Non-Muslim Malasian Men Like a Little Strange, a Lot.

BAD news for Malaysian women. Local non-Muslim men, it seems, prefer to marry foreign women from countries such as China, Vietnam, Indonesia and Thailand.

Women from these countries are said to be gentler, soft-spoken and less demanding.

"As far as I know, and from what has been conveyed to me by men married to foreigners, the demands of these foreign women are not as excessive as their Malaysian counterparts. They are also unassuming and soft-spoken," Deputy Home Minister Datuk Tan Chai Ho told reporters at Parliament lobby yesterday.

Earlier, Tan had members buzzing with this revelation — that the number of men getting hitched to foreign women was increasing and records showed that from 2000 to June this year, there were nearly 34,000 marriages involving local men and foreign women.

The number of such marriages had steadily increased over the years. In 2000, there were 3,953 marriages, followed by 4,085 in 2001, 4,847 in 2002, 5,123 in 2003, 5,701 in 2004 and 7,277 in 2005. As of June this year, 3,009 marriages were recorded.

Vietnamese brides were the most popular with 1,185 marriages last year and 1,711 involving girls from China.

Indonesian and Thai women are also favourites with Malaysian men. Their numbers have increased by 46.9 and 36 per cent respectively from 2001 to 2005.

In contrast, a total of 2,478 marriages between Malaysian women and foreigners were recorded in 2000.

The number went down to 2,209 in 2001 but increased slightly to 2,434 in 2002. It dipped again the following year to 2,240, and went down further to 2,140 in 2004 and 1,456 in 2005. As of June this year, only 509 such marriages were recorded.

Tan said the ministry was keeping a close watch on locals marrying foreigners to ensure the marriages were genuine and not marriages of convenience.

He said the Immigration Department was investigating about 10 cases of foreign marriages which were deemed suspicious as there were huge age gaps between the brides and grooms.

"We cannot say the marriages are illegal as love transcends all ages, but we are investigating them based on complaints," Tan said, adding that if a marriage was found to be a sham, the foreign spouse would be deported.

On the matter of divorce in the country, Tan said there were 24,000 divorce cases recorded since 2001.

There were a total of 3,236 divorces in 2001, followed by 4,342 in 2002, 4,734 in 2003, 5,940 in 2004 and 5,244 in 2005. As of May this year, 694 cases had been recorded.

Tan said 30 per cent of the divorces were due to irreconcilable differences, followed by financial problems (20 per cent). The rest were due to among others things, sexual problems, physical and emotional abuse and third-party interference.

Comment: Do foreign women make betters wives? Do you have one? Do you have a trade-in? For the Elephantettes, do you have a foreign husband or worse? Enquiring minds want to know.