A Malay educationist has slammed the government for allowing non-Malays into Mara Junior Science Colleges (MRSM) and the matriculation programme for university admission.

Educationist Zainal Abidin Wahid, a co-founder and former professor at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, said the opening of these two Malay 'reserves' was not right at the moment as the Malays still lag behind the Chinese and Indians in tertiary education.

He described the government's decision as regrettable and said the Umno leaders were being "very generous" in allotting a 10 percent quota to non-Malays when they did not have a reason for doing so.

"They are opening the door when other people have yet to knock it," he told the audience of about 50 people attending the education dialogue on issues and challenges facing Malay students at UKM on Sunday.

He also described the non-Malay political leaders and others who have resisted a reciprocal quota for Malays in private institutions of higher learning but have demanded for more non-Malay places in exclusively Malay educational domain as "the act of extremists".

The one-day dialogue, organised by the Federation of Peninsular Malay Students Association (GPMS), was attended by more than 20 Malay-based non-governmental organisations (NGOs), academicians, student leaders and individuals.

It was held to discuss the issues challenging the Malays in education, particularly the '10 percent quota', and the introduction of English as the medium of instruction for science and mathematics.

Zainal Abidin said the Umno leaders' rationale that the opening of these two institutions would lead to greater national integration was also off the mark.

"In 1969, there were students from every ethnic group in English-medium schools, but it failed to stop the May 13 tragedy," he said.

He claimed the May 13, 1969 racial clashes were partly due to Malay unhappiness over the language and education issues.

Social implication

He warned that the imbalance in racial representation at tertiary level could lead to serious social implication if the matter was not handled properly.

"The Prime Minister (Dr Mahathir Mohamad) himself admitted that currently there are only 25 percent Malay students at tertiary level, if all Malaysian students at public and private universities, and overseas, are taken into account," he said.

"In addition, Malay students are also facing difficulties in getting jobs, partly due to non-Malay employers' tendency to employ staff from their own ethnic group," he added.

"Even if Malaysia achieves developed country status in 2020, probably there will be only 25 percent Malay professionals, if the current trend in higher education continues," he said.

This, he said, could lead to unwanted social consequences. "Malaysia is waiting for a volcanic mountain to erupt," he warned.

He said the government must view the language issue as an important matter and be firm in its stand on the use of the national language at the private institutions of higher learning.

"It is awkward to have English as the medium at the highest level in education (which is a current practice in most universities) for a country whose national language is not English," he said.

English preferred

He said it was common knowledge that international companies prefer English educated employees which put Malay-educated students (from public universities) at a disadvantage.

He pointed out that 93.3 percent of unemployed graduates now are Malays.

"To blame them for studying arts and religion, and thus being uncompetitive for jobs is not true. This country is run by no less than 75 percent of those who studied arts, religion or economics, yet we are now very well-respected and are even regarded as a leader of developing nations.

"If our government servants are incompetent, how could they take Malaysia to where it is today," he said.

Zainal Abidin said those who are demanding for equal rights — as well as those who want to let go of the Malay rights — should look back in history as former leaders have already "settled the matter".

"Our policy makers must remember that many points of disagreement had been resolved with the "give and take" attitude and had been agreed upon way back in 1955 and 1957, and thus, should not be brought up again," he said.

Price to pay

He reminded that the Perikatan (Alliance) leaders (Umno, MCA and MIC) agreed to the Malay privileges "as a price that the non-Malays have to pay in order to form a multi-racial government".

"At that time, the Malays (or Umno) could have formed a Malay government on their own through democracy because the non-Malays only have majority in two out of 52 parliamentary seats," he said.

However, he said that the Malay leaders then, led by Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra, had agreed to allocate 17 seats (or 750 percent more) to their non-Malay counterparts so that a "Malayan government" could be formed, instead of the "Malay government".

In addition, he said that Umno-led government had also agreed to open citizenship to non-Malays in Malaysia for a one-year period, beginning August 31, 1957.

"That resulted in almost one million non-Malays, who mostly did not speak a word of Bahasa Malaysia or English, being given Malayan citizenship," he said.

Citizenship

Zainal Abidin continued that Umno-led government has also been very generous in granting citizenship by applying the Jus Soli principle, where one is granted with automatic citizenship upon birth.

In contrast, he said that countries like China and Taiwan were then practising the Jus Sanguinis principle, where one has to have "enough blood" similar to that of people in those country in order to get citizenship.

"If people from other races stay in China even for 100 years, they will not be granted with citizenship because they do not have enough Chinese blood," he said.

Zainal Abidin said he was bringing up this matter again as he wanted the non-Malays to be thankful "that the Malays did not chose to be the king in their own country".

Thus, he said, it is very important for the government to ensure that at least 55 percent of the Malaysians who have access to tertiary education are the Malays in order to avoid a social imbalance which can lead to a destructive future.

"It is very sad that the (Umno-led) government so easily open MRSM and matriculation to non-Malays, without getting the same from the private institutions of higher," said Zainal Abidin.