The comparative analysis on the laws governing national service between Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, the United Kingdom, Sweden and Philippines / Hariz Sufi Zahari …[et al.]

The Malaysian National Service has been viewed to be lacking on certain areas. This research aims to make a comparative analysis on the adequacy of the Malaysian National Service Training Act 2003 (NSTA 2003) as compared to the laws on national service in other jurisdictions including Singapore, South Korea, the United Kingdom, Sweden and Philippines. This research involves a doctrinal approach in looking into legislations that govern national services in aforementioned countries. The legislations were examined on the issues revolving five (5) themes, namely the selection of candidates, duration for each respective programed, the status of identification of conscientious objectors, the provisions with regards to the conscripts or participants' absence without leave, and the punishments to those who fail to register to the programmers as provided in the legislations. The research found that the NSTA 2003 is lacking of specific guidelines on the selection of candidates when it is compared to other countries, apart from its age limit. In addition, the duration of the Malaysian National Service has been found to be shorter than other countries, as it is only for the duration of up until three (3) months. Also, the NSTA 2003 does not recognize conscientious objectors as it does not provide the freedom for a candidate to refuse participation in the programmed. Finally, the NSTA 2003 regards absentees to be committing an offence and therefore, provides for punishments to those found guilty, ranging from fines to community service

Re-Examining the Publicity, Advertising and Marketing of Legal Profession in Malaysia

The legal practitioners in Malaysia are restricted from publicising, advertising and marketing themselves on the grounds of fiduciary relationship with clients, the duty to serve the public and it is professionally undignified. Despite the advancement of the Information, Communication and Technology, lawyers are restricted in utilising it for publicity, advertising and marketing. At the same time, the public is deprived of information to engage the best lawyers of their choice. Furthermore, while other countries such as European Union, United Kingdom, Singapore and Australia have moved forward, the Malaysian legal profession remains unchanged. This concept paper investigates the adequacy of the Legal Profession (Publicity) Rules 2001(“LPPR 2001”) in legalising publicity, advertising and marketing. This paper adopts a qualitative research methodology with doctrinal and comparative approaches. Firstly, this paper focuses on content analysis of statutes as the primary source of law. Secondly, content analysis on secondary sources of law including journal articles, and online sources. Thirdly, conducting a comparative study by analysing the primary and secondary sources of law in other jurisdictions. This paper explains that lawyers must be allowed to innovate into new methods in publicising, advertising and marketing themselves. Society will greatly benefit from this as they will be more informed and knowledgeable in engaging the service of lawyers of their choice. This paper ends by suggesting that there is a dire need to legalise the publicity, advertising and marketing of the legal profession in Malaysia. Thus, this research is significant to the development of the legal profession in Malaysia

The Feasibility of Mandatory Vaccination Program Under the Malaysian Legal Framework for Education Sector

The spread of the COVID-19 virus has been halted partially due to the vaccination program around the globe. However, such initiation has been actively under attack by a portion of society that believes vaccination is not the way out of the pandemic. A similar notion of anti-vaccine has slipped through Malaysia, particularly in the education sector, as they refuse to be vaccinated. This has been contributed by the lack of legal provision that regulates vaccination in Malaysia. Based on the literature and scientific data on the effectiveness of vaccination programs in curbing the spread of COVID-19, this paper aimed to weigh the legal argument on the possibility of imposing mandatory COVID-19 vaccination in Malaysia’s education sector to eradicate this deadly disease virus permanently. This paper embarked on a comparative, doctrinal analysis methodology where secondary data were collected and analysed. Literature from primary and secondary sources such as the laws, guidelines, textbooks, journal articles, government reports, newspaper articles, and online sources from multiple jurisdictions was analysed. The outcome of such analysis is laid down in a narrative design in highlighting the importance of mandatory vaccination within the education sector. This paper proposed hard and soft approaches on imposing mandatory vaccination programs within the education sectors in Malaysia is highly recommended, considering that the benefits of vaccination outweigh the risk of eradicating COVID-19 in Malaysia

The Adequacy of Data Protection Laws in Protecting Personal Data in Malaysia

With the burgeoning technology, Malaysia has seen a staggering number of data breaches and data leaks within this past decade alone, with no signs of the trend decreasing. This has raised questions on whether the Personal Data Protection Act 2010 (PDPA) adequately protects the personal data of Malaysians. With the recent COVID-19 pandemic, data has been collected on a larger scale than before, with more frequent data leaks occurring. Hence, this study aims to analyse the adequacy of the PDPA by benchmarking it to the United Kingdom’s (UK) Data Protection Act 2018, which have seen a decrease in data breaches since the implementation of the new legislation. In this context, personal data refers to information processed or recorded that relates directly or indirectly to a data subject, who may be identified from the information and may include sensitive personal data. The study uses a doctrinal analysis methodology to best explore the ideas and concepts within the literature available regarding the protection of personal data. The study also employs a comparative analysis methodology by comparing the scope and application of Malaysian and UK legislation for benchmarking. The findings suggest that there are improvements to be made for the PDPA to be adequate