steadyaku47

Friday 30 October 2009

The Malays to remain stupid? A government Policy?

This was forwarded to me - a good read by Syed Bakar Ali.

A well written article by an intellectual Malay
An Education policy designed to ensure the Malays remain stupid so they can be controlled and manipulated by the Malay elite - The feudal lords - Umnoputras. 
But what is really sad is that the Malays themselves believe in this, hence there is no way this will ever change.  You can take a donkey to the water, but you can't force it to drink unles it wants to, Right?, Real sad!
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THE FIRST BUNGLE OF THE 1ST 100 DAYS IN OFFICE!
By Syed Akbar Ali

In one of my Four Wheel Drive trips into the jungle some years ago, we stopped at a place called Cheneh inTerengganu. I remember a makcik at a roadside stall made some nice ayam goreng. 
My good friend Juhaidi was with me and also my two boys.Cheneh was (and maybe still is) a typical rural backwater.  The folks did not seem to know if they were coming or that there was Astro but I think the favorite show was 'Tom Tom Bak'. But I did recall saying aloud that someday I hope that the folks in Cheneh would watch CNN, BBC and CBS and that we could just drive up and ask the makcik in Cheneh 'Whats on CNN today?' But I think that's not going to happen at all. Tuan Tuan dan Puan Puan, our Prime Minister Dato Najib has made his first bungle - and within the first 100 days too. No Sirs, it is a major bungle. You have bungled big time.
Lets manage this "crisis in the making" now. First of all please stop from saying anything more about the switch from English to Malay. The more things you say, the more "face saving" devices you will need for you to swallow your pride before you can undo this mistake. But this mistake must be undone.
I just happened to be with Tun Dr Mahathir Mohammad yesterday Thursday July 9th 09 slightly after noon when the news came in that the Cabinet had decided to flip flop over the language issue.
Firstly Tun Dr Mahathir raised a simple but valid point. The main reason quoted by Tan Sri Muhyuddin to favor the switch to Malay was that the rural Malay kids were doing poorly in Maths and Science (which are taught in English) compared to the urban kids. But what about exam scores for the rural kids in all other subjects which are taught in the Malay language? Dr Mahathir said no one showed him the statistics for that. Why?

If you say that English is the reason why the rural kids are doing so poorly in Maths and Science, then by your logic the rural kids should be scoring the same as or better than the urban kids in other subjects that are taught in Malay? By your logic rural kids should be doing better than the urban kids in Sejarah, Geografi, Kemahiran Hidup, Bahasa Malaysia and other Malay language subjects.
But we know that rural kids generally score lower than urban kids in most subjects (except maybe Agama). And language has got nothing to do with it. Rural kids are usually found in lower income households, their parents are usually less educated, they have less achievement goals and so forth. That is why you call them 'children from rural areas'. They are poor people and they are underachievers.
So this comparison with rural kids and urban kids is not fully accurate (Tun Dr Mahathir used another word which I need not repeat here).
Let me give you some street feedback. At least one Internet based employment agency has instructions from its clients to completely ignore any job applicants who are graduates from UTM (University ITM). As we know UITM graduates are all Malays. They say the quality of the graduates is low and their English is bad.. They are unemployable. This is what I heard.
Another preference by another employer - a Multi Nationa > Corporation - in the job market is to take in job applicants who are graduates of IPTA (private universities) who have done twinning programs. This means their English is good and they are more marketable. Again this means Malays with poor English skills are not preferred. Bottom of the line.

And here is some news from Cyberjaya. We opened up Cyberjaya and gave foreign investors much benefits and incentives to open business there. Among the foreign investments in Cyberjaya are 'Call Centers'. Well some 'Call Centers' in Cyberjaya take in Indians as a first choice for employment. They feel that generally Indians speak better English. Second choice are Chinese. Finally they will look at Malays as the last choice but rarely. Even with the emphasis on English the past six years, the Malays cannot speak enough English to get a job nswering telephones in Call Centers in Cyberjaya. THIS IS PATHETIC !
We cannot shut them down or arrest them under the ISA for practising such discrimination. They come here for business. We must provide them the tools necessary to run their businesses well. We are not doing the job.
To Dato Najib and Tan Sri Muhyuddin Yassin, why are you doing this? Who agrees with you? Who are you afraid of? Takkan UMNO Johor is so powerful to frighten Muhyuddin?
Last nite I met a Deputy Minister and a well known "ultra Malay" ex-newspaper editor. The Deputy Minister said it was a bad decision to switch back to Malay. The 'ultra Malay' ex-editor was visibly upset and said "I have no comments. I don't want to say anything." I think he did not agree with the switch at all.
Another well known "ultra-ultra" Malay defender of all things Malay (if I just mention his job you will know who he is) said the switch to Malay was 'satu langkah ke belakang'.

