MIC Youth demands action on ‘racist’ principals in two weeks

KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 26 — MIC Youth is set to give the Chief Secretary to the Government Tan Sri Sidek Hassan a two-week deadline to deal with school principals accused of making racial slurs.

The movement’s chief T. Mohan said today Sidek will receive the memorandum stating this demand on Wednesday.

He said that the wing will consider legal action, if there is no response within the deadline.

“In the Johor case, the accusations were clear. Police reports have been lodged, but there has been no action,” he said when asked about the purpose of the memorandum.

Mohan explained that they decided to apply pressure on the person running the civil service since the education minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin declared disciplining civil servants was not in his jurisdiction.

“We are confident of a stern action against the principle so that it can serve as a lesson to everyone,” he told The Malaysian Insider.

“Enough is enough, the authorities must act,” said Mohan.

Siti Inshah Mansor, the principal of SMK Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra in Johor, had allegedly told students during an assembly that the Chinese could return the China and that the Indians resembled “dogs” with their prayer strings.

Following the public uproar over her controversial statement, about 20 reports were lodged against the principal.

In Kedah, Ungku Aznan Ungku Ismail, the school principal for SMK Bukit Selambau, Sungai Petani, caused a national outcry when he too allegedly uttered racial slurs to his non-Malay students.

Ungku Aznan had allegedly publicly told a few Chinese students to go back to China for they were behaving disrespectfully when they were seen having breakfast in the school canteen during the Ramadan fasting month.

He later escaped stern punishment when he was merely reassigned to an office in the district education office at Kuala Muda in Sungai Petani, shortly after the incident, drawing flak from many political leaders, including those from MCA.

The government has come under fire for failing to act quickly on the matter, despite their swift action in the case of controversial rapper Wee Meng Chee or “Namewee”, who had produced a video in response to the incident involving the principals.

The opposition said the government was practicing “double-standards” in how it handled both matters, and have predicted that the Johor school principal would likely be let off with a mere slap on the wrist.

Muhyiddin had said that any action against permanent civil servant must strictly follow the existing procedures and regulations.

He said the government must also investigate the investigation fairly and allow the accused opportunities to defend themselves.

Muhyiddin had previously said that he had made a decision and the public to wait to the final decision by the Public Service Department (PSD).

Early this month the Public Service Director-General Datuk Seri Abu Bakar Abdullah said that the PSD would present the investigation papers on Siti Inshah to the Prime Minister’s Department Disciplinary Board.

courtesy of Malaysian Insider