Sorry Utusan, ‘Malay-nising’ names of places, roads depicts narrow-mindedness

Sorry Utusan, ‘Malay-nising’ names of places, roads depicts narrow-mindedness




“THE most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.” – English satirist George Orwell (1903-1950)

“Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” – Spanish-American philosopher George Santayana (1863-1952)


At a time when the Malaysian economy is being challenged by an inflationary spike that can potentially impoverish many low-income households, it feels so anti-climactic that some media prefer fanning ‘racially’-sensitive issues instead of rallying their audience towards building their economic resilience.


With due respect to the editorial rights of Utusan Malaysia, the airing of its article entitled “Melayukan nama tempat, jalan” (Malay-nise names of places, roads) raised eyebrows given that nobody can tell for sure if the article intended to portray non-Malays as unpatriotic even though they can converse and write in Malay perfectly.


This also begs the question if, in light of the new-found enthusiasm by the powers-that-be to resurrect Bahasa Melayu’s dominance as a lingua franca, all anglicised names – or to a wider extent all non-Malay origin names – will have to be replaced by a Malay name. It is also unclear if Arab-sounding names are to be given exemptions.


As a media practitioner ourselves, we are fully aware that media content is usually crafted to cater to our audience (or at least to a majority of them).

In this regard, wouldn’t the article only be appealing or injecting a sense of short-lived pride considering the fact that the task of name replacement is never as easy as it sounds?

Utusan Malaysia deserves every right to instil the notion of nationalism among its audience so long as it is able to distinguish between being a mouthpiece of the powers-that-be and fulfilling its editorial objectives of empowering its readers with the knowledge of current issues.

Given that the general election (GE15) is supposedly around the corner, media practitioners in general must abstain from becoming a tool of the ruling political coalition by diverting truth from bigger, underlying problems at hand (ie. the chicken crisis, depreciation of the ringgit and escalating national debts, to name a few) or to serve as a platform to canvass for votes.

Above all else, politicians are chameleons – they can change colour at ease (they promote Bahasa Melayu like no tomorrow to the public but school their children in England) – and they come and go but not media organisations whose longevity is much more predictable.

Malaysian media practitioners are generally aware about the sincerity of the current proponents of Bahasa Melayu – either that they are promoting the Malay language for their political mileage or that they are hiding their English language deficiency.

Rest assured that Bahasa Melayu shall flourish as a lingua franca naturally – exactly like what it used to be at the peak of the Malaccan Sultanate in the late 14th or early 15th century – if the current batch of political leaders can make the Malaysian economy prosper again.

In tandem with this, Utusan Malaysia should challenge the powers-that-be to reignite the Malaysian economy from its gloomy state. Once the Malaysian economy booms, global citizens will queue up to learn Bahasa Melayu like how they are so eager to learn Japanese or Mandarin.

In essence, nobody is glorifying the so-called legacy of the Western imperialists but only to ensure a piece of history is left behind for younger generation Malaysians.

After all, it is a well-known fact that the content of Malaysian history has been ‘butchered’ to conceal certain “water face dropping” truths (ie. that of Parameswara being a Hindu Indian prince from the Srivijaya kingdom prior to his embracing Islam following his marriage with a Persian princess or Hang Tuah’s very own Chinese origin).

Lastly, we should be careful about being a jaguh kampung (literally translated: village champion) who menang sorak kampung tergadai (literally translated: winning the cheers but losing the village). – May 26, 2022