Malaysia’s New Anti-Bullying Law Promises Up To RM250K For Victims, A Sabah Girl Missed It By Five Days

Malaysia’s new Anti-Bullying Act is facing its first public test — a 10-year-old beaten in a Sabah dormitory over a fallen towel, five days before the law even existed.

In Brief

Malaysia's Anti-Bullying Act, offering victims up to RM250,000 compensation, came into force five days after the Tenom school assault occurred.
The Tenom victim cannot access the new Tribunal's compensation mechanism due to the law's explicit exclusion of incidents predating 16 June.

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Malaysia passed its Anti-Bullying Act on 16 June.

Five days earlier, in a primary school dormitory in Tenom, Sabah, a 10-year-old girl was beaten over a towel that had slipped off a clothesline.

The law arrived, but it just missed her — or did it?

Three weeks on, with a viral video, a police investigation, and a nation’s worth of parental fury now bearing down on the case, Malaysia is about to find out what its newest piece of legislation is actually worth.

The altercation on 11 June began over something almost too small to believe. A towel fell from a clothesline inside the school dormitory, and clothes belonging to an 11-year-old dropped to the ground.

What followed, according to investigators, was a sustained assault on a 10-year-old girl that ended with the victim being referred to the hospital for treatment.

The Video Brought The Case To The Public

For nearly three weeks, the incident remained within the school until a 1.5-minute video began circulating online — showing the victim being beaten, kicked, and having her hair pulled, visibly trembling throughout.

By the time it reached social media platforms this week, it had accumulated tens of thousands of views and a comment section full of parents threatening retribution and quietly resolving never to send their children to residential school.

Tenom district police confirmed they are investigating under three provisions:

Section 325 of the Penal Code — voluntarily causing grievous hurt
Section 507B of the Penal Code — bullying
Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998 — for those who recorded and distributed the footage

At least three individuals have been called to assist — the alleged perpetrator and those involved in filming and spreading the video.

The Sabah Education Department is conducting a parallel inquiry.

Built for Cases Like This, Blocked by a Calendar

The Anti-Bullying Act 2026 came into force on 16 June — five days after the Tenom incident.

It is Malaysia’s most significant legislative response to school bullying to date, establishing a dedicated Anti-Bullying Tribunal and, critically, making parents financially liable if their child is found guilty.

Compensation to victims can reach up to RM250,000, depending on the severity of the injury sustained and its impact on the victim.

But the Tenom family will not see that money — not through this Act, at least.

Under Article 7(1) of Malaysia’s Federal Constitution, a person cannot be punished for an act that was not an offence under law at the time it was committed — the legal principle known as ex post facto.

The Anti-Bullying Act did not exist on 11 June.

Section 29(3) of the Act is explicit: the Tribunal’s jurisdiction extends only to bullying “which occurs after the coming into operation of this Act.”

What the New Law Cannot Do

That does not mean the perpetrator walks free.

The criminal investigation continues under pre-existing Penal Code provisions — Sections 325 and 507B — which were already in force well before 16 June.

What the victim specifically loses is access to the Tribunal’s compensation mechanism — the most significant new protection the Act introduced.

The process itself is not immediate either; complaints must first pass through a committee before the Tribunal takes over.

The Tenom girl falls into the gap — visible enough to be defined by the law, but just too early to benefit from it.

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A First Test With No Instruction Manual

Malaysia has had bullying provisions in the Penal Code for years — what it has not had, until now, is a dedicated tribunal, a formal complaints process, and a government portal, tab.bheuu.gov.my, launched the same week the Act took effect.

The Tenom case is arriving at precisely the moment these mechanisms are being switched on for the first time, with no precedent, no case law, and no public record of a single complaint processed through the new system.

It is, in that sense, the worst possible first test — and the most necessary one.

At least one commenter online invoked the name Zara Qairina — a previous bullying-related death that remains unresolved in public memory — as a quiet warning against optimism.

Melalap assemblyman Datuk Jamawi Jaafar has urged the public to stop sharing the viral footage, citing the victim’s emotional well-being and the integrity of the investigation — a warning that carries its own irony, given that the pressure now forcing official action exists largely because the video spread in the first place.

Meanwhile, Nurainie Haziqah Shafii, a lawyer and MUDA’s Secretary-General, standing for the Simpang Jeram state seat in the Johor state election, noted the case carried “a lot of story.”

The 10-year-old has been treated and discharged, the 11-year-old suspect is known to investigators, and the law is two weeks old; everything that happens next is the test.

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