Tuaran: The United Sabah Lotud Association (Usla) fully supports the call by Sabah Umno Deputy Chief Datuk Abdul Rahman Dahlan for the return English medium schools in Sabah.
USLA President Datuk Raymond Tombung said it is high time for the long-standing issue to be seriously addressed by the State and Federal governments given the substantial decline in English mastery among Malaysians since the abandonment of the medium in schools in the 1970s.
“Poor English mastery is even reflected embarrassingly among political leaders, giving Malaysia a poor image at the international level. Hence, this situation should have long awakened the Federal Government into taking drastic action to reverse the trend,” he said in a statement Monday.
Raymond, who is also an advisor of Parti Solidariti Tanah Airku (Star), is also worried for the Gen-Ys of the natives who are now realising the critical importance of the English language and struggling to master it but having no proper avenue to hone their English-speaking skill.
“Because of this lack of proper learning source, they are now speaking in broken English with cringy topsy-turvy grammar, losing out to non-natives in the job market and unable to continue their tertiary education abroad.
“Only those whose parents can afford to send their children to private schools can proceed to go to universities abroad,” he said.
He urged all native NGOs to wake up to this need and fight loudly for the return of English medium schools for the sake of the Gen-Ys.
“We need to veer off from the current obsessive focus on cultural activities and look forward into the future with academic, intellectual and socioeconomic development.
There is a need for balance between cultural preservation and education in the new age which is fast being dominated by new technologies such as artificial intelligence.
“We need to fully recognise that English as the world’s lingua franca is the vehicle to socioeconomic progress to move the natives upward to the level of being world citizens and leaders,” he said.
“What we need now is a high-powered collective pressure from the native NGOs to call for the state and federal governments for the return of English medium schools. Such a change would benefit us meaningfully in the long run and would hopefully turn Sabah into a respected English-speaking state.
“Let us in one voice turn this legitimate desire into a strong and consistent political demand from our leaders,” he said.
Abdul Rahman was reported Sunday that he supported the use of English as an alternative language of communication for official matters in Sabah.
“This is provided for in the Sabah Constitution and must be upheld by the Federal Government. While I fully recognise that Bahasa Melayu is the nation’s official language and it is intended, among others, to unite the nation, we must not be blind to the fact that proficiency in English will give Malaysia an added advantage in this fiercely competitive world,” he said.
“In fact, in this regard, I would like to go an extra step. I also like to urge the Federal Government to bring back government-run English medium schools in Sabah. We can start with urban locations in Sabah and gradually expand it to cover the rest of the state,” added Abdul Rahman.
He said the government’s Bahasa Melayu medium schools should continue to exist and be improved but an earnest effort to create a few English medium schools as alternatives should also be undertaken.
He pointed out that the number of these schools could be smaller than Bahasa Melayu medium schools because what is important is that there is an alternative for parents who want their children to master the English language.
