Parents lodge complaint over SPM invigilator who insulted students in exam hall
By Sarban Singh, The Star
PORT DICKSON: A police report has been lodged against a teacher who allegedly made racist remarks in front of some 180 students at a school examination hall in Lukut, near here, on Wednesday morning.
Teluk Kemang MIC Youth chief A. Achutan led a group of parents from SM Raja Jumaat to lodge the report at the district police station here yesterday.
The woman teacher, assigned to the school as chief invigilator for the Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia examination, has since apologised to the students but the parents decided on the police report as “we do not want such an incident to recur.”
A parent, M. Prabhakaran, alleged that the teacher had told some students who had been noisy before the examination to “return to China and India.”
“The teacher was apparently making an announcement over the microphone when she made the remarks.
“She seemed annoyed when some of the students paid no heed to what she was saying,” said Prabhakaran, adding that she had allegedly repeated the racist remarks several times.
“The students were disturbed by what she said. How can you make such remarks before teenagers, especially when they are about to sit for an examination?” he asked, adding that the students then reported the matter to school headmaster Cheah Les Ngan.
Prabhakaran, who teaches at another school, said the headmaster and several teachers met the invigilator over the issue and advised her to return to the hall and apologise to the students.
Neither Cheah nor state education director Abdul Halim Abdul Talib, who was away, could be reached for comments.
District police chief Supt Baljeet Singh confirmed that a report had been lodged and said the police would record statements from the relevant people.
The incident here followed two high-profile cases involving two principals in Johor and Kedah, both of whom were suspended and then removed from their schools after allegedly making racist remarks against their students.
Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Nazri Abdul Aziz told Parliament early this month that it was the first time in the civil service that government officials had been cited for racism.
