KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 23 — A leader of Datuk Ibrahim Ali’s political party Putra today sued the Malaysian government in a bid to convert vernacular schools into schools that use Bahasa Melayu to teach students.
Parti Bumiputera Perkasa Malaysia (Putra) vice-president Mohd Khairul Azam Abdul Aziz said he had filed the lawsuit at the Federal Court under the Federal Constitution’s Article 4(4), where he sought for the apex court to decide if vernacular schools and the law that established them are constitutional.
“Through that notice of motion, I am seeking a declaration that Parliament has no power to enact Section 17 and Section 28 of the Education Act 1996 that established Vernacular Schools as it is against Article 152(1)(a) of the Constitution,” he said in a statement today.
Under the Education Act, Section 17 states that the national language shall be the main medium of instruction in all educational institutions in the National Education System, except for national-type schools created under Section 28 or others given exemption by the education minister.
Also under Section 17, educational institutions that do not use the national language as the main medium of instruction have to teach it as a compulsory subject.
Section 28 enables the education minister to establish both national schools and national-type schools. (National-type schools are defined in the Education Act as primary schools using Chinese or Tamil as the main medium of instruction, and where the national language and English are compulsory subjects.)
A check of the Federal Constitution shows Article 152(1)(a) as stating that the national language shall be the Malay language and that no person shall be prohibited or prevented from using (except for official purposes) or from teaching or learning any other language.
Citing Article 152(1)(a) and a Federal Court decision in 1986 in the Merdeka University case, Mohd Khairul Azam claimed that it is mandatory for public bodies such as schools established by the government to use Bahasa Melayu as the medium of instruction.
“I don’t deny the constitutional right of the minority ethnicities to learn and teach the mother tongue of their ethnicity.
“What I question is as a government agency, vernacular schools cannot use languages other than the national language as the main medium of instruction,” he claimed.
Mohd Khairul Azam also outlined what he wants to do if he succeeds in challenging the legality of vernacular schools.
“If the court allows my application and declares that vernacular schools are not constitutional, then I will apply for all existing Vernacular Schools to be renamed as National Schools and use Bahasa Melayu as the main medium of instruction, no longer the respective mother tongues,” he said.
He also said that a court decision in his favour would allegedly block the channelling of the government’s allocation in Budget 2020 to vernacular schools, further claiming that all government funds that had in the past been given to vernacular schools should in such a situation be returned to the government.
He asserted that his lawsuit was filed purely on legal issues and to uphold the Federal Constitution, saying it should not be played up as a racial matter.
He concluded by saying that he hoped that his lawsuit would enable Malaysians to have certainty on whether vernacular schools are valid or illegal from a constitutional point of view.
