JANUARY 21 — On January 18, 2017, Malaysians were alarmed with the "so-called" contention made by a professor from Harvard University, Professor Lant Prichett that our graduates are akin to Danish dropouts.

This was reported in a Free Malaysia Today (FMT) online portal entitled "Local Grads Only as Good as Danish High School Dropouts” narrated by Minderjeet Kaur on 18 January 2017. As expected, some Malaysians posted vicious comments lambasting the government and local universities for failing to produce high-quality graduates.

Ironically, the title of this article was changed to "Rote Learning a Bane in Tertiary Education, Harvard Professor warns” the day after. A few hours later, FMT released another article reporting that Professor Prichett clarified that he had no data on Malaysia and as such his statements "could not be construed as saying anything about Malaysia.”

The Harvard professor said he has not done any studies on Malaysia and therefore would not say anything about Malaysia tertiary graduates.

What is wrong with these kinds of Malaysians that quickly jump in the bandwagon whenever there is an opportunity to badmouth the country? Last week, Faiz Subri’s triumph at Puskas award was overshadowed by a number of Malaysians that questioned his English. They have forgotten the pride and glory this individual has bestowed upon the country.

Now, Minderjeet Kaur of FMT misquoted Prof Prichett’s claim on the quality of Malaysian graduates to bring shame upon the country. Sixty years of nationhood and many Malaysians have taken for granted something that they already have — citizenship.

Many Chinese and Indians in Brunei, Rohingyas in Myanmar as well as Palestinians in Lebanon and Syria, to-date, have been denied citizenship. Unlike Brunei, the Malaysian (then Malayan) government, upon independence in 1957, had provided citizenships to almost all Malayans regardless of race and religion, even if they originated from outside the Malay archipelago.

While other countries in the region were building military strength, Malaysia on the other hand was focusing on the enhancement of human resource. As a result, after 60 years of nationhood, Malaysia became a successful story — transformed a poor agricultural country into one of the largest trading nations in the world.

How was this made possible — through providing good policies on national education. The following facts show that the local graduates are not as bad as Danish dropouts: