UNDER ‘BRAIN DRAIN’ MAHATHIR, LITTLE NAPOLEONS CLOSE ANOTHER DOOR TO TALENT – NOW TAIWANESE DENTAL SCHOOLS REMOVED FROM LIST OF RECOGNITION

The Malaysian Dental Council (MDC) is said to have removed seven Taiwanese dental schools from its list of recognition.

However, the authorities claimed that the basic dental qualifications from Taiwan dental schools had never been recognized under the Dental Act 1971, and had never been placed under Second Schedule of the Dental Act 1971 either.

While the explanation fails to clarify the issue, it sparks off another controversy. The health Ministry and MDC need to sort out this matter for Malaysian dentistry students studying in Taiwan.

The education bureau of Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP) revealed the issue in mid-July. MDC president Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah responded later but the issue did not come to an end.

Both sides have had their own explanations. One side claimed that the government had recognized seven dental schools in Taiwan while the other side argued that the government had never done so.

So, what is the actual situation? The public need an answer from the relevant authorities.

Malaysian students studying dentistry in Taiwan and those who have graduated from Taiwanese dental schools need an explicit answer.

According to the president of the Federation of Alumni Association of Taiwan Universities Malaysia Lawrence Ting, Malaysia recognized the seven dental schools from Taiwan in 1996 but no gazette has been made.

The authorities must explain the reason of not gazetting the recognition and make amends.

The incident has affected Malaysian students currently pursuing dental courses in Taiwanese universities. The authorities must settle this matter immediately.

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From the macroscopic point of view, this issue is not confined to Malaysian students studying in Taiwanese dental schools, but also the government’s effort to bring back our talents overseas.

We used to stress the importance of retaining our talents and have even set up TalentCorp to woo Malaysian talents living abroad to come back and participate in nation-building. The issue of not recognizing dental degrees from Taiwan exposes our deficiency in attracting foreign talents to return home.

While the government is opening its arms to welcome Malaysian talents overseas to come back, it has nevertheless opted to not recognize dental schools from Taiwan. Such conflicting move will not help effectively woo our talents to return but will instead aggravate the outflow of talents.

Malaysian graduates from dental schools in Taiwan are professionals and the government should keep them in the country to serve the community. The government should standardize its move in attracting talents to return and not to shut the door behind them. This triggers frustration which will lead to more exacerbated outflow of talents.

MYSINCHEW