My heart was crushed when I learned that the so-called Barisan Nasional 'consensus' was to proceed with the implementation of teaching Mathematics and Science in English. Knowing our government, I was surprised at myself for actually holding out any hope at all.

On closer scrutiny, my feelings of despair could have been compounded by the 'democratic' manner in which the decision was taken. It was very clear that the idea was rejected by large segments of society from the beginning. Do the people have any say at all?

Umno's past education policies had wrought the present predicament on Malaysians. When we have everything going for us then, the government decided to go against the grain and 'remove' English from our lives. Now that countries like Singapore, Thailand and even Indonesia are seeing the need to improve the teaching of the Chinese language, the twisted minds of our leaders see the logic of going the other way! It's committing a folly all over again.

Let's imagine there is a large country to our north with more than a billion people. That country is galloping ahead economically and present a huge potential to our own growth. That country has one of the largest economies in the world and is expected to overtake the