Recently, I went to the national registration department (JPN) in Melaka to register my newborn baby boy, well within the deadline of two weeks after birth.

I submitted all the necessary documents, together with the form. But the lady at the counter looked at my wife's identity card and said that all registrations for Sabah, Sarawak and Indonesia, have to be done at the IC counter and, what's more outrageous, is that I have to bring my wife, who is a Sarawakian, along to submit her thumbprints as proof.

I immediately objected to the ridiculous condition since my wife had just been discharged from the hospital. There is also the matter of being in confinement (dalam pantang) which applies to almost all new mothers for about 44 days. To my added astonishment, it was a married lady I was dealing with, who I would assume would understand my predicament!

She also mentioned that this is a new regulation, but in the application form there is no mention of it.

The condition simply does not make sense for the reason I stated. On top of that, why is it imposed on Sarawak and Sabah residents, who are very much part of Malaysia? Besides that, I brought my original marriage certificate so that JPN need not call for my wife's presence.

Unless the period of registration for such cases is changed to up to two months, instead of two weeks, this 'new' condition is impractical and unreasonable.

JPN has to resolve this issue soon (I hope mine will be settled tomorrow). Please be more reasonable to people like me who tried our best to register before the end of the two-week period and abide by JPN requirements.

Also, the JPN management and staff should be more understanding when coming up with any new regulations so that unjustified inconveniences like this will not happen again.