Mah reverses racial, gender sports segregation policy at Johor school

 

Following an intervention by Deputy Education Minister II Mah Hang Soon, a secondary school in Batu Pahat, Johor, has reversed an earlier policy that imposed racial and gender restrictions on certain co-curricular activities.

SMK Dato’ Bentara Luar previously issued a notice to Form 1 students, requesting them to each pick three co-curricular activities.

However, it controversially restricted certain activities to certain races and genders.

Only Malay boys were allowed to pick football and sepak takraw while netball was restricted to “Malay girls only”. Basketball and ping pong were restricted to “Chinese boys and girls only”.

The school’s principal Abdul Razak Hamid reportedly defended the segregation, saying the move was driven by an apparent lack of space.

Mah told Malaysiakini today that he personally contacted the Johor education department to change the policy and remove all restrictions.

The MCA senator also called the policy a “mistake” because it contradicted Malaysia’s education philosophy.

“It was a mistake on the part of the principal [...]

“It is through sports activities that we can encourage integration, students to play together (and) to promote unity, camaraderie and the spirit of togetherness,” he said.

“I asked the school to change this policy. It shouldn't happen.

“It is against our (national education) blueprint,” Mah added.

One of the five aspirations of the Malaysian Education Blueprint 2013-2025 is to foster unity among students. One key method was by enhancing the Student Integration for Unity Plan.

Mah showed Malaysiakini an updated version of SMK Dato’ Bentara Luar’s list of co-curricular activities - which no longer imposed racial or gender restrictions on any sport.

Aside from sports activities, the school had previously imposed racial restrictions on certain charity, language, faith-based and subject-based clubs as well.

The Interact and Pendidikan Moral clubs were restricted to “Chinese and Indians only”.

The Pendidikan Islam club was limited to Malay students only while the Buddhist society was confined to Chinese students only. The Chinese language society was also restricted to Chinese students.

In the updated list, these restrictions were also removed. - Mkini