KUCHING: The unity federal government could emulate Sarawak’s move in recognising the Unified Examination Certificate (UEC) as well as providing sizable funding annually to independent Chinese secondary schools and aided Chinese primary schools (SJK Chung Hua).
Datuk Jonathan Chai, president of the Association of the Boards of Management of Aided Primary Schools in Kuching, Samarahan and Serian said the government could recognise UEC with a condition of having a credit in Bahasa Melayu (BM) in Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM).
As such, it signifies that the status and importance of BM is not compromised and this is also the version adopted by the Sarawak government.
“The country will only flourish and excel if the government develops and looks at education purely from the perspective of education, casting aside all racial and religious elements,” he said.
Speaking to New Sarawak Tribune recently, Chai said the issue of recognising UEC, is a “political landmine” every government has been trying to avoid, following Education Minister Fadhlina Sidek’s recent statement that the ministry had no plans to recognise the UEC.
This was despite it being among the key pledges in Pakatan Harapan’s manifesto for the 15th general election (GE15).
Chai said this is especially under the prevailing political climate when many supposedly “straightforward” issues are being politicised by certain irresponsible individuals and turned into racial and religious slurs to create untoward tensions within the community.
“Still, time after time, some politicians and political parties have capitalised on the issue to gain political mileage because perceptions vary from individuals and ethnic groups and there is always room for manipulation and even to create misconceptions and misunderstandings against our multiracial setting,” he said.
On March 15, the Education Minister also said that the government has never received any reports from the task force responsible for submitting a review to recognise the UEC.
Fadhlina said the task force was supposed to submit the report to the ministry within a three to six-month period starting November 2018 and that the period had been extended six times from the initial period until Feb 28, 2020.
She said the final report on the research was not submitted by the task force even until the final date.
However, Chai said even though there had been delay in compiling the report, this should not be an excuse for not accepting the report as voluminous findings and useful feedback were gathered from various organisations and stakeholders in the process and substantial time and efforts were taken.
“In fact, I, together with other leaders of Chinese education from Sarawak have also flown to KL to give our opinions on the matter to the panel more than a couple of years ago.
“Looking at how the authority (or the Education Minister) dealt with the report, I don’t think the report would have any bearing or impact on whether the government would recognise UEC eventually and frankly, I think it’s a mere delaying tactic to buy time,” he said.
Realistically speaking, Chai felt that the current government is not stable enough to deal with such a sensitive issue at this juncture and for the sake of political stability.
“I personally think that we could wait for a little longer to give way for the government to deal first with the other more pressing problems like reviving our economy and tackling the inflation,” he said.
Having said that, he said, it is also sad to see that some politicians are trying to politicise the issue and stir up the racial sentiment over the recognition of UEC without really understanding the academic standards accorded to UEC and also the implications of keeping the talents by recognising UEC.
“It will take lots of courage and strong political will if our leaders in Putrajaya were to take the matter seriously by making a landmark decision to recognise UEC in future,” he added.
Sarawak has recognised the UEC since 2014, allowing holders of the certificate to work in the state civil service and apply for scholarships from Yayasan Sarawak and for entry into the state-owned University of Technology Sarawak.
Apart from that, the Sarawak government also has been granting annual allocations to the 14 Chinese independent secondary schools in the state since 2014 such annual grants started off with RM3 million in 2014 and increased by RM1 million every year.
Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Fadillah Yusof has meanwhile assured that he would find out the reasons or rationale behind the Ministry’s decision not to recognise UEC.
The Petra Jaya MP also said that he would share with Fadhlina on the Sarawak government’s approach in recognising the certificate and believed that there is still room for negotiation on the matter.
According to Fadillah, the previous Pakatan Harapan government had decided to recognise the UEC on condition that the management of the independent Chinese secondary schools accepted the national education syllabus such as History subject.
