NUTP wants new gov’t to push ahead with Jawi lessons

The National Union of Teaching Profession (NUTP) urges the new government to implement the stalled plan to introduce Jawi in primary school Bahasa Malaysia (BM) syllabus.

The plan, which has been years in the works, faced fierce opposition from vernacular education groups, including Chinese education group Dong Zong.

NUTP president Aminuddin Awang said various studies have been conducted to support the introduction of Jawi in the BM subject.

“NUTP hopes the new education minister will include Jawi in the BM syllabus and will not back down to any opposition.

“The efforts and studies on this have been conducted for a long time by education experts,” he told Malaysiakini when contacted.

Aminuddin (pictured above) added NUTP also hopes there will not be a reintroduction of teaching mathematics and science in English.

Instead, he hoped schools would be supplied with stable Internet, and any changes introduced by the new minister will not burden teachers.

As it stands, the teaching of Jawi in the BM subject for vernacular schools is optional. The teaching of basic Jawi consists of three pages of the subject’s textbook.

Despite the flexibility, the move was strongly opposed by vernacular education groups. The debacle, among others, was blamed for Maszlee Malik’s resignation as education minister on Jan 3.

Then prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who took over from Maszlee as acting education minister, later floated the idea of re-introducing English as a medium of instruction for Mathematics and Science (PPSMI).

PPSMI was introduced during Mahathir’s first tenure as PM in 2002, but was scrapped in 2012 when the current prime minister Muhyiddin Yassin was education minister.

Meanwhile, NUTP welcomed Muhyiddin’s move to carve out higher education to become its own ministry.

Aminuddin said combining the education and higher education portfolios meant higher education was neglected.

“We saw before the lack of focus on higher education. By splitting the portfolio into two ministries, we hope there won’t be any areas neglected in the (higher education) minister’s aim to reach excellence,” he said.

Muhyiddin’s move to split the education portfolio reverses Pakatan Harapan’s move to bring all matters of education under one roof.

Yesterday, he announced former lecturer Mohd Radzi Md Jidin as education minister, with former cardiologist Dr Mah Hang Soon and Muslimin Yahaya, who was a special officer in the Home Ministry before contesting in the 14th general election, as his deputies.

Noraini Ahmad, who was a corporate executive before becoming a career politician, was appointed Higher Education Minister, with former associate professor Mansor Othman as her deputy.  - Mkini