It is doubtful that the governments move to offer Mandarin, Tamil and Arabic as optional second languages for primary school pupils will meet the objective of attracting more non-Malay Malaysian pupil enrollment.

DAP described the move as a step in the right direction in Make additional language studies compulsory: DAP (April 7).

More subjects in English, without downplaying the importance of Malay, will go further in meeting this objective. You may ask why the emphasis on the language of a colonial master?

English does not belong to the British anymore. It belongs to no one but to everyone in the world that speaks it.

In this wired world, everyone who does not have a good command of the language stands to lose. More so now than ever as the world becomes a global village. From airline pilots to physicists and anyone who surfs the Web, English is all important!

Language is cultural marker, and English a universal one. Those who have a good command of the language have continual access to knowledge and communication with the rest of the world.

When English was the lingua franca in schools 40 years ago, there was no racial polarisation. There was no need for vision schools to physically integrate the students who were already socially integrated. Maybe a leaf from history could be taken to understand our education problem today.