PRESS STATEMENT CHIEF INFORMATION PUTRA MALAYSIA
17 Januari 2021 | 4 Jamadilakhir 1442H
1. Referring to Free Malaysia Today website based from the link https://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/highlight/2021/01/26/its-time-we-go-back-to-the-original-social-contract/ – Under the letter to the editor section written by Kua Kia Soong, quoted from the article said, “Nazir Razak’s suggestion for a new national consultation to discuss the economic, political and social path for the nation is a good one although I believe we should use the original Independence social contract as a starting point. He further called for the setting up of a National Consultative Council (NCC) to bring leaders of respective fields together to carve out a new way forward for the nation. Again, I concur except to stress that ‘leaders’ should be those who lead organisations representing the various ethnic, cultural, religious and gender communities rather than academics.”
2. PUTRA, agrees with the idea of Nazir Razak, of having a new national consultation regarding economic, political, and social path of the nation as well as to bring the subject matter experts (with combination of both academician as well as field expert), in the respective field to carve out a new way forward for the nation. But we totally disagree, on following the original social contract as the Federal Constitution currently sufficient to govern all laws.
3. The question is, why now Kua Kia Soong is asking to follow the original social contract? Doesn’t he understand, that the current Federal Constitution is “THE LAW” that we had been following and all other law acts revolve within the Federal Constitution? Below are the answers for the subheadings that Kua has argued:
a) Post-May 13 New Economic Policy (NEP) was a fait accompli
It is true, that the New Economic Policy was a fait accompli, but till today as we speak, the Bumiputera still have not reach the required pie despite of it is being govern under the article of 153 (8A). Currently, 72 percent of the Bumiputera are in the category of B40. Talking under the industry, the Bumiputera are in the most low-value added industry. So question who has benefited from this policy?
In the terms of education, why is Kua only focusing on UiTM? There are other institution that other races can enter for public university, such as University Malaya (UM), Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) and many more public universities. By the way, what is the population ratio per race to enter for tertiary education that Kua is looking at? Currently the Bumiputera’s is estimated at 63 percent of the whole entire population.
Now in the manner of private institution, UNITAR as example, they impose strict regulation for the Bumiputera to enter and despite of that expensive fees make Bumiputera even harder for them to pursue for tertiary level. In terms of study loans, when PTPTN allow study loans to be converted into scholarship, suddenly there was a spike of increase of students graduated from private university. The bumiputera does not enjoy any of those benefit as they can not event enter into private university, but yet, the rights of the Bumiputera’s are being questioned.
b) The Rukun Negara must be inclusive
Quoting from the article, “Not only that, the views of representative organisations of all ethnic communities were not sought nor taken into consideration. Likewise, the ill-fated “National Cultural Policy” of 1971, which also incorporated a token number of non-Malay academics, had never been accepted by all the ethnic communities in the country to the present day.”
There is no such thing as ill-fated National Cultural Policy, as the Rukun Negara is done holistically. Only ill-hearted and ignorance of the citizen would argue such things under the Rukun Negara. In this point Kua told to quote, “When we look at the first principle of the Rukun Negara itself – belief in God – we realise that it is not only contrary to the secular principle of the Malaysian constitution, but it also excludes all Malaysians who do not believe in a monotheistic God.”
Based on the the principal of belief in god in Kua has missed look on the manner of the word ‘belief’. For a person who dosen’t belief in God still need to “belief that there is no god” but that does not mean that they are left out from the first principal. Also it is stated, that, in the Federal Constitution under Article 3 (1) stating that Islam is the religion of the Federation; but other religion may be practised in peace and harmony in any part of the Federation.
Therefore, there is no such thing as Malaysians, who do not belief in a monotheistic God is left out because it is stated the Federal Constitution.
c) Affirmative action based on need not race
Kua also said “More potentially dangerous and insidious is the effect this widespread racial discrimination has had on ethnic relations in this country. Unity can only be promoted through an affirmative action policy based on need, sector, or class, never on race.”
There is no such thing as a widespread racial discrimination as currently all races are allowed to chase their own economic pie. This racial discrimination only happen when there is ignorance of understanding of the third, fourth and fifth principal of the Rukun Negara and using the Federal Constitution only for own personal or political agenda.
Talking about promoting unity through affirmative action policy based on need, sector, or class never on race, there are many employers out there that is using “Mandarin speaking only” as requirement for jobs. It is the correct move to do if the company deals with China based company that requires communication. Jobs such as car salesman don’t require Mandarin speaking but yet there are still employers put Mandarin speaking as a pre-requisite to enter the job.
4. To recap on all the points that have been given by Mr. Kua, there are none of the points that he wrote in the article about building the nation in terms of politics, education, and social but what he has been asking and questioning, is all about the Bumiputera rights under the Federal Constitution. Therefore, one of the principal of PUTRA is to protect and uphold the Special Right of the Bumiputera and all that is related to the Federal Constitution.
5. As a solution, we can still create the National Consultative Council (NCC), with the focus on building economic, political, and social path for a better nation without touching the rights of any other race that is stated in the Federal Constitution.
PUTRA PERKASA NEGARA
Ashraf Bin Rosli
Ketua Penerangan Parti PUTRA
