KUALA LUMPUR, March 12 — The absence of Malaysian universities in the Times Higher Education (THE) World Reputation Ranking 2015 is a strong indicator that local varsities are still unable to convince Malaysians to study locally, a DAP lawmaker said today.

Serdang MP Dr Ong Kian Ming admitted that making it to the top-100 universities in the world on the list is not a defining factor for any university, but at the same time should not be ignored.

“Perhaps that is the ultimate challenge for Idris Jusoh — to improve our local universities to the extent that high performing Malaysian students would prefer to stay home than to go abroad to pursue their university education,” he said in a press statement, referring to Second Education Minister Datuk Seri Idris Jusoh.

This year’s annual THE reputation rankings did not list any Malaysian university among the top-100 schools in the world or in Asia, nor did a local varsity make it among the top-100 universities aged under 50 years.

Ong today said that it would do no good to be obsessed with university rankings, but stressed that does not mean the authorities should shrug off such findings.

“I have gone on record to say that we are sometimes too obsessed with university rankings. I do not feel that Idris Jusoh needs to defend the absence of Malaysian universities in the Top 100 lists of the Times Higher Education world university rankings.

“But he should not need university rankings to tell him that our local public and private universities are far from being world class and that almost all top students prefer to study in world class universities overseas rather than stay in Malaysia,” he said.

On February 21, Idris declared that Malaysia’s higher education system is now on par with advanced countries such as the United Kingdom, Germany and Australia in terms of quality of education.

The minister said this was proven by the fact that 11 public varsities here have been listed among the top-100 universities in the world if going by achievements in subjects.