Jacky Yong

Lots has been said about the language and its uses in Malaysia. The latest development saw our former Prime Minister to urge the government not to forsake the future of our children by denouncing the importance of English. I am totally aghast at the action of some parties who chose to childishly ignore the use of English to increase the competitiveness of Malaysians as a world-class citizen. English is, after all, the 3rd most spoken language in the world after Chinese and Spanish. Note that Malay, or its nearest variation Bahasa Indonesia is nowhere near the top 10.  And this decision came from no other than the seniors in our very own Menteri Pendidikan! And today the news says that majority of the people do not want English to pass in SPM! What the fuck are they thinking?

Let us just step back for a while and look at the Malaysians now as a whole. Throw a stone anywhere, chances are the person you hit knows a smattering of English, at least to be able to communicate properly with any English-native speakers. Last Sunday I went to the zoo, and I stopped at a bus-stop to take a rest. There was an old Malay grandma there, probably in her 70’s, looking after her young toddler grandchild. To my surprise, she speaks in English with us, refusing to converse in Malay even when we sprinkled some Malay into our conversation. She even spoke in English with her young grandchild, who is no more than 14 months old! There was a bit of typical Malaysian slang, but the point is that everywhere, people have no problem talking in English. So why the decision to lower English to second-class status?

Have you ever been to Thailand? Indonesia? Vietnam? Japan? Korea? How do you communicate with the most common of all people that you see; the taxi drivers? Do you have problems communicating with them in those countries? If you only speak Malay, then the answer is most probably a big YES. Do you think tourists to Malaysia will have problem communicating in English with our taxi drivers? Other than the quarrel about the use of meters, chances are that most if not all taxi drivers in Malaysia can speak good English.

We have been so long into allowing our SPM test papers to be answered in both Malay and English. Just as when we are almost seeing the result out of this, they have to revoke the importance of English. Wouldn’t it be a waste of effort? Come on, get real. For those who still insist on the purity of the Malay language, let me ask you this question. Can you speak purely in Malay without ANY influence of foreign language, especially English? What is the word “komunikasi“, “satelit“, “implikasi“, “dansa“, “televisyen“, “radio“, “komputer” doing in the Malay language? How do you pronounce chlorofluorocarbon in Malay? Or the mezzanine level? How about phobia? Tell that in Bahasa Baku to my face, you hypocrites!

I am not saying that Bahasa Melayu is of lower status. I cannot ignore its importance in Malaysia. I speak fluent Malay, and it’s the second language that I picked up after my native Cantonese. I had a very close Malay friend in primary school. But it just annoys me that some people choose to ignore the importance of the English language, and that they can live with just Malay in their daily lives. For those people, go live in an island and good riddance with you!

*Sigh*, what has our education system come to now? My poor girls…… 🙁