Thursday, June 22, 2006

University Admission Figures - One Big Lie!

A Malaysiakini reader who called him or herself as Product of the System disputed the statistics that Higher Education Management Department director-general Prof Datuk Dr Hassan Said offered. I posted that in Malay Engineers, Chinese Accountants, Indian Doctors.

Product of the System averred that Prof Hassan Said’s presentation of the methodology of assessing one’s CGPA, co-curricular activities and point system has been nothing more than an annual UMNO sandiwara (theatrics or in this context, bullsh*t). It’s a show & tell produced, directed and edited by UMNO to fool the gullible Malaysian voter.

He or she claimed that it has been an annual ritual for the pro-BN media to publish statistics of successful applicants into the ‘crucial courses’ of medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, engineering and law, broken down into bumiputeras, Chinese and Indians, when those figures have been false.

He/she said: “Falsifying statistics are sometimes less indecent than concealing them. Hassan Said did not reveal the breakdown of successful applicants by their entrance route – STPM or matriculation. During the racial quota era, STPM applicants formed at least 40 percent of the student population.”

“In 2004 and 2005 – the era of pseudo-meritocracy, the number of STPM students gaining entry into UM medical school numbered only 36 and 17 out of 168 and 207 respectively. In other words, from a decent figure of 40 percent, the number of successful STPM applicants crashed to a mere 8 - 21% of the annual intake into UM medical faculty. It goes very much without saying who forms 90 percent of the student population - matriculation candidates.”


Therefore, for non-Malays the so-acclaimed “meritocracy” system was even worse than the “racial” quota system. I must say he’s not the first to point this out. I have met many academicians who told me this when the so-called “meritocracy” system was introduced. In other words, the UMNO government has no intention ever of allocating university places on merit. In reality, the authority has further increased the racial quota in favour of its social policy.

To summarise, Product of the System said the so-called "meritocracy" system has been an UMNO sleigh of hands, where there has been actually (1) less percentage of non-Malays being admitted to Malaysian universities, (2) the insidious use of the term "bumiputras" because in reality non-Malay bumiputras, mainly Sabahans and Sarawakians, are being denied the fair allocation they deserve, and (3) weak or substandard Malay students kept in universities for eons until they would eventually pass, thus denying able non-Malay students admission to universities year in and year out.

Read his full letter here for more detailed points.

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