18 May 2019

Education Minister Dr Maszlee should stick to his Ministry and not Human Resources

Dr. Maszlee the Minister of Education had done enough damage and confusion in his ministry. He should stick to his ministry and not encroach into the Human Resource Ministry on matters of job opportunities and marketability.

The Minister of Education needs to have his head examined for saying that language requirements for job seekers is the reason why the Matriculation intake must be expanded for Bumiputeras thus depriving other Non-Bumiputeras their rightful places in tertiary education.

The language requirement could be related, relevant or inherently essential for certain jobs. Sometimes these language requirements may not be just Mandarin per se but also proficiencies in English and Bahasa Malaysia. Why should the Minister of Education single out Mandarin requirement based on a general assumption and fallacy that this is racially discriminative? This is truly irresponsible and unbefitting of someone elected as Minister of Education. The Cabinet member should have asked his colleague the Human Resource Minister to do a study or a survey prior to jumping into conclusion hastily.

Instead of playing the race card, exploiting and provoking racial tensions, Dr. Maszlee should be true to the spirit of UBAH and New Malaysia. Sadly, DAP ministers who in the past questioned the single ethnic recruitment in the civil service which has been dominated by a single ethnicity now chose to allow BERSATU in Pakatan Harapan (PH) government to turn their eyes on the private sector instead.

Why is Dr. Maszlee fanning the race card when the PH government dominated by DAP and PKR was voted in by promises of meritocracy and needs-based policies? Why is the minority party BERSATU reintroducing race centric policies and rhetorics to the deafening silence of the majority in DAP and PKR now? Are we returning to the same old policies in New Malaysia like the proverbial “Old wine in new bottles“?

Why pick on the Chinese language again? Does the Chinese-majority party DAP agree with Dr Maszlee? Is Mandarin the primary qualification for all industries throughout the private sector or is it just a figment of Dr. Maszlee’s imaginations? Or is Dr. Maszlee confusing Malaysia with China or Taiwan?

Again, PH must be reminded that Dr Maszlee targeting the Malaysian Chinese by depriving them of fair opportunity in public local universities intake is an outright “No” to the voters who believed in PKR and DAP’s promises of meritocracy and needs-based instead of race-based.

As a matter of fact, job hiring is based upon commercial needs and demands. All SMEs in Malaysia irrespective of ownership hire talents based on who is best equipped to improve the company’s performance. If there is any inadequacy or disadvantage in our graduates in the job market, the Education Minister should suggest remedial actions by equipping our students. It has nothing to do with ethnicity but education, thus the Minister of Education is barking at the wrong tree and giving a wrong prescription by increasing matriculation intake and depriving Non-Bumiputra of a fair entry in the local university intake.

Dr. Maszlee is still stuck in the old mindset of racial agendas and is a disappointment to the expectations of educational reform in new Malaysia. Even Dr. Mahathir wants to bring back Science and Mathematics in English in recognition of the need to equip our students with a good command of the language. Dr. Maszlee as Education Minister should utilise the power to change the national education syllabus to tailor teaching and learning that will fulfill the needs of the industry instead of playing on racial sentiments. Learn English, communicative or commercial Chinese language, etc, besides safeguarding the position of Bahasa Malaysia to ensure the progress of our beloved nation.

Does Dr. Maszlee have any inkling on how business operations are driven? Corporations do not discriminate based on ethnicity but hire base on marketability and profitability. There have always been policies and bumiputera quota to ensure the intake of bumiputeras. We should not hinder competition and growth by creating unnecessary political rhetorics and prejudices thus affecting the growth of businesses.

The PH government must be reminded that 95% of the Malaysian Chinese voted for UBAH and DAP for a fairer and level playing field.

Generally, job-seekers must fill requirements as the business requirements dictates. Dr. Maszlee should insist on helping non-Chinese to learn more languages to make them more competitive instead of coming up with policies that may spoil them or stunt their growth.

Surprisingly, the DAP top leaders and the normally vocal and outspoken DAP Deputy Education Minister Teo Nie Ching appears to be silently in agreement with her Boss Dr. Maszlee.

Senator Dato’ Sri Ti Lian Ker

MCA Vice President

-MCA Online-