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<h2 class="gmail-headlines" style="border-width:medium;border-style:none;border-color:currentcolor">When a particular mentality affects public policy</h2>
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<p style="border-top:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-top:10px;padding-bottom:10px;font-size:12px"><span class="gmail-muted">Sunday July 9, 2017</span></p></div><div class="gmail-tool-box"><div class="gmail-share-this-wrapper"> <span class="gmail-st_facebook_vcount"><span style="text-decoration:none;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline-block" class="gmail-stButton"></span></span><span class="gmail-st_twitter_vcount"><span style="text-decoration:none;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline-block" class="gmail-stButton"></span></span><span class="gmail-st_email_vcount"><span style="text-decoration:none;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline-block" class="gmail-stButton"></span></span>
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Zurairi AR is a humanist and sceptic who believes in doing good for
goodness' sake. He tweets for believers and non-believers alike at
@zurairi.
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<p>
JULY 9 — If you wish to understand how much power the status quo wields
over the country’s policies, look no further than how easily the <span style="font-size:inherit"><a id="gmail-PXLINK_3_0_2" class="gmail-pxInta" href="http://www.themalaymailonline.com/opinion/zurairi-ar/article/when-a-particular-mentality-affects-public-policy#">healthcare system</a></span> was swayed over the mere issue of language.</p>
<p>
According to the Malaysian Medical Association (MMA), Putrajaya’s
insistence that contract house officers have SPM-level Bahasa Malaysia
(BM) qualification could force some affected graduates to wait two years
before they may be employed.</p>
<p>
As it is, president Dr Ravindran Naidu said medical graduates with no
such qualification have already been waiting for placement since last
year.</p>
<p>
Potentially, this could further affect medical graduates from continuing their career for years to come, <span style="font-size:inherit"><a id="gmail-PXLINK_2_0_1" class="gmail-pxInta" href="http://www.themalaymailonline.com/opinion/zurairi-ar/article/when-a-particular-mentality-affects-public-policy#">compounding</a></span> the problem of distribution of doctors across the country, and an overhang of supply of graduates.</p>
<p>
And it all started, as always, as a knee jerk reaction.</p>
<p>
The complaint had predictably come from the ethno-religionists; from
pro-Malay groups like Umno Youth, its Umno Overseas Club alumni,
Perkasa, to Islamists like PAS, ABIM and Pembina.</p>
<p>
Among the complaints given were that the BM requirement waiver will
result in doctors who are unable to communicate with patients.</p>
<p>
Of course, this is a strawman argument. Not having SPM-level
qualification does not in any way imply that someone cannot already
speak Malay, just as having the cert does not mean you will be competent
in speaking and comprehending the language — especially when it comes
to serving patients.</p>
<p>
Yes, BM is important when dealing with Malay patients, but does an SPM
certification acquired back in school — for housemen, it would be at
least six years back — help with that?</p>
<p>
Nor does it mean that doctors are “too stupid” or “too arrogant” to pass <span style="font-size:inherit"><a id="gmail-PXLINK_1_0_0" class="gmail-pxInta" href="http://www.themalaymailonline.com/opinion/zurairi-ar/article/when-a-particular-mentality-affects-public-policy#">the exam</a></span>.</p>
<p>
It just means that someone does not follow the national education system, no less, no more.</p>
<p>
In this case, the policy was waived as a response to over 20 graduates
waiting for their placement because they did not attend school in
Malaysia, some of them children of diplomats.</p>
<p>
<span class="gmail-caption-box gmail-pull-left" style="float:left;width:620px"><img alt="Putrajaya Hospital... the country needs qualified doctors to serve in its hospitals, but the latest kerfuffle over an SPM BM requirement is throwing a spanner into the works. — Picture by Saw Siow Feng" src="http://www.themalaymailonline.com/uploads/articles/2017/2017-07/putrajaya-hospital-siow-feng.jpg" style="float: left;" width="620" height="414"><span class="gmail-img-caption">Putrajaya
Hospital... the country needs qualified doctors to serve in its
hospitals, but the latest kerfuffle over an SPM BM requirement is
throwing a spanner into the works. — Picture by Saw Siow Feng</span></span>Despite
some irresponsible reporting, it should be noted that the waiver was
not made because they are children of diplomats, it just so happens that
children of diplomats do not go to school here. And why would they when
they cannot live here?</p>
<p>
And as several doctors have told <em>Malay Mail Online</em>, speaking
Malay is nowhere near half of the job of doctors. In real life, patients
come in all languages and dialects — those posted to rural areas would
inevitably have to learn to master a rudimentary understanding of
whatever language, and failing that, rely on other doctors or staff to
translate.</p>
<p>
It may be hard for the Malay supremacists to understand, but Malay
