I refer to the Malaysiakini article Avoid decline and fall of UM .

I am a graduate from UM and I have few things to add. I believe UM's status hasn't dropped that much, but the thing is they are staying at their comfort zone. The other universities are getting better and better but UM is still staying in their comfort zone and continuing to dream.

While I was studying in UM, UM spent millions of ringgit every year to improve their so-called quality of education. But they only concentrated on the image not on actual quality. Millions was spend to renovate buildings, upgrade roads and beautify the landscape. New buildings were erected with the latest architectural design.

I still remember when in 2004 they spent millions for that year’s Merdeka celebration by displaying hundreds of the Jalur Gemilang flags and renovating many parts of UM. There's nothing wrong with celebrating Merdaka or having necessary renovations done but the thing is UM has failed to improve the core of its education and research facilities.

The labs are not up to date. The worst are the engineering labs some of which are using 20-year-old equipment. How are the students supposed to compete with the rest of the world? A lab assistant told me that they had been requesting for new equipment for many years but the reply was always ‘no budget’.

So where the heck did they get the money to beautify UM? In some universities in India, lectures are conducted in classes with no air-conditioning and on old benches but their labs are equipped with state-of-the-art equipment. No wonder they have among the best engineering and computer studies in the world.

The main problem with our universities (and many Malaysian policies)is that they concentrate on the outer look and not on inner quality. They believe that by making the university look great on the outside, they can raise the their world rankings higher. If their main priority was to improve their quality of education, I'm sure they would spend lesser time on beautifying their image.

Another big mistake UM is doing is that they are letting go of all their good lecturers. Instead of giving them a counter-offer and persuading them to stay on, their tidak apa attitude results in these good lecturers being grabbed by many other international universities.

It's so pitiful. What are left behind are lecturers who only know how read out from their presentation slides word for word, lecturers who always come late to class, lecturers who love to talk about their life and lecturers who simply know nothing at all.

When is UM going to come out from under its coconut shell? Only God knows when that will happen.