A Tan Sri from Kelantan said in English "this is a giant leap backward for the Malays"...

In the present world, the English language is a 'life giving' language. The amount of new knowledge and new information that comes out in the English language is astounding. No one can translate all the new knowledge and information that comes out in English EACH and EVERY DAY.
It is impossible.. We have to master this language. There is no other way.
Then we have the 'tidak masuk akal' ideas. Tan Sri Muhyuddin says after the switch back to Malay, he still wants to upgrade the teaching of English in the rural schools. He wants to employ about 1000 native English speakers to teach English in rural schools. By native speaker I do not know if he is referring to Mrs Naidu from Brickfields or if he wants to employ real Mat Sallehs from outside the country.
Mrs Naidu the retired English teacher will gladly teach English to our children for RM3000 per month. But we will have to pay the Mat Sallehs RM15,000 a month or more before they will come to work here. But if that is a good idea then why not employ 1000 Sallehs at RM15000 a month to teach Maths and Science in English in the rural schools?
Because according to Tan Sri Muhyuddin, it is not the school children in the rural schools who are to be faulted. The real culprits are the teachers. Muhyuddin let the cat out of the bag. Here is what Muhyuddin said (from th Press):
"It was based on empirical studies and other specialist reviews," he said. Based on studies conducted in 2008, he said, the ministry found that only a small percentage of teachers fully used English to teach the two subjects. "On average, the percentage of those using English during Mathematics and Science periods was around 53% to 58%," he said, adding that only a small number of teachers were proficient. Muhyiddin said studies carried out by local universities found that students' mastery level of English during the entire policy was around 3% while the level among rural students was low."
So don't push the blame on the rural students lah , Syewel !
It is the teachers who were malas to teach in English.
And there are other reasons why some Malay teachers do not use English. Among them are religious reasons because some people believe that speaking English may lead to you 'jadi kristian'. Fulawei, ada bodoh macam ini pun dalamkalangan guru kita kah?
Even in the towns (including Kuala Lumpur ) it is also considered "showing off" if Malay people speak English. So there are other quite illogical reasons why Malay teachers are shy to speak and teach in English. Did he just blame it (and quite wrongly too) on the rural school children. That is not correct.
And even if what Tan Sri Muhyuddin is saying is indeed true, why burden the urban kids and dim their chances at a better future just because the rural kids are having problems with English?
Urban kids are usually the children of parents who are more educated, who work in offices, run businesses and generally earn a higher income and enjoy a better standard of living. The rural folks are usually much poorer than the urban folks.
That is why we have to make sure that the rural folks get the same or better opportunities to get out of the poverty cycle and move up in life so that they too can enjoy a standard of living like the urban people.. A good education and the ability to converse in English is definitely one way up.
But what this policy reversal has done is to lower the entire national average.. Instead of moving the rural people up the ladder, we are now moving moving the urban folks down to the level of the rural people. We are lowering the averages. Hang tak payah jadi pandai macam aku, biar aku jadi bodoh macam hang !
We are nailing the Malays inside the language cocoon. We are also creating a "non English understanding rural poor" versus an "English speaking urban elite" divide. The Malays who cannot speak English will be left further and further behind.  BUT YOU THINK UMNO CARES FOR YOU ????
The English speaking urban folks (Malays, Chinese and Indians) will move light years ahead of the non English speaking folks. There will most definitely be an English speaking elite in the country. Then we have also allowed International Schools in the country to be opened to all Malaysians. We also have foreign universities like Nottingham and Monash. We are basically denying many Malays from qualifying to enter these universities and international schools. They can go to UITM and become more 'cocoon infested' and unemployable.
But very, very few kids make it to university or college in the first place. Only 2% to 3% of the population goes to university anyway. The large bulk of our young kids will become school leavers (SPM or PMR) with no employable skills, no knowledge of "life giving" English. Their future is doomed.
Akhir sekali saya nampak peluang hidup bagi budak Melayu dari kampong menjadi lagi tipis. Siapa yang ada tanah getah, mungkin akan kerja potong getah saja di kampong.
  Kalau tak ada tanah getah, depa akan berhijrah ke Bandar dan pekan untuk mencari kerja sebagai office boy, messenger dan peon. TERIMA KASIH AJELAH KEPADA GOMEN NAJIS !
** They may even think that office boy, messenger and peon are three different careers.

