By Zareef Muzammil
SHAH ALAM, Nov 26 — Raising awareness to stop violence against women should not end after 16 days of activism but it must be continued until it is normalised within the community, says the Selangor Menteri Besar.
Dato’ Seri Amirudin Shari said the people should be concerned over the acts of violence as it is unlawful and should not be inflicted on anyone.
“The 16-day campaign is to create the awareness that violence against women is something that should not be happening at all.
“The state government will continue to support the move and welcome the cooperation from various parties to join the 16-Day campaign as this social problem is happening among the society as a whole no matter what race or status,” he said at the launch of the state-level ‘16-day Activism Against Gender Violence’ campaign, held at the Selangor State Secretariat building, here yesterday.
Amirudin added that every family institution is faced with various challenges and is in need of a strong supportive ecosystem from the community as well as from legal aspects.
The Selangor Social Welfare Department (JKM) had previously reported that an 80 per cent increase, or 254 cases, in domestic violence were recorded from January to October.
Based on the data from its Legal and Enforcement Unit, the highest number of cases were recorded in Hulu Langat with 70 incidents reported, followed by Gombak (34), Subang Jaya (34), Klang (29) and other areas with a total of 90 cases.