Khat will punish DAP in GE15

From FMT:

DAP leaders meet as party threatens to implode over khat rage

by Robin Augustin and Ho Kit Yen

A DAP supporter outside DAP’s Menglembu assemblyman’s service centre in Ipoh, where he vented anger over the move to introduce khat for Year 4 vernacular students by throwing eggs

PETALING JAYA: DAP grassroots members are up in arms over the apparent defence by party leaders of the education ministry’s move to introduce a chapter on the Malay-Arabic calligraphy of khat in the Year 4 Bahasa Melayu syllabus in vernacular schools next year.

Tens of thousands of messages have flooded the social media pages of DAP leaders as well as private chat groups for divisional members, with some threatening open rebellion if the party does not oppose the move, which many parents of Chinese school students label an unnecessary burden.

“The reactions I’m getting are very negative,” a senior DAP leader in Selangor told FMT under strict condition of anonymity.

He said many are accusing the party of “caving in” to government policies seen as undermining the community, adding that they want DAP to show it will not be “another MCA”.

The DAP leadership plans to meet today to come up with an official stand on the matter.

Yesterday, party supremo Lim Kit Siang dismissed fears by the Chinese community over the teaching of khat, the calligraphy of Jawi, a variant of Arabic script widely used for the Malay written form before it was romanised.

Lim recalled his own experience learning Jawi when he was detained under the Internal Security Act in 1969.

Chow Siok Ming (left), who staged a protest against the teaching of khat outside a DAP service centre in Ipoh, meeting Menglembu assemblyman Chaw Kam Foon

“It did not make me any less of a Chinese, and may have helped in making me more of a Malaysian,” he said.

But despite Lim’s influence, the statement did not help ease tempers among the grassroots.

As of press time, more than 35,000 mostly angry comments have greeted a statement by Deputy Education Minister Teo Nie Ching to allay concerns by parents by saying that her ministry is engaging with various groups on the best way to include khat in the Bahasa Melayu syllabus.

Awang Besul died of distemper

former DAP Tigress died of 'dat-temper'? 

At least one of the opponents decided to vent his anger by pelting a DAP leader’s office with eggs.

The man took his two daughters to Menglembu assemblyman Chaw Kam Foon’s service centre in Ipoh, and uploaded a video of him engaging in a foul-mouthed rant before pelting the premise with eggs.

message to the DAP

I wonder whether he said 'tiu' and 'niamah' etc
Canto is tops for swearing

“I voted DAP last year and for the last six general elections,” he said. “Please DAP, don’t betray us Chinese. We believed what you said.”

The man was arrested and later released.

Chaw said he had met the man, whom he said was only expressing his fears as a concerned citizen.

The move to introduce khat in the Bahasa Melayu syllabus for national-type schools was first opposed by Chinese educationist groups Dong Zong and Jiao Zong.

They said khat is “not suitable” as part of learning the national language and would only burden the students and teachers.

The National Union of the Teaching Profession (NUTP) however was in support of the move and said it should not be politicised.

“Our stand is that anything which is educational and non-religious is acceptable. Khat is Arabic calligraphy, the exposure does not mean religious content is being taught to our students,” NUTP secretary-general Harry Tan told FMT.

Khat is Arabic calligraphy 

He also said the additional unit on khat in the textbook would be introductory, and that students would not be assessed or required to purchase special calligraphy pens.

On Saturday, Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad dismissed the protests against the khat move, saying only some in DAP were against the idea.

Many DAP leaders FMT spoke to said they had received angry comments from supporters who threatened not to vote for DAP anymore.

“Khat is only the tip of the iceberg. (There has been) a series of unrealised promises including on the Unified Examination Certificate, a bad economy and U-turns on reforms,” said a state leader.

He said many see Education Minister Maszlee Malik as incompetent.

“No changes in education policies – instead we saw the introduction of ‘black shoes and khat’,” he added, referring to Maszlee’s move last year to replace white school shoes.

Personally I don't mind khat; in fact I would love to learn khat and Jawi and Tamil and Kadazan, etc.

But can a Year 4 vernacular school student afford the time to learn khat when he could have profitably used that precious time to learn Bahasa, History, English and computer coding?

Maszlee is truly INCOMPETENT.

And Mahathir tok-kok in arguing that it's only fair for vernacular school students to learn khat since the government hasn't stop them from learning their own language. 

He was reported as saying: "We have never objected to other writings (including) in Chinese, as this is something special in our country.

"Chinese language writings are not allowed in other countries such as Indonesia, for instance, (and in) the Philippines and Thailand, they use their own (language) writings.”

Has anyone forced his grandchildren to learn Mandarin, Tamil or even Malayalam (language of Kerala)? If not, why force vernacular school students to learn Arabic calligraphy?

Maszlee also tok-kok when he said other forms of calligraphy, including Chinese, will also be considered. 'Consider' was the eff-ing word he used in his purported 'holistic assessment' of the UEC (which we now know will take another 500 years).