9 comments:

  1. Throughout history as we know it and read in books , politics and religion have been used as supreme Godly coverups to protect certain elites such as you-know-who. Just that you are one of the few who dares to speak the truth ( as you now it )

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  2. I have said it on many occasions that a GOOD KUNG FU Sifu will eventually produce good disciples not the other way round!

    To learn anything good the TOK GURU himself must be the BEST!

    The so called educators today came from a second class group of students themselves who did not and could not master the English Language!

    They were the post MCE/LCE gang! Please remember after 1976 the MCE & LCE exams was no more in existence, it became the SPM/PMR standard!

    So these teachers are also not to be blamed. The good ole teachers that taught MCE/LCE standard are all retired and if not mostly dead!

    Hiring old teachers maybe a solution if they are willing to teach again...getting Mat & Minah Salleh's to come and teach, wow lots of money wasting again..sounds UMNO very much!

    Here now we have half past six Ministers leading and talking cock & bull stories!

    What have we here, just but a bunch of NING KAM PUT's! calling themselves leaders and "Mentelis"!

    Ask them what education they went through? How come they could still speak ENGLISH?

    The generations that have been destroyed can no longer be corrected, it is already HISTORY!

    We are making the wrong moves but UMNO feels that this is the only soultion to stay in power!

    Let the rubber tapper, fisherman and padi planter remain as what they are whilst the UMNO Menteris will send all their kids overseas like NAJIB and gang does to all their kids, send them overseas and come back to have the upper hand and lead this country and become CEO's!

    This is Malaysia Boleh !
    A Melayu killing ALL his fellow MELAYU in broad day light!

    God bless this country...!

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  3. As an ex-English teacher myself, I can think of not one single point to add to this excellent discussion of the issue at hand. To say I cringed when I heard the news announced, is the least of it.

    Just a note on hiring mat salleh to teach English. This is not a new idea; it was done before. Ask those who had them what it was like to be taught by a Scotsman or an Australian, or any one of the others! The children barely understood them, and just giggled when they were spoken to!

    I know of one mat salleh, who was a bum in England, and came here because the money was too good. She wasn't even a trained English teacher. Her major in school had been Biology. Boleh cakap Engrand cukup ke?

    She tried communicating with her students in Kuang (just outside KL) but they just smiled at her. In the end, she'd walk everywhere with her flask of 'coffee' - neat gin - under her arm. It was the only way she could endure her two years here.

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  4. It's chicken and egg situation.

    You started off by saying with this

    "...But what is really sad is that the Malays themselves believe in this, hence there is no way this will ever change. ..."

    How to make them understand when they have been made stupid in the first place?

    Really. There's a lot work to be done. You got to beat the mainstream stream media.

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  5. No Pak, that's not the government's policy to make Malays remain stupid. The big picture of this government's policy is to use Bahasa Melayu to make Malays, Chinese and Indians and all citizen remain STUPID.

    The reason why only the majority stupid is Malays is simple because if all Malays are clever then every Malay is ruler with no Malay to be ruled.

    And the reason why this government wants to make all non-Malays as stupid as the Malays is due to the fact that it is the non-Malays that will make the Malays clever by making the Malays see that they are stupidier than the non-Malays in all aspects.

    While this government has proven that the Malays had been ruling this country by their command of English not by Bahasa Melayu, Chinese, Tamil and other languages other than English, the non-Malays have proven that Bahasa Melayu is the "language of the ruled, not of the ruler".

    In other word, Bahasa Melayu is the language of a Pariah Nation.

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  6. The target is the kampong folks. These are ones you have to educate and bring them to awareness. Why kampong folks? Because they are the majority voters. Urban voters are well controlled. Look at the constituencies populations. The rural outbeat the urban.

