Women's safety: Selangor to enact by-laws

By-laws intended to ensure the safety of women shoppers, including the provision of special parking spaces for them near mall entrances and with ample lighting, are to be enacted by the Selangor government.

This is response to a spate of violent attacks on women at shopping mall car parks and a memorandum urging the state government to take action, the state executive councillor in charge of women's affairs, Rodziah Ismail, said today.

"The Selangor government as agreed with the local enforcement authorities to enact a by-law to ensure the safety of women, especially in public places such as shopping malls," she said told a press conference.

The Batu Tiga assemblyperson added that the memorandum called for special parking spaces for women near mall entrances, with ample lighting and CCTV cameras, which she hoped would be considered when the local authorities drafted the by-law.

“We hope this by-law will create a conducive environment for women,” Rodziah said.

A number of first-person accounts of robbery and attempted kidnapping at shopping mall carparks have spread through online social media networks in recent months.

These have fuelled paranoia and claims that the crime rate has gone up, despite the police saying that it has, in fact, gone down.