He was eff-ing 'defensive' when he started to tok-kok like embracing other calligraphy too. If so, why not start off with Malayalam calligraphy? Although I have to admit, I am not sure whether Mamak will appreciate my suggestion, wakakaka.

Malayalam calligraphy 

Furthermore, Malaysiakini columnist Commander (rtd) S Thayaparan asked:

The real question is, why even introduce something like this at this moment? Surely there are more important issues in our education system that need to be addressed?

Even in (if?) this was not a cultural issue, is good handwriting a priority when it comes to educating our young people?

What possible benefit could the introduction of khat into our education system have beyond the pabulums espoused by certain non-Muslim intellectuals?

I am afraid the Commander has been spot on - what is the educational benefit of messing around with calligraphy (Khat, Arabic, Tamil, Malayalam, English or Chinese) for our young school students already trapped in an ill-run schooling system of pitiful standards.

And education standard has been and will always be one of the central pillars of Chinese revered values. They don't like UMNO and now Pribumi morons eff-ing up their children's education, and which has been precisely why they move over to the vernacular education stream years ago. Even parents of around 100,000 Malays school students have seen the same light.

The problem the Chinese Malaysians in particular suffer from is they are considered by Malays (PAS, UMNO and even Mahathir's Parti Pribumi) as unpatriotic, whatever 'patriotic' is meant by their understanding.

Whatever the Chinese Malaysians' objections to khat might be - time wasting, inappropriate moment now, non-beneficial, Maszlee's eff-up again, whatever - if they protest against the study of khat as they have now, the general Malay perception of this Chinese behaviour would be many-fold, unpatriotic, anti-Islamic, anti-Malay, anti-rulers, biadab, communistic, Anglo shit-eating balls-carrying, eff them, dismiss Chinese from cabinet, expel them from Malaysia, etc.

As Commander (rtd) S Thayaparan said:

These days supporters of Bersatu Parti Pribumi are quick to condemn non-Malays when they speak up on the very issues which were political currency for Malay political operatives before the historic May 9 win.

[meaning: Parti Pribumi now is exactly like what UMNO had been]

This idea that speaking up on “non-Malay” issues would rock the Harapan boat is prevalent in social media.

[meaning: therefore, must 'give in' to Mahathir's Parti Pribumi's interests in order NOT to rock the Pakatan boat]

When it comes to the culture war, the non-Malays lost a long time ago. The reality is that people who speak up on issues like these are like soldiers who skulk around in jungles not realising the war is over.

Don't look to non-Malay political operatives in Harapan to oppose such measures. They are now part of the problem.

What he meant by the last two paragraphs are that: 

(a) only the DAP Gurkhas (grassroots) dare to speak up, whilst 

(b) Lim KS, Lim GE, and the DAP top dogs (possibly with the exception of Dr Ramasamy, Ramkarpal Singh, Sangeet Kaur and Zaid Ibrahim - the Indians and Malays) have long already lost their spines to challenge or question Mahathir.

Zaid Ibrahim has just said:

The limited hours in school should be utilised for the pursuance of practical knowledge.

There are many things students need to learn, so many branches of knowledge to pursue, but why impose?

We have limited hours in school, it is best we use to study things that are of practical use. Use (your) own time and money to study khat (Jawi calligraphy) and other beautiful things in this world.

Introducing khat has been typical of ministers in Pakatan Harapan, who like to show they know better, their patriotism so-called, and their cultural preference.

And they like to show power, that is why they like to impose. Little do they realise that the things they impose are not really followed, except superficially.

And that's exactly what twitter-finance blog said:

Empowering the Year 4 students with proficiency in English will help them to further study in “STEM fields” – science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Even sending the primary students to learn to write basic computer programs using languages like Scratch, Lua, Python or Java principles through a fun game like “Minecraft” can be more profitable to the country in the long run.

We know why PM Mahathir supports his boy who politicise the education system in the khat controversy. The old man tries to hoodwink the Malay voters that under his leadership, he can suppress and oppress the ethnic Chinese even to learn primitive Arabic scripts. The premier also wants to prove that his party PPBM (Bersatu) is more Malay than UMNO-Malays and more Islam than PAS-Muslims.

Yes, this “khat” drama is nothing but Mahathir’s political stunt to trick gullible Malay-Muslims who currently do not support him to jump ship to his camp.

Unfortunately, the innocent students become collateral damage in the 94-year-old prime minister’s selfish desire to enlarge his base. He knew the vernacular schools have no choice but to reluctantly learn the Jawi which was abandoned 50 years ago.

If Lynas will be the last straw which will break Pakatan's back in GE15, then khat will be the disaster to break the DAP's hold on the Chinese Malaysians' adoration.

Lim Kit Siang, you are NOT infallible, invulnerable or immune to defeat. Remember 1999.

Because of khat, the Chinese Malaysians will punish you (as they did to the MCA and Gerakan), that is, if you dare to stand in GE15 in a Chinese dominated constituency.