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#MakeSchoolASaferPlace: anger and dismay after Malaysia investigates student who called out teacher’s rape jokes
- Police opened a probe into Ain Husniza Saiful Nizam for ‘breaching the peace’ with TikTok video exposing teacher’s remarks in class
- The teacher has initiated a US$237,000 libel suit against the student, while her family plans to launch a US$1.9 million countersuit
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Dozens of influential Malaysian civil society groups have expressed dismay and alarm after a 17-year-old student who took a male teacher to task for allegedly joking about rape in class was served with a defamation suit and called up by police for “breaching the peace”.
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Ain Husniza Saiful Nizam in April became a national talking point after she called out the teacher – without naming him or her school – and sparked intense conversation about sexual harassment in schools and entrenched misogyny in the country’s culture.
The teacher in question was summoned for questioning and subsequently transferred from the school while a probe was pending.
Authorities this week said they were classifying the case as “no further action”.
While the teacher was “insensitive towards the feelings of schoolgirls who were there, what he did was not enough to satisfy the element of crime to charge him in court,” the news website Malaysiakini quoted an official with knowledge of the investigation as saying.
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