a well-to-do family.

Someone commented that I am always picking on the Muslims. Jangan jadi bodoh. I am not picking on anyone. Why is it that the Muslims always make their lives so miserable? Ini bukan ajaran Quran pun. This is just ajaran mazhab or peraturan pihak yang berkuasa. That is all. 

The non Muslims do not suffer all these self imposed rules and regulations.

For the Muslims nak kahwin susah. Belanja kahwin pinjam duit. Lepas kahwin kadar cerai pula tinggi.

It all leads to one big horror story - impoverishment. The whole thing makes you poorer financially and emotionally.