Bullying complaints: Children deserve to know what happens next, advocate says
KUALA LUMPUR: Children subjected to online sexual harassment and bullying are not only struggling to find help but may also be left in the dark about whether action has been taken against those responsible, a teenage child advocate has warned.
Pocket of Pink (POP) advocacy and partnership officer Jaz Leen Lim said her friends had received unsolicited explicit images from strangers on Snapchat, while others had faced blackmail after connecting with people online.
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“I have an Instagram account too and sometimes you get creepy texts from guys. Some of my friends on Snapchat have had strangers send pictures of their private parts outright to them. It is common.”
POP is a youth-led non-profit organisation that combines art, media and education to address gender norms and advocate for safety.
Lim, a student and member of the Unicef Young Persons Advisory Group and a former Petaling Jaya City Council child councillor, said children experiencing abuse often confided in friends rather than school counsellors.
She said the problem extends beyond online abuse, with children who report bullying at school often left uncertain about what happens after their complaints are lodged.
“Usually, a discipline teacher will have a talk with the student but the complainant is not aware of how the talk went because it is private. That is about the end of it. There is zero transparency.”
She said this often leaves other children carrying the emotional burden of supporting traumatised friends without the training or adult support needed to help them.
“A lot of the time, we trust our friends more than the school counsellor. Children are then put in a position where they have to become the trusted adult.
“It is a huge burden for the child experiencing trauma and the child suddenly forced to become a counsellor for a friend.”
Speaking to theSun at the National Child Protection Leadership Conference 2026 recently, Lim said children could also be expected to provide a “perfect chronological order” of events on a form before their complaints appeared valid.
Seeking help could expose them to further humiliation, with even a visit to the school counselling room potentially fuelling rumours and fresh bullying.
“Just walking into the counselling room may become the start of another bullying campaign. People begin asking why she is going there or saying she has a mental illness.”
Although Portal Aduan Buli allows students to lodge complaints directly with the Education Ministry, Lim said she feared they could face pressure when cases were referred back to school leaders, while remaining unaware of the action taken.
The lack of trust and open communication at home could further discourage children from turning to adults for help, said Lim’s mother, Clytia Wong, 53.
“If you are not having meaningful conversations with your children when they are young, how can you expect them to tell you what is happening when they are 15 or 16?”
Wong said she had delayed giving her daughters devices until they reached secondary school but believed teaching responsible social media use was more effective than an outright ban.
“It is about showing them how to use social media responsibly. That is more important than banning it.”
Children’s Protection Society Malaysia KL branch director of programme and advocacy Tengku Yasmin Nastasha Tengku Abdul Rahman said the problem was not simply the availability of laws or reporting channels but whether cases reached the proper authorities promptly.
“The gap we often see is not the absence of laws or reporting channels. It is what happens before the matter reaches the proper authorities.”
In a written response, she said suspected sexual offences must not be handled solely as internal school matters, noting that Section 19 of the Sexual Offences Against Children Act 2017 requires such information to be reported to police.
Tengku Yasmin called for independent safeguarding officers, alternative reporting channels when complaints involved school personnel, fixed referral timelines and confidential systems to track action taken and support provided.
“Schools should not conduct an internal process in a way that delays or replaces reporting to the proper authorities.
“Protecting the reputation of an institution can never come before protecting a child.”