Posted by: mdnorhafiz

Many of my friends (especially from Malays) raise their eyebrows when I stress on the goodness of teaching of Science and Mathematics - with some even calling me a Melayu London which means I have forgotten my roots.

Frankly, I'm proud to speak Bahasa, even prouder when I read the news in The Star last week about a Chinese girl (from China) who studies Bahasa literature here.

But hold on guys, please think out of the box and do not let anger and emotion rule your senses and intelligence.

Yes, I know that Bahasa is spoken by millions of people stretching from Nusantara to South Africa, and even in Arabic countries (for Malaysian Muslims who do pilgrimage to Makkah and Madinah will be surprised that a majority of traders there can speak Bahasa fluently). And to my astonishment, I met two Sri Lankans overseas - on separate ocassions last year - who can converse in Bahasa (this apparently happens due to the migration of their Malay descendants during the Colonial British era).

Millions of Bangladeshi, Indians, Nepalese, Pakistanis, Burmese and Philippinos who seek their fortunes in Malaysia assimilate Bahasa into their daily lives.

All of them speak Bahasa - albeit slightly different styles due to different geographical locations (even English is slightly different in the US, UK and Australia).

But when it come to Science and Mathematics, I'm totally supportive that these subjects be taught in English.

I would also like our Ministry of Education to extend it to other subjects as well - especially Prinsip Akaun (Principles of Accounting) and Ekonomi Asas (Economics).

No matter how hard it is, we have to admit that English is widely used as a medium of knowledge. References (be it books or on the internet) are written in English.

The terms or jargons in Mathematics and Sciences subject (even in Prinsip Akaun and Ekonomi Asas) are widely qouted in English - which if directly translated to Bahasa will lead to confusion when our children go for further studies for those subjects at universities.

Please look at the history of the early days of Muslim empire, the great Muslim scholars dug deep into ancient greek manuscripts to learn about fundamentals science, economics, philosophy, politics, arts and mathematics.

At its peak, western great scholars scoured great libraries in Muslim empire cities (like Baghdad) and learnt those subjects in Arabic.

When the Reinassance began, those western scholars brought the knowledge back to Europe and stored it mostly in Latin - after which English slowly gained its strength as a medium of knowledge until this day.

So, when was the era of Bahasa glory? We can say it during Malaccan Sultanate era when traders all over the world used Malay as lingua franca at every port city in Nusantara. Yet, Bahasa lost its shine when the Sultanate fell and never could regain its status (here, we can conclude that economic strength plays a vital role in glorifying a language).

For so called "pejuang bahasa" (especially to those who demonstrated last week), take the time to go to bookstores all over in our country. Most of the books are written in English. Bahasa books are relegated to religion shelves. If you are fortunate enough, you might find just a handful of books in economics, sciences, finance, literature, motivation, politics and philosophy written in Bahasa.

For our Sasterawan Negara, Datuk A. Samad Said, I'm really proud of his fight for Bahasa and its literature. But if he were to go to any bookstore today, the Bahasa contemporary novels sections are filled with rubbished teenage romance stories (which carry no philosophy nor artistic that can educate Malaysians).

There is nothing wrong with the policy to teach Science and Mathematics in English, but we should blame those responsible for the lousy implementation of the policy.

I feel the Ministry of Education rushed to implement the policy when they received the suggestion from our former Prime Minister, Tun Dr Mahathir - without any consideration (the example of "yes boss" culture in our government today).

Did we have enough competent teachers to teach the children in English at that time?

The answer is no.

No adequate training was provided to the teachers nor were there enough quality reference books.

To make matters worse, not many parents were able to understand English very well - especially in the rural areas.

No extra or special assistance was given to them. In the end, our children became the victims and their fortunes were left hanging.

I do hope the Ministry of Education, together with the Parent Teacher Association could work together to enhance the policy. With more people involved, more ideas can be shared. To abolish the policy is totally backward.

No Bahasa, no Mandarin and no Tamil, please. -The Star/ANN