©New
Sunday Times (Used by permission)
by Tunku Abdul Aziz
IT never fails to amuse me to see our reaction to international surveys in which
Malaysia is included among countries that are put under a microscope and
examined in detail for purposes of comparison on a range of social, economic and
political issues.
We waste little time in discrediting those who show us in
unfavourable light, and on the very rare occasion when we are praised for
achieving something against the best in the world, we literally go over the top.
We tend to behave as an insecure child would who simply could not come to terms
with reality –– a forgivable failing in an immature person, but the same traits
underpinning our national behaviour and psyche suggest a disturbing character
defect.
Let us confine ourselves to two international surveys that make the greatest
emotional impact on us, the Transparency International Corruption Perceptions
Index (TICPI) and the Times Higher Education Supplement–Quacquar elli Symonds (THES–QS)
World University Rankings.
In the case of the TICPI, which first came out in 1995, showing Malaysia at
roughly the half–way mark but well below Singapore, the reaction to begin with
was unexpectedly hostile.
Then prime minister Datuk Seri Dr Mahathir Mohamad was quick to dismiss the
findings as a Western ploy to belittle our achievements.
The promoters of Transparency International Malaysia found themselves in a
frightfully difficult position with the former prime minister firing a salvo, so
early in the day, across the bows of the good ship "Transparency".
We were upset and humiliated by the repeated accusations made by our powerful
detractors that we were part of a foreign conspiracy to blacken Malaysia's
image.
When they realised that the TICPI was an important barometer of governance and
was developing into the most authoritative single measure of comparative
international corruption, with implications for foreign investment, their tune
changed a little.
If the revelations now in the public domain are to be believed, then there is
absolutely no room for complacency.
The THES–QS ranking of world universities has done its worst to the pride and
fortunes of our self–proclaimed "world class" institutions of higher learning.
It has, in one fell swoop, destroyed the myth of intellectual excellence of our
universities.
Some vice–chancellors have taken the strictures in their stride, while the
others who have thrived on, and made a virtue of mediocrity, have not been slow
to question the validity of the methodology employed.
Some outstanding work is being done in many of our universities and they should
continue to address internal weaknesses so that they will, in time, achieve
academic excellence that has so far eluded them.
Learn from the surveys but do not become obsessed with rankings. We must first
strengthen the foundation of our higher education through policies that
encourage rather than control and regulate.
Excessive controls stifle new ideas and initiatives, and it is difficult for
vice–chancellors to operate effectively in a highly regulated bureaucratic
environment.
Today, the truly great universities of the West owe their outstanding
contributions to knowledge in several important areas of human endeavour to the
freedom of action they have enjoyed, to develop educational excellence without
let or hindrance.
Politicians should not intrude into areas they least understand and in this way,
they can hold universities accountable for results.
From my conversations with some of the more astute vice–chancellors, I have
gained the impression that they would greatly welcome being left to their own
devices to get on with their work on a day–to–day basis. It is a fair request.
There are today, 20 public universities and 15 university colleges in the
country. But as we all know, bricks and mortar do not a university make:
outstanding teachers attract outstanding students, and in combination with a
dose of intellectual freedom, they form the ingredients for an ideas–challenged
community of scholars.
The notion that having a doctorate is all that is required of a university
teacher is one of the reasons why our standards are dismally low.
The output in terms of research publications in international journals of some
of our university teachers is abysmally low even by Southeast Asian standards,
so I am told.
Our future as a small nation, naturally not counting some two million Indonesian
cousins in our midst, depends for the most part on our ability to compete with
the best.
I cannot believe that we can be competitive globally unless we are prepared to
recant our stand made more than three decades ago against the use of English as
the language of instruction in our national schools.
That policy has crippled our competitive position and Singapore stands as a
shining example of practical and sensible pragmatism. And haven't they reaped
enormous benefits from keeping standards high?
Displacing English in the name of nationalism has put this country back at least
50 years.
The unintended victims are the Malays who can find reasonable employment only in
government agencies. With an English education, they do not need crutches to
make their way in the world.
Before I am accused of being a cultural renegade, or worse, let me say that I am
not suggesting that English should replace Bahasa Malaysia as our national
language. It is the language of the whole of the Malay world; it is our unifying
language.
I know about the argument that is being trotted out by warriors of Bahasa
Malaysia that China and Japan do not need English to achieve global economic
power. We are neither China nor Japan.
We must not forget that they are both homogenous societies with a very long
tradition of respect for scholarship and learning.
They have a great capacity to absorb scientific and technical knowledge and have
enormous resources for translating every book on every conceivable subject into
their languages. Their strengths differ from ours and so are their social,
economic and political imperatives.
Let us, as we become increasingly immersed in the globalised economy, think in
global terms so that we may meet squarely the future challenges that are bound
to come our way.
We can only do this by empowering our people to equip themselves with the
language of world trade and communication.
Make English the language of instruction, Bahasa Malaysia and Mandarin
compulsory languages, and Tamil a school subject where there is sufficient
demand for it.
This change in our education strategy would bring enormous benefits to our young
people of all races, particularly the rural Malays, whose only opportunity for
engagement with the enlightened and exciting world of knowledge is by acquiring
proficiency in English, which is denied them.
Our universities would be transformed and would attract international faculty
members and students. We would set our students free from the intellectual
constraints, incestuousness and inbreeding that unfortunately characterise the
Malaysian campus environment.
A change of this magnitude requires of our leadership moral and intellectual
courage of the highest order, but this will make a dramatic difference to the
way we compete for opportunities: for the Malays, doing without the reliance on
government largesse for basic survival would make them a more confident people.
On reflection, if I had been born in a kampung where education was limited to
reading, writing and arithmetic, I would be still ploughing with a water buffalo
in a padi field instead of annoying a lot of people with my opinion column in
English.
And if you, my readers, had not been exposed to the English language, you would
be spared the pain of reading all this. Worth thinking about.
The writer is a former president of Transparency International Malaysia
and a former special adviser to the United Nations Secretary–General on Ethics.
He can be contacted at [email protected]