| the indian community at large worry about temple, tamil schools, housing/land/TOL, govt jobs, IC/birth cert/marriage registration, minimum wage, microcredit loans, harrassment from authorities, free/cheap/reliable medical services, removal of gangs/thugs, removal of samsu shops, and education opportunities.
those in middle class and above have slightly different set of worries. their worries will be on employment, housing, business opportunities, crime rate, toll rate, petrol price, civil rights, migration, transportation problems, local council performance, children education, peace, etc. Form Cabinet task force to aid Indians |
|
|
|
|
Parliamentary Opposition leader Lim Kit Siang today urged the government to establish a Cabinet Task Force to find solutions to end the marginalisation of Indians and other groups in the country.
• Conversion of all partially-aided Tamil primary schools into fully-aided schools • RM500 million allocation to upgrade Tamil primary schools • Stop demolition of Hindu temples and other places of worship nationwide. Lim said his proposal was in view of a 30,000-strong “cry of desperation” by those who attended the Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf) rally on Nov 25. “The Cabinet should end the denial about the marginalisation of Indians in Malaysia and come out with a new policy for a new deal to end the marginalisation of Indians and all marginalised groups in Malaysia,” he added in a statement. Lim stressed that the Cabinet and MIC president S Samy Vellu cannot deny that Indians have been marginalised over the last three decades. As an example, he pointed out that before the New Economic Policy was implemented in 1971, the civil service comprised of 17.4 percent Indians. This figure shrank to 5.12 percent in 2005. MIC's 'disservice' Meanwhile, Lim also accused MIC of doing a “disservice” by not properly informing Abdullah about the plight of the Indian community.
“For decades, the Indians have been marginalised politically, economically, socially, educationally, culturally and religiously, reducing them into a new underclass,” he said. Lim said these were the reasons why 30,000 Indians from all over the country rallied behind Hindraf. However, he disagreed with Hindraf’s claim that the Indians are victims of a state-sanctioned ethnic cleansing. |
He said the task force should be headed by Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and should focus on: 
“Abdullah said he has ‘big ears’ and is prepared to hear the truth. It is shocking that nobody in the MIC leadership… is prepared and has the courage to tell the prime minister the truth.