    Get into the hearts of the kampong folks. Get them not to follow and fear the UMNO appointed village heads blindly.

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  7. The article might have addressed the issue from the writer's perspective but i do not think it has fully addressed the whole problem. Well, i had a chance to meet up with about 30 headmasters during a trip. Everyone (im not saying most) agreed that the move to Malay language is a good idea for students. Their argument simply says; 'last time the students used to fail only one subject, that was english. Now the students failing 3 subjects'. According to them, the best idea is to change back the system, back to malay but give extra classes for english language. Another problem they addressed was the syllabus, which needs to be changed and the shortage of PROPER english speaking teachers.Thats the crux of the problem. No, do not blame the students entirely. Mahathir's view? Mahathir is not a perfect man. He screwed up quite a few things himself. Like bringing foreign workers to Malaysia. Well, thats another topic. Ho yes, Im one of those kampung boys u mentioned. I was taught in malay from standard 1 to form 5. I do not have a perfect command of english, but its enough to get me a job. How did i learn my English? I went for an intensive course in British Council for 3 months. U see, their syllabus is nothing like ours. They encourage u to learn english, make it fun. We used to watch Mr.Bean and wrote short stories about it. It was so unlike ours, which is tedious and keeps changing whenever there is a new Edu Minister(mayb to give a chance to the NOW related publishing companies to make money). I agree with the current system on taking the back step. The step forward i would like to see is simplifying our syllabus, may be reducing the number of subjects (like back in 1980s) and give more hours to english . That would work. That was the idea given by those headmasters. Ho yes, please do not politicize education. What the minister did was right. Well, Tun did ask for stats, but can he show some stats on how many students really succeeded in getting a job in MNCs just because they were thought science and maths in english? This one for Tun : Address the basic problem Tun, dun take shortcut lagi like you did with foreign labors and foreign investment.(I have not included the others, proton, perwaja,BNM, such n such)

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  8. What the Ministers of Education, past and present have done is, keep the sea, away from the shore. As long as these two elements do not meet, there will never be, a beach. IT'S A VACUM. A Very Effective Role Played By Media, Over the Years.
    There are good and bad education statastics, who knows them. The cotree ministry officials.
    Headmasters get to know by word of mouth and so do the teachers. The film is smoked screen and is kept vague. The headmasters do not want to loose their chairs and position, by rocking the boat. The teachers want to get promoted, why rock the headmaster. They merely nod in consent, when they attend Education Seminars.
    Now the Wolf in the Sheep Skin awakens. When these same headmasters or teachers, happen to be sitting within a group of parents, than you can hear these educationists, at thier elm. Blasting the policy because, the group they are in, is agaist the idea of the Edu Min. policy being changed every tiem and not keeping abreast with world trends.
    The government service does not care for the public. The Government servant is the biggest, Biggot and Hipoctrate in this country. Their interest is to polish the officer, who in turn polishes the Minister and wale their time.
    Yes!!!! Majority of the Government servants have been recruited, from Kampongs and these guys have the highest score for Agama. That is why the Urban Educated officers, are manuplating and masquaerading them with lies and fallacies.
    GOD BLESS MALAYSIA.

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  9. Let me play devil's advocate here. I fully agree with such a government policy. It is essential for the government to keep a section of the population stupid, not just Malays; Chinese, Indians and lain lain as well.

    It is the nature of society where different layers must exist. Imagine a situation where everyone has a good education. What is so bad about it you might ask? Plenty actually.

    Firstly, if everyone has a good education, who will be the ones tapping rubber trees or planting the paddy? Who will be doing the menial jobs in society? More foreign workers?

    Secondly, in the event whereby, the rural folk get smarter and shun the labour intensive jobs in the rural areas, they will move to the towns and cities leading to over-congestion in the urban areas. If everything works out well and good paying jobs are aplenty, this will lead to inflation.

    These are only two points I have raised in a more detailed manner. Others include a smarter society does not bode well for politicians, the potential taking over of the agricultural sector by Big Business leading to more inflation, the rise of 'ghost towns' where urban migration is prevalent and so on.

    The government is doing this for the greater good. Sacrifices must be made; not by the ruling elite but the general population.

    If you buy any of this crap, you are a bigger fool then I am.

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