I refer to the letter National Service first, studies last?

It is hard to imagine how a government could be so inconsiderate and uncompassionate. We are referring to the callous policy of compelling Lower Six students to forego more than three months of their schoolwork in order to attend the so-called national service boot camps.

We call on the new education minister and his deputy from the MCA to tell us on what accepted educational principles is the government carrying out this irrational practice.

They may be able to spin out some flimsy reasons through some standard ‘cut-and-paste' reply by their officials.

In that case, it will be more than fair for us to call this not a Barisan Nasional government but a ‘Barisan Irrational' or ‘Barisan Inconsiderate' government.

We strongly and rightly feel that this ridiculous and unreasonable practice is an extreme injustice to the affected students. It destroys their spirit and will and without a single doubt will affect their studies as well as their performance in their STPM examination.

This is because under this enforced absent-from-school policy, the students will be forced to give up more than three months of their Lower Sixth Form studies in order to be present at the controversial boot camps.

This, as we know, amounts to anywhere from one-fifth to one-quarter of their STPM syllabus.

If they fall sick as a result of attendance at the camps (as not a few of them have) and take time to recover to good health, they could be absent from school for far longer than three months.

As a result, they could be missing anywhere from one-third to one-half or more of their syllabus and they will be at a great disadvantage.

Can the education and defence ministers and their officials tell us how this is not tantamount to a deliberate attempt to damage the students' future?

Is there a racial motive behind this policy of inconveniencing and handicapping our children just to line the pockets of the crony 'national service' contractors?

We would like to tell these authorities that our children are our precious possessions and we don't want to see them being subjected to unjust and irrational policies. What happens to even one child is felt by all of us and we stand united.

We now see that it is no small wonder that people have been voting for change in the past several by-elections. We won't be surprised if the trend continues for future by-elections and onto the general elections.