First published in The New Straits Times on 3rd June 2009.

EDUCATION in Malaysia is a spectator sport. We set Olympian targets for our children and they have no choice but to compete. Like the international sports meet, our education system is highly politicised, too.

Like the athletes, we indulge our children with years of intensive training via tuition, extra classes, on-line portals and supplementary books, priming them for examinations.

A small number excel, many do well enough, and some do okay. Every year, we get all excited by the over-achievers and lap up the drama of the fisherman's daughter or fishball noodle seller's son who did well against the odds.

It is always with the small number that did exceptionally well that our problems begin. What do we do with these precious resources of ours?

Like clockwork, at this time of the year, the drama starts. Parents and students cry foul, and every politician worth his gasbag will be on the case of the manual labourer's kid who scored 15As but has nowhere to go. It is easy to get all emotionally riled up, of course.
It can either be about Public Service Department scholarships or places in the medical faculties, but many point to inefficient bureaucracy, or a not-so-brilliant system.

But the subtext of the complaints, be they in the guise of calls for transparency or meritocracy, is that non-Bumiputera students are being victimised, denied scholarships or places, to accommodate less qualified Bumiputeras.

There is a touch of racism in the manner in which the insinuations are made, that surely the Bumiputeras are never good enough to get anywhere on their own steam. Even the screw-up at Universiti Sains Malaysia is also seen by some as such an attempt to deny some students places that are rightfully theirs.

The 2,000 PSD scholarships reserved for the top scorers are getting all the attention now because many are not getting them. There is a quota that follows the population breakdown with 60 per cent of the scholarships reserved for Bumiputeras.

In letters to newspapers, rants by politicians and parents, there are insinuations that if not for the quota, more non-Bumiputeras would have gotten the scholarships. That may be so, but take the number of straight As students, which is close to 5,000 every year. Could there not be 1,200 (or just over 20 per cent) Bumiputeras among the high achievers ?

What if, as suggested by some, that if indeed the quota system were to be scrapped, based on their rankings, Bumiputera students could have been awarded as many as 1,500 scholarships, instead. The quota may have in fact denied some of them.

The irony is that there are thousands more scholarships meant for studies at domestic universities but not much noise is made of these.

It has been suggested that almost half of the nation's high achievers tend to aspire for careers in the medical fields. Taking the number of top scorers as a guide, it would be over 2,000 aspirants. Very few countries in the world, including developed nations, have the facilities to admit such a high number of medical students in a year.

Even if one were to deny Bumiputera students altogether from being considered, there would still be non-Malay students who would be denied entry into medical faculties, no matter how many As they get or how unprivileged their backgrounds may be.

I believe we must be better at explaining things and not let our failure to do so make cracks out of fissures.

On another education-related issue, I think that the attempt at democratisation is great, but what else that can be said that has not been said about the number of subjects a 17-year-old should sit for. I am not sure if we will get any great ideas, though I believe the exercise can reveal the extent of how the people feel.

I have always believed 10 subjects is sensible, if not already a lot. As the number of subjects increases, we are surely moving to the ridiculous. If parents insist, they should be made to sit for the papers, too.

The culture of excellence must be one of the factors for the dozen or more subjects taken, but we have taken excellence to an absurd level.

The survival instinct also figures in our decision-making; more subjects mean a better chance of scholarships, etc. I would suggest that if the students insist on taking more subjects, they be allowed to do so. The government, on the other hand, should only recognise 10 subjects when evaluating a candidate for a place in the university or a scholarship. The rest is gravy for gloating.

I also believe the government should stop sponsoring our high- achieving 17-year-olds for studies abroad. They should instead be sent to local universities. We are sending mixed signals; while we want to elevate the status of our universities, we are at the same time denying them some of the nation's best brains.

Perhaps scholarships should be awarded for post-graduate studies or, as many have suggested, tied to those in public service, such as security, health and teaching personnel. This will put the value of the scholarships to beyond As.

First published in The New Straits Times on 6th May 2009.

SOME folks want to colour code us. There has been talk that people have been asked to gather in Ipoh and wear black for the much-awaited sitting of the state assembly tomorrow.

Just like in neighbouring countries, some want our political activism to be reflected by the shirts we wear.

I am not sure why the colour black was chosen. Ideally, primary colours are preferred, of course, but black is cool, too. But it can be also ominous and threatening. Or are they in mourning?

During the reformasi days in the late 1990s, it was red, copying the Indonesian political activism then that chose the colour as a rallying cry against their government.

Similarly, the Bersih de-monstration chose yellow after the Thai pro-monarch groups.
During the protest march against the use of English for the teaching of Mathematics and Science, the colour of choice was white. It must have cost a lot of money to have all those shirts made.

