Although the Deputy Prime Minister and Education Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin claims that Malaysia has the best education system in the world, better than Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States, international educational tests like PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) and TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study) have consistently shown that Malaysia’s 15-year-old students are not only below the international average in the three critical subjects of reading, science and maths but four or even five years behind their peers in the top-performing countries/regions in Shanghai, Singapore, South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Japan.
But it is fortunate that the 35 Cabinet Ministers did not represent the country in these PISA and TIMSS tests or Malaysia would be ten or even more years behind other countries.
This is because the Cabinet today has created history and a record of sorts, demonstrating that the 35 Ministers in the Najib Cabinet 2015 have comprehension problems worse than ordinary school children who are already several years behind other countries.
This is because even the average school children would not have made the colossal error committed by the 35 Ministers today in concluding that the call by the Minister for Agriculture and Agro-based Industry, Datuk Ismail Sabri Yaakob to Malay consumers to boycott Chinese businesses was not targetting Chinese traders alone but aimed at all traders.
After the Cabinet meeeting, the police today called up Ismail Sabri for investigation over his racist call on his Facebook to Malay consumers to boycott Chinese business, which prompted my tweet: “Sheer rigmarole when PMO has cleared Ismail Sabri”.
This has only made the police, the overwhelming majority of whom are dedicated and professional officers committed to the duty to maintain peace and uphold law and order, look very foolish.
On Monday, when Ismail went overboard with his racist fulminations on his Facebook calling on Malay consumers to boycott Chinese business, I had occasion to ask the Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar whether his twitter account had broken down or whether Bukit Aman had suffered a breakdown of Internet access, as he had been strangely quiet for several hours on his twitter account.
One of Khalid’s trademarks as IGP is to immediately take to the twitter to direct his police officers to investigate political or civic society leader (but not from Barisan Nasional) for any infringement of the law in their statements or speeches, and I myself was such a victim, when the IGP twittered that the police would investigate me under the Sedition Act for saying on the fifth anniversary of the death of Teoh Beng Hock that his killers have yet to be brought to book as Beng Hock did not commit suicide by jumping off the 14th floor of MACC in Shah Alam on July 16, 2009.
It was a few hours after my tweet that Khalid took to the twitter to say Ismail would be investigated, but all this was only for show, full of light and thunder but meaning nothing.
The Cabinet meeting today is the most disgraceful in the nation’s history as the Cabinet Ministers just fell short of former UMNO youth leaders who gathered yesterday with the “I am Ismail Sabri” placard endorsement.
It shows that the 35 Ministers are incapable of taking a stand on the Great Rights and Wrongs in the country.
Malaysians, regardless of race, religion, region, gender or age will have to pass judgment on the quality and character of the 35 Cabinet Ministers, for no Malaysian has brought more shame and disgrace to the country’s international reputation and standing than the Cabinet Ministers themselves since the start of the new year.
(Speech at the DAP Sarikei Dinner in Sarikei on Wednesday, February 4, 2015 at 9 pm)
The other day while surfing the Youtube, I came across a programme where the Head of UNESCO was interviewed. He had been an education planner from India and he gave a very candid view of his experiences of India as well as China in education [being located in Beijing now] It is obvious that China has been able to move faster than many countries which were given a much earlier opportunity to progress; including India, but failed to do so. It will do a lot of good for our Education Ministers and their Deputies to listen to his view. We have had spent too much time politicizing the business of education; generally merely wanting to make a quick buck in proclaiming to make Malaysia an education hub! In fact, based on most if not all those projects, we have been merely paying lip service just to satisfy our ego. The pronouncement on errant traders, deliberately twisted on racial line just indicated how desperate some of our ministers are. Even today, many educational leaders around the world are looking at improvements to the next round of PISA; while we have the audacity to claim that we are on the top of the world education parade! And to those very hard working Malaysian students, we can only conclude that they had done so IN SPITE of the obstacles they faced in the local school education. To-day, even countries in Africa have risen to question their governments on education but we still hide our heads in the muddy water!
SHAME! SHAME ! SHAME ! Malaysia’s cabinet is a disgrace for the whole world to see. They are the thieves of integrity! No morals; no pride; only a pack of thieves!!
You must understand, you cannot whip the V.I.P. prince; you must whack his close frriend (“the whipping boy”), Sorry lah!
Some fellows stand on their hands so as not to dirty their shoes, and you are not suppose to laugh at them!
Umno, despite possessing the special expertise in making U-turns, in this case resorted to making distortion which in effect amounts to concoction.
Our 35 Cabinet Ministers hv intelligence far different fr that of rakyat
This is d reason Y d nation is in dis state