On rallies and interviews.

I have just watched the 101 East interview on Al-Jazeera, and here’s my take on part of it. Bear in mind that I wasn’t there for it because I was AFRAID. I WANTED to be there.

1) Water Canon and Tear Gas not equated to force: That is simply bullshit. ANY use of force, is a use of force. And that includes water canons and tear gas. And as Malik Imtiaz said, there was NO NEED to use force.

2) There is a historical background to not allowing marches: Oh really? Go visit Tok Mommy’s blog where the history of Malaysian marches is TRULY represented.

3) The police not allowing the rally because they feared violence: Well, isn’t that what the police and the FRU was there for? To stop violence. They could have done just that and nothing more. Instead, what did they do? Use unprecendented FORCE (water canon & tear gas) on a peaceful group of people taking a walk. Who perpetuated the violence? The police could have allowed the protest to go on, and be on the watch for violence, and used force ONLY where necessary. In this case, force was totally unnecessary, and the ONLY violence seen during the protest was from the police, not the demonstrators.

4) Media relegation: The fact the govenment think that the media needs to be relegated, whether by the gov, or by the press itself, says that we do not have a free press. Self relegation is still relegation.

5) Representation by the middle-of-the-road, non-political-affiliated citizens: More bullshit from the government. Imtiaz was correct when he said that the rally would have been larger if the roadblocks were not enforced. It would also have been larger if the government did not have a massive campaign to initimidate the middle-of-the-road, non-political-affiliated citizens. The repated announcements in the mainstream media of plans to arrest anyone who turns up, of possible violence, and the video clips of past violent riots being shown on television was a concerted effort by the government to discourage people to attend the rally. The huge show of force by the police and the FRU also contributed to the whole intimidation method. The road blocks and the huge presence of the FRU up to a day before the rally passed like wildfire over SMS from people who were in KL, not for the rally, to people whom they thought was going. I was planning to attend the rally. I was plagued with SMS’s from Friday night, warning me not to go, by people who cared for my safety. To say that we were not there because we didn’t care for the cause is wrong. We weren’t there because we feared for our safety. Trust me, the intimidation and the road blocks and the police blocks, and the LRT bypass and etc worked. Speaking for myself; it worked on me, on the friends I planned to go with, and their friends, and on other middle-of-the-road, non-political Malaysians.

Apex Universities

A search on google.com for ‘apex university’ produces 6 hits to Malaysia-linked websites on page 1. A brief browse of the next few pages reveal that the idea of apex universities, while not new… is not a well-used one. Most of the hits where the word ‘apex’ were linked to a university, merely represent the location of the university, an acronym of some sort, or the name of a sports team within the university. It is very obvious that the government’s sudden announcent of apex universities represent an attempt to increase the reputation of education in Malaysia much more than it is worth. Whether or not they are trying to create a local version of the ivy-league, oxbridge, redbrick or russel group is arguable. However, it is undeniable that none of our local universities qualify to compare with these highly-esteemed institutions. Our universities aren’t even fit to squat under their shadows.

The intentions of the government is unclear on the goal of apex universities and how they are going to accomplish it. If it is merely a measure of extra support, extra funding, and recognition – then all is fair. If it is meant as a pretence to compete with the creme de la creme of universities worldwide, then this whole charade is a farce. There may be some positive gain from it. It will encourage private universities to be more competitive in the race to become an apex university. This is probably a good thing for their students. If it means more funding and more support from the government, then obviously the students will stand to gain from it as well.

In the bigger picture, will it really benefit the fledging tertiary education industry of this country? Will our public universities compete in the same way the private ones will? Apart from the first five universities, the rest of the industry is barely 20 years old. ALL of the universities need support, funding and recognition. Giving a certain university more funding than another would be unfair to the rest. If anything, the weaker universities would need more support than the stronger ones. Is putting these young universities in a race for a meaningless title and pitting them against each other beneficial for the students? Now is not the time for our universities to go dog-eat-dog. Universities should be sharing resources and helping each other to improve.

I wrote in an earlier post about the ‘full circle‘ comment. In it, I mentioned that the majority of international students studying in Malaysia aren’t here to get a local degree. Most of them leave with degrees which contain the name of an overseas institution, most often of an Australian, American, or British University. See where I’m heading?

For our universities to be recognised as ‘good’ worldwide, it is not among the local universities that they must compete with. It is with every accredited university on this planet. So what if we have an apex university if its ranking worldwide is 1000th? The Acamedic Ranking of World Universities for 2007, doesn’t rank a single Malaysian University in the top 500. Neither does The QS World University Rankings by The Times. Not a single one of our universities are close to being competitive internationally.

Is there any reason to wonder at all why the undergraduates who can afford it get overseas degrees? Any reason to wonder why so many of our private colleges/universities offer twinning programmes, under which the student will end up with an overseas degree even if they study locally? As long as these private universities are awarding degrees not of their own name, they cannot achieve worldwide ranking because they do not get full credit for the quality of their degrees. And as long as the public universities don’t buck up to raise their standards instead of their intake, we will come NOWHERE close to competing on a world stage.

Where’s the apex? Are we reaching for the peak of Mount Everest? Swimming into the Marianna Trench? No we are not, we will be left flaundering at the base of the mountain (which we reached via helicopter) yet again. Victims of a government who have many ideas, none of which work. The government needs to increase support for education in this country, not to turn the whole idea of good quality tertiary education here into a comedy caper. Dearie me…. is this where I end the post with my signature phrase again? What you think is best for us, may not necessarily be good for us.