Apart from the obvious problems brought about by the demonstrations, one would ask what purpose is served by such gatherings.

I hope it is just a show of collective displeasure in the political developments in the state and nothing more than that.

I am rather agnostic about the desire to express anger and dissent by demonstration. As much as I think it is a waste of time -- the ballot boxes after all await us sooner or later -- I also believe people should be allowed to gather peacefully if they want to.

I subscribe to the idea that some discomfort may be the price to pay for the greater good, just like income tax.

Nevertheless, there will be some people who may perennially be spoiling for trouble. They are the ones likely to push the limits and bait law enforcers. They are essentially troublemakers easily swayed, or used, by savvy politicians who know which of their buttons to push and chains to yank.

One or two key figures have been the constants in all these colourful expression of dissent, though they are seldom in the forefront. They would inevitably, and predictably, be calling for attention after the fact, decrying the treatment some of the demonstrators would receive from the authorities.

But beyond the collective angst that the gathering hopes to display, what else do our black-shirted fellow citizens hope to attain from their mass show of force?

I believe everyone knows the score in Perak. The lines are very clearly drawn. You are either supportive of the Barisan Nasional government or the previous administration.

Do the demonstrators think that by taking to the streets they would change things?

If indeed that is what they are thinking, ala Thailand or the Philippines' people's power, then they are promoting anarchy.

I do not believe, as much as we are divided by our politics and our sense of justice or injustice, we would want anarchy where mobs rule.

Where does it end? There has to be a line drawn somewhere. Sanity must prevail at some point. Someone must say enough is enough.

Do we go on and on, squeezing every single drop of hope from the people, just because we have politicians who believe their sole reason for being is to politicise.

If indeed Pakatan Rakyat feels that they were cheated of the government or that the palace had wrongly awarded the Perak state government to Barisan Nasional, then it should, as it had done, gone to the courts and await judgment.

But do they take to the streets if the courts decide against them, that the courts are wrong, corrupt and working at the behest of the BN?

What if someone were to mobilise a show of strength and got a bunch of people to wear green and show that there are much more of them than tomorrow's crowd?

Do we continue with this ding dong battle till our ears bleed?

This is where things will get complicated. Once suspicion is planted, respect for our institutions systematically destroyed and anarchy promoted, it will be hard to have a semblance of order back. We shall reap what we sow.

First published in The New Straits Times on 29th April 2009.

IT is presumptuous of me, but I suspect that the opposition may have better luck in Parliament now than before.

The operative words are "better luck" and not necessarily something the opposition can take to the bank.

Nevertheless, their chances of influencing proceedings in Parliament are now technically better.

While the number of elected Barisan Nasional members of parliament remains somewhat the same as last year, I suspect that the major mid-term cabinet reshuffle, following Datuk Seri Najib Razak's appointment as prime minister, will effectively reduce the number of active backbenchers.

Currently, BN has 140 MPs, while the opposition has 82.
Of the BN elected representatives, 29 are ministers, 33 deputy ministers, and two deputy speakers. This means BN has 76 backbenchers, and toe-to-toe they are six fewer than the number of opposition MPs.

Now, consider the fact that of the 76 backbenchers, at least 15 are ex-cabinet members, including a former prime minister, a former finance minister, a former international trade and industry minister and a former home minister.

They include Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, Tengku Tan Sri Razaleigh Hamzah, Tan Sri Rafidah Aziz, Datuk Seri Syed Hamid Albar, Datuk Seri Ong Ka Ting, Datuk Seri Jamaludin Jarjis, Datuk Seri Fong Chan Ong, and Datuk Shahrir Samad.

In theory, such a formidable line-up supporting the frontbenchers is great. But would they be regular faces in Parliament?

I don't wish to prejudge them. Nevertheless, I do not see most of the veteran MPs and former cabinet members attending parliamentary sittings as regularly and diligently as, say, a first-term MP or those from the opposition.

As it is, senior members of parliament and former cabinet members rarely attend sittings, unless, of course, it's a major event -- like the opening of a session or the tabling of an important bill such as the annual budget.

Some suggest that their absence is largely because they do not want to loom large over their successors, who would be at the frontline promoting and defending government policies. Nor would they want to be in the house to see their policies changed or criticised.

Also, it has been suggested that former cabinet members do not want to offer the opposition the opportunity to revisit their decisions in their respective ministries.

Say, if 10 of the former cabinet members were to be absent most of the time, then BN backbenchers would be 66-strong, and assuming the normal number of absentees due to MPs needing to be somewhere else, then the backbenchers' strength could be further depleted.

