Primary school textbook blunder not acceptable: Warisan
Published on: Thursday, February 23, 2017
Penampang: The latest misinterpretation of some words used in a primary school textbook is clear evidence that Sabah has to have its own Education Ministry as pursued by Parti Warisan Sabah.Wira Warisan Penampang Secretary Pritchard Sebastian Gumbaris said such mistake would never have happened had the Federal Government used Sabahans and Sarawakians in drawing up and completing the controversial textbook.Pritchard said this is only a primary one syllabus and appeared in his daughter's textbook. ADVERTISEMENT It soon went viral on social media causing dissatisfaction among parents, particularly from the KadazanDusun community.Published in the Pendidikan Moral textbook on page 23, the translation of "Terima Kasih" was wrongly interpreted according on the portion referring to the ethnic language of the Orang Asal Iban and Kadazan of Sarawak and Sabah, respectively. In the said book, "Terima Kasih" in the Iban language was translated "Kotoluadan" while in Kadazan it was "Magsukul"; both were incorrect.The blunder angered the KadazanDusun community as the word "Magsukul" is not even a KadazanDusun word, but belongs to another community in Sabah.ADVERTISEMENT "This error is unacceptable. We feel that the Education Ministry is not sincere in educating the people of the Federation of Malaysia, particularly us Sabahans. Such a simple mistake showed the Iban and KadazanDusun communities have been sidelined."How much money has been spent on the research? Or was this book published without research and motivated purely for project purposes only?
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"If the ministry is sincere, such mistake would have been noticed. Unfortunately, the printed book was released by the Home Ministry and later used as the school's textbook for all seven-year-old students," he said.Pritchard added that Sabahans have been divided by racial and religious sentiment over the last 30 years since the current government took over Sabah and they have been politically divided ever since. Such an important textbook with nonchalant attitude towards the right terminology for Orang Asal language, he said, showed the Orang Asal of Sabah and Sarawak are not a priority for the Government."The State Government must tackle this issue as soon as possible if they are sincere in maintaining the dignity and harmony of all Sabahans. We can't afford to have more racial tension as it would not benefit us. Sabahans must be united and not broken up according to their races."This is also why we need to have our very own Sabah Education Ministry which will not be controlled by the Federal Government as is now pursued by Warisan's President Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal and Deputy President Darell Leiking. "Sabahans have many ethnic groups with different dialects and it would be a nightmare for Malayans to draw up such textbook with relation to Sabah. Hence, a new approach to Sabah's education is a must to avoid this textbook and many more textbooks that may have similar if not worse mistakes," he said.Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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Pritchard also urged the Government to immediately remove this textbook from circulation as well as other textbooks which may have similar errors."It's pretty hard now for me to explain to my daughter that what is written in the book is wrong when they (the students) were made to believe that the text book is the truth and nothing but the truth," he said.