KL urged to accept Sabah’s decision on jawi lesson

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Chan (centre) attended a Christmas celebration with the Rukun Tetangga Zon Bandaraya Kota Kinabalu yesterday.

KOTA KINABALU: Member of Parliament for Kota Kinabalu, Chan Foong Hin, yesterday welcomed the Sabah State Cabinet’s decision regarding the teaching of jawi script in Sabah.

Chan was referring to a news report quoting Sabah Rural and Regional Development Minister Ewon Benedick as saying that the Sabah Cabinet, in a meeting recently, decided that jawi should be an optional subject and not included in the Bahasa Melayu syllabus.

“I totally agree with the Sabah government that jawi script lessons should be provided as a separate and standalone subject with separate classes from the mainstream Bahasa Malaysia subject.

“It should only be taught if and only if the students are interested and decide to learn them willingly without being forced to do so,” he told reporters after attending a Christmas celebration with the Rukun Tetangga Zon Bandaraya Kota Kinabalu at the Luyang multi-purpose hall yesterday.

Chan, who is also secretary of Democratic Action Party (DAP) Sabah, noted that it is a very wise decision by the Sabah government as making it optional does not deprive those who wish to learn the script the opportunity to do so.

“The federal government ought to listen to and accept the Sabah government’s decision which was made clearly and collectively by the Cabinet and recorded down in their minutes. This is in line with the state’s autonomy on education as enunciated under the Malaysia Agreement 1963 (MA63),” he said.

Chan also noted that prior to the usage of the roman script and alphabets, the jawi script was indeed used to write the Malay language and it has been used all over the nusantara region, including the Brunei and Sulu Sultanate previously.

“The jawi script is indeed recognised as part of the Malay language and no one is disputing that. However, as the roman script is currently more widely used and is sufficient for Malaysians to learn the Malay language, the jawi script ought not be made compulsory.”

“In fact making jawi script learning a separate subject which perhaps can be named ‘Advance Malay’ (just like Advance Mathematics), might even lead to more actual academic study into it and will have less disputes,” said Chan.

He added that at this stage, it would be better for the federal government to just do away with the substantive jawi lessons in the national Bahasa Malaysia subject and do the necessary adjustments to the syllabus.

“Sabah is one of the three regions forming Malaysia, and if the Sabah government has clearly made its stand on the teaching of jawi script, the federal government ought to respect the same,” he said.