Such a situation could prove advantageous to the opposition, especially if experienced government MPs stayed away, and cabinet members and their deputies were bogged down with commitments and travel.

There is the likelihood there would likely be more opposition members present than government representatives during sessions.

In terms of experience, perennial opposition members such as Lim Kit Siang and Karpal Singh are seasoned representatives who are likely to be the first to sign in every morning, marshal their attacks and fire salvos across the aisle.

Together with opposition leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, who is also someone with considerable parliamentary experience, they could likely dominate proceedings, simply by virtue of their being wily and by their understanding of the house's rules and regulations.

Expect, too, a lot of baiting and ideological battles.

There are, of course, members of the frontbenches and, in fact, the backbench who are more than able to match them, but those in the government are unlikely to be at sittings daily.

The government whips, presumably, are expected to have more to do, especially in making sure MPs attend sittings, particularly when voting on motions are to take place.

The government was almost caught once before, in the previous sitting, when its MPs were not in the house in numbers greater than that of the opposition.

Ironically, while we are seeing the strongest government backbench ever in terms of experience and knowledge, we might also see a weak one if many of them do not make regular appearances in parliamentary sittings.

First published in The New Straits Times on 22nd April 2009.

DEATH threats via text messaging must surely be something new, even if only for political assassination.

A union of an overactive imagination and mobile telephony saw half a score of Terengganu assemblymen miss a sitting for fear of their lives, via threats delivered surreptitiously to their mobile telephones.

However, they braved danger soon after when told by the prime minister that such threats via SMS, like divorce, should not apply.

The reality though, through trickles in the media, is that they could not get along with the menteri besar and want him to go.

In all likelihood, Datuk Ahmad Said's Mercedes-driving defying days (remember the Proton Perdana snub incident?) may have finally come to haunt him.
But as if to prove that political infighting is not the domain of Barisan Nasional, the union of Pakatan Rakyat is currently papering over the cracks in the coalition. Statements issued by party leaders that were meant to help were inadvertently making the situation worse.

Things flared upon a once simmering situation pertaining to a deputy chief minister, who recently resigned from his post and the Penanti state seat amid clouds of suspicion and indignation.

But the story must be the seemingly open warfare between party leaders, even as their members tried to shush them just in case BN was listening.

By-elections have evolved into a political strategy rather than a necessity. The fact that they are costly and potentially divisive, not to mention mentally draining and distracting, has not bothered PR.

Perhaps that is what it does well, politicking 24 hours a day. While one should not willy-nilly resign, there have been five since the last general election last year.

Perhaps that is why Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak has floated the idea of BN abstaining from Penanti.

Despite the seemingly ridiculous abuse of the democratic process, the ruling party, I suspect, would not give a walkover. It is just that many are, for the moment, exasperated by the current strategy of constant chaos and disorder.

The cracks in PR are also seen in the decision by the Selangor state government to decline Bukit Lanjang state assemblywoman Elizabeth Wong's offer to resign.

While it is admirable that the Parti Keadilan Rakyat and Selangor leadership would stand by her, one cannot help but speculate that they would rue the day they decided to turn down her offer.

I am not judging her, nor taking a moral high perch on the issue. I believe what she did was her business, but as a public figure, different rules apply.

It would certainly be a cause of discomfort for some PKR partners to have such a controversy in their midst.

I know we are now in the 21st century, but we are a relatively conservative nation. What do we tell our 17-year-olds if they were to ask us about the Eli Wong saga or her lifestyle?

I suppose I cannot take issue with Perak assemblyman Nga Kor Ming for reciting the Quran; it is, after all, his right to do so, especially if he was not doing anything blasphemous. His recitals were even endorsed by Pas spiritual leader Datuk Nik Aziz Nik Mat, who, in fact, was in the audience during one of Nga's inspired speeches.

However, I have an issue with the fact that Nga's recital was not that of a believer, but instead by an opportunistic politician. Muslims believe the Quran to be the words of God and, as such, should not be used for crass politicking.

Nga should realise that people need not be political to be uncomfortable with his opportunistic embrace of the holy book.

Beyond the novelty of a non-believer reciting a verse or two is the reality of a politician playing to the gallery for political gain, selectively going through phrases here and there to suit his political agenda.

Would Nga subscribe to parts about sinners and punishments, or the part about Islamic jurisprudence, in the Quran?

Would Nga be quoting the Gita if he were addressing a crowd of Hindus? Religion should be something one should refrain from using in the down and dirty world of politics.

Thus, from Kuala Terengganu to Penanti to Bukit Lanjan, and throw in a Quran-quoting Christian, too, political junkies should have more than their daily fix.

But for the rest of us, the unending political dramas must be like yet another bad day at work.