poobalan.com

From NST:

…Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak said the matriculation centres were important as they gave a chance to Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) holders, particularly Bumiputera students, to secure a place in public universities….Before the matriculation programme was introduced in the 1980s, Bumiputera students who excelled in their studies found it difficult to enrol at public universities due to the limited places.

“Some of them were also stuck at the STPM (Sijil Tinggi Persekolahan Malaysia) level and could not further their studies,…

…Najib said the matriculation programme had reduced the gap between the intake of Bumiputera and non-Bumiputera students. “It has helped to increase the number of Bumiputera students in public higher learning institutions, particularly in courses such as medicine, dentistry, architecture, accounting and management.”

Najib said the matriculation programme was also open to non-Bumiputera students, who had been allocated 10 per cent of the available places.

Well, that’s the funny thing. STPM is considered tough and a hurdle, thus matriculation was introduced. What does that imply?

Thus Malay (or is bumiputera?) SPM leavers took a separate route to public universities, to enrol in bachelor degree programs. Also, 10 percent of the places are allocated to other Malaysians (this was done recently - about 5 years ago, I think).

Every year, there will complaints and unhappiness over matriculation students intake versus STPM students intake, comparison of syllabus, and also performance of both sets of students in public universities.

Four more matriculation colleges will be completed by 2010, in addition to the existing nine, bringing the number of available places to more than 40,000. Not only this policy is to remain, but its to be developed further! When would the discrimination end?

This discrimination is also one of the things that segregates the public. After 10 years, is such discriminative policy still needed? We have ample public universities, and we have poor students from all walks of life.  Steps should be taken to remove such restrictions. For example, we can replace matriculation syllabus with STPM while maintaining the ratio. This will ensure a fair entrance for all universtity students. Or we can increase the ratio from 10 percent to 20 percent, until in future it becomes an open entrance.

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I still remember those days Lebuh Ampang was a beehive of local Indian community. Now its becoming a meeting place for foreign workers. Areas around Masjid Jamek has been hijacked and turned in Ramadan Bazaar few years back. When Hari Raya and Deepavali came in the same month (happens every 30 odd years once and 3 years in a row) few years back, the Deepavali traders were relocated to Brickfields. At that time, there were some commotion and problems, but of course we have no say, and had to move to Brickfields area.

So, now Brickfields is planned (is it in KL 2020 City plan?) to be Little India. Good for them. Another “WILL” which will take ages to materialise, if at all it does.

Najib also supported the proposal to develop Brickfields into a “Little India”.

“Brickfields is a unique place because it is a microcosm of the Indian community,” he said, adding that in the past the Government had acquired three pieces of land in the area from Tenaga Nasional Bhd to erect Hindu temples.

“We will continue to develop this area. It is important for us to be one,” he said.

Earlier, Federal Territories Minister Datuk Seri Zulhasnan Rafique said Brickfields had a 100-year history and suggested that it should be developed into a Little India like those in Vancouver, London and Paris.

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The wheels are in motion. Hindraf has been banned. MIC announces it welcomes HINDRAF members to join MIC. Now a task force WILL (can you remember how many WILLs have been said and its status now?) set up to look into problems of Indians without proper identification. Deputy PM Najib announced this. Actually a task force was set up for Sabah last week (WAS!) to settle similar problem faced by Sabahans.

The Government will set up a task force to look into the problems faced by Indians born in Malaysia who have no birth certificates and identity cards, said Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak.

The Deputy Prime Minister said there were 20,000 to 30,000 Malaysian Indians who had no documentation and that he had raised the issue at last week’s Cabinet meeting.

“Malaysians born in this country must be given ICs and birth certificates. We have decided that the Home Ministry will set up a special task force to provide genuine citizens with proper documents,” he said Thursday in his speech at the Bazaar Deepavali in Brickfields.

He stressed that this applied to only Malaysians of Indian origin born here, and not those who came from India for work or other purposes.

Can anyone venture a guess why this is announced now? Surely this is not a new problem that fell from the sky. So what changed? Is it due publicity of such cases in the media? Is it due to MIC? Is it due to BN’s rebranding? Or is due to the “H” word? Is it mere coincidence? Is it due to change of political climate?

For many years, MIC Youth has been trying to solve this problem. T Mohan said they could only solve few cases at one time and the success rate was low. So, what changed?

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