doctors who do well do sometimes have to learn Chinese dialects as well
as part of their job.</p>
<p>
And that still does not count the many other languages you have to deal with when it comes to foreign workers and tourists.</p>
<p>
Compare this with how it was reported in 2015 that over 1,000 medical
graduates had quit their ambitions to become doctors due to poor
English. Truth is, when it comes to a science field, the language of
reference is still English.</p>
<p>
The confusion among the detractors of the Health Ministry’s decision to
waive the SPM-level BM requirement stems from the failure to understand
the contract system offered by the Health Ministry starting late last
year.</p>
<p>
Now, medical graduates would be given a contract of two years to
complete their housemanship, and if chosen, can continue their contract
for a further two years of compulsory service under the Health Ministry.</p>
<p>
It is only then they would be absorbed into a permanent position within
the ministry, if they are capable. Without the two years of
housemanship, and the two years of compulsory service, graduates cannot
even practise medicine.</p>
<p>
Many will not even continue serving the government. They would go on to
private practice, or may not even serve as doctors at all.</p>
<p>
These are the people affected by the waiver. Those who enter permanent
service would still be required to have the SPM-level BM qualification.</p>
<p>
Hence there is no issue of BM being sidelined in civil service at all, despite claims by detractors.</p>
<p>
But without the waiver, the graduates are essentially stuck, unable to
continue practising even when they do not aim to serve in public service
at all.</p>
<p>
The waiver is not even a new thing, as it has been applied to foreign medical officers or <span style="font-size:inherit"><a id="gmail-PXLINK_5_0_4" class="gmail-pxInta" href="http://www.themalaymailonline.com/opinion/zurairi-ar/article/when-a-particular-mentality-affects-public-policy#">physicians</a></span>, and contract medical officers all this while.</p>
<p>
There is no question about it: BM is the national language. And by
right, all Malaysians should be able to speak and write it due to its
inclusion in the national education system. Just like how Malaysians
have learned English in school, there is no excuse to not being able to
use both languages.</p>
<p>
But when it comes to respecting BM, how that is actually being carried out is ultimately shallow.</p>
<p>
There is little recognition and support for authors and writers who
write in BM, what more if you are not a Malay. Even the evolution of the
language, by preferring certain English loan words over reusing archaic
words or inventing portmanteau has resulted in a slightly ugly
modernist BM.</p>
<p>
The call for the use of BM as a way of uniting the nation rings hollow
when there is so much divide-and-conquer happening in the public sphere.</p>
<p>
When it comes to a national identity, we did not follow Indonesia by
only having one new identity, one people that speaks Bahasa Indonesia —
no matter what their <span style="font-size:inherit"><a id="gmail-PXLINK_4_0_3" class="gmail-pxInta" href="http://www.themalaymailonline.com/opinion/zurairi-ar/article/when-a-particular-mentality-affects-public-policy#">ethnicities</a></span> or culture.</p>
<p>
We also did not follow Singapore by having a melting pot with all four
BM, Mandarin, Tamil, and English recognised as national languages and
represented in public.</p>
<p>
The pro-Bumiputera lobby would call for a single-stream school in Malay
by abolishing vernacular schools, but they would not surrender
Bumiputera-exclusive institutions, nor would they agree to the abolition
of taxpayer-funded Islamic schools and the <em>pondok</em> stream.</p>
<p>
There may be a reason for that. At the core of the matter, the
ethno-religionists do not wish for a shared identity that all Malaysians
can adopt, or the equality of all ethnic identities. What the status
quo wishes is for the supremacy of one language, culture, and religion
to dominate over others and in time displace them.</p>
<p>
As long as supremacists are given leeway, and in turn decide public
policy, we should never expect racial unity in this country.</p><p><a href="http://www.themalaymailonline.com/opinion/zurairi-ar/article/when-a-particular-mentality-affects-public-policy">http://www.themalaymailonline.com/opinion/zurairi-ar/article/when-a-particular-mentality-affects-public-policy</a><br></p><br clear="all"><br>-- <br><div class="gmail_signature">**************************************<br>N.b.: Listing on the lgpolicy-list is merely intended as a service to its members<br>and implies neither approval, confirmation nor agreement by the owner or sponsor of the list as to the veracity of a message's contents. Members who disagree with a message are encouraged to post a rebuttal, and to write directly to the original sender of any offensive message. A copy of this may be forwarded to this list as well. (H. Schiffman, Moderator)<br><br>For more information about the lgpolicy-list, go to <a href="https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/" target="_blank">https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/</a><br>listinfo/lgpolicy-list<br>*******************************************</div>
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