'I personally do not think that it is necessary to dismantle the NEP. The NEP is not the problem. The problem is generally low standards of education.'

'Swift removal of affirmative action destabilising'

Onyourtoes: There is no reason for the private sector to discriminate. The private sector does business using its own money. Its objective is to ensure viability and profitability. Hence discrimination (in the sense of employing people with lesser ability) does not arise. Would you want to employ a lousy Chinese at the expense of a good Malay?

Universiti Malaya's Lee Hwok Aun says removing the NEP will destabilise many things, so what are you suggesting - maintain it for another 50 years?

Pemerhati: Lee said,"To completely do away with race-based affirmative action means taking away the matriculation colleges and some universities. It can be quite destabilising."

The quality of some of the Malay graduates is so low that they are an embarrassment to the many brilliant and able Malay graduates. One wonders if the graduate is of the calibre of Abdul Razak Musa of MACC or is he like Azmi Sharom of UM.

The problem can be easily solved if all applicants to tertiary institutions are selected after they sit for a common entrance examination and race is no longer a criteria for admission, as is done in almost every advanced democratic country in the world.

If that happens every Malay graduate will automatically earn the recognition he deserves as a graduate. The continuation of the unfair, discriminatory and racist policies after several decades of affirmative action only serves to make the non-Malays angry and the Malay graduates looked down upon.

HA Lee: Thanks for the comments. Permerhati, no, the problem will not be easily solved with meritocracy. I believe that is the direction we need to be heading, but to get there many more things need to be resolved before that, or at the same time.

A salient example is matriculation colleges and other pre-university programmes, which under-equip bumiputera students. These institutions need to be reformed, and perhaps a plan for a gradual scaling back of preferential selection into universities.

The disruption I refer to is the reaction from the youth and their families if they suddenly are unable to gain entry into university, after having hopes raised and been fed for decades an ideology that government will take care of you. You could say that that's fair, and in a sense you would be right. But would that stimulate a surge in student quality? I am not convinced that would easily happen.

Onyourtoes, I was discussing more broadly the troubling trend, in my view, of social segregation. Undoubtedly by choice, but it cannot be good for society for some groups to basically abandon the public schooling system, then largely pursue private tertiary education and work in the private sector, while the converse happens for other groups.

As you point out, the public sector should be representative of society. You've selected an easy case to illustrate the 'impossibility' of discrimination in competitive labour markets. Of course, hiring a lesser qualified person of one race over a more qualified person of another is glaringly discriminatory, counterproductive, and unlikely.

A more appropriate perspective of discrimination is to compare similarly qualified persons who only differ in race and to assess whether employers have a tendency to hire or promote people from one race over another. This is an empirical issue, but like or not, a lot of people have rigid perceptions about this.

Joker: The removal of affirmative action is only destabilising for the cronies because the majority of the Malays and real bumiputeras do not enjoy any perks anyway.

If the affirmative actions are really impactful and successful, we would have seen much more than 30 percent equity ownership by Malays and also a much bigger Malay middle-class.

Quigonbond: Right now, the race-based policy creates an effortless road for someone of a particular race to get to university. If a member of a race is poor, then the government should assist that individual - food, shelter, proper schooling - to give that member a fighting chance to get to the university programme of his/her choice.

That member of the race should not be given anything more that is not obtained through hard work, because it is just patently unfair to other more qualified candidates.

Destabilisation will only happen if the government is negligent in providing basic assistance to give someone a fighting chance - and it cannot be confined to race because there are poor Chinese and Indians, etc, just as there are poor Malays.

David Dass: I personally do not think that it is necessary to dismantle the NEP. The NEP is not the problem. The problem is generally low standards of education - exacerbated by the lower standard matriculation course and examinations and the lower proficiency of English. These problems should be addressed.

As for racial distribution in both the private and public sectors, the government should make it it's business to ensure a better distribution. My starting point for everything is that distribution of intelligence is the same across all races. And if there is a variation in standards between the races because of different exams or systems of education then examine these differences and improve them.

As in the old days, make government schools the best schools. Emphasise English as it is the universal language - there are 300 million Chinese who are now English language fluent and there is the same number for India. Is there any good reason for our continued ambivalence over the English language?

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