Parliament rejects motion on latest racist episode
By Clara Chooi, The Malaysian Insider
KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 30 — Dewan Rakyat Speaker Tan Sri Pandikar Amin Mulia thwarted a DAP MP’s attempt to raise the latest racist schoolteacher episode in Parliament today, claiming that the Education Ministry was already on the case.
The motion, raised by Er Teck Hwa (DAP-Bakri) in his notice to the Speaker’s office yesterday, was rejected in chambers today for failing to fulfil one of the three criteria needed to proceed with the matter.
In his letter to Er, Pandikar explained that motion was not “urgent”, claiming that he had been informed that the Education Ministry had already formed a special committee to look into the incident.
“On this grounds, I reject YB’s motion in chambers,” he said in the letter, which was made available to the media in Parliament this afternoon.
In the House earlier, when Question Time concluded, Er stood up to protest against the Speaker’s decision but was shot down by Deputy Speaker Datuk Ronald Kiandee.
“The Speaker’s decision is final,” he told Er.
In the latest incident on November 24, a teacher, who was invigilating in the SPM examination at a school in Lukut, Negri Sembilan, had allegedly uttered racial slurs against the Indian and Chinese communities.
The teacher, reportedly from a secondary school in Port Dickson, had purportedly censured the Indian and Chinese students when they arrived late to the examination hall by telling the Chinese to return to China and the Indians to India if they failed to understand her instructions in Bahasa Malaysia.
The incident is one in many other similarly racially-charged episodes involving civil servants over which the Najib administration has been constantly accused of failing to act on.
In his prepared text to protest the rejection of his motion today, Er pointed to Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin’s statement in the media that despite being the education minister, he did not have to power to take action against civil servants on Grade 48 and above.
“If what the minister said is true, then what is the use of the ministry’s formation of a committee when the minister himself does not have the power to take action against these civil servants?” Er asked.
He added that in the latest incident, the teacher had emotionally disturbed the students who were taking their SPM examination at the time.
“The students’ minds have also been poisoned by these racist statements, which are in contravention of the country’s education objectives to foster racial unity in schools.
“These statements are still being made by teachers and no drastic action has ever been taken by the ministry to prevent this from recurring.
“I am sure that the elected representatives in the House who are equally as concerned for the people as I am would follow me in condemning this latest episode or any other statement aimed at destroying racial unity for personal gains,” he said.
At a press conference later, Er reiterated the opposition’s call for the government to enact a Race Relations Act as an avenue to punish those guilty of attempting to disrupt national unity as well as to prevent similar incidents from recurring.
