PKR trio lament a missed '1Malaysia' opportunity
A slew of PKR youth leaders expressed their disappointment that the National Registration Department has spurned what they see as a “commendable attempt” to ease the cramp of narrow race identification on future generations of Malaysians.
A slew of PKR youth leaders expressed their disappointment that the National Registration Department has spurned what they see as a “commendable attempt” to ease the cramp of narrow race identification on future generations of Malaysians.
PKR vice-presidents Nurul Izzah Anwar and N Surendran, and Penang state legislator Sim Tze Tzin, were moved to comment on the NRD’s refusal to allow their Pakatan Rakyat colleague, Hannah Yeoh, and her husband, M Ramachandran, to register their newborn as an ‘Anak Malaysia’.
“This is sad,” offered Nurul Izzah, who is MP of Lembah Pantai, who is herself the mother of two kids.
“Hannah and Ramachandran’s baby is Sino-Indian but that term doesn’t qualify as a recognised race category,” continued Nurul.
“Their request that their baby’s race be rendered as ‘Anak Malaysia’ is a commendable attempt to ease the constraints of narrow race identification on future generations,” she commented.
Gender equality
Nurul’s fellow PKR vice-president Surendran chimed in to endorse her view, describing Hannah and Ramachandran’s attempt at floating a new category of citizen as “refreshing” and “simply compelling for its novelty.”
“Besides, the attempt enjoys the additional distinction of promoting gender equality,” opined the human rights lawyer.
“If they were to categorise their baby as Indian that would smack of patriarchy and if Chinese, it would reek of matriarchalism,” he remarked.
“Calling the baby ‘Anak Malaysia’ is gender equality at its best and what’s more, it allows for a liberating new beginning in race relations in Malaysia,” he elaborated.
“It’s a pity the dullards in bureaucracy are out of sync with the desire of a Malaysian couple who want to start the process of freeing Malaysians from the shackles of a too narrow definition of race,” chortled Surendran.
‘Imagination at its fetching best’
Sim Tze Tzin, PKR state assemblyperson for Bayan Baru in Penang, said he was dismayed that Hannah and Ramachandran did not succeed in moving the bureaucrats in NRD to see things the way the young couple did in wanting their baby called by the novel category of ‘Anak Malaysia’.
“It is imagination at its fetching best,” remarked Sim, about Hannah and Ramachandran’s failed attempt.
“I’m sorry to hear that the imagination displayed by Hannah and Ramachandran has been given short shrift,” he said.
“But who’s knows, the future may bring another attempt which may issue in a different conclusion.
“You can’t blame me - I persist in the hope of a new Malaysia waiting to be born,” added the 35-year-old engineering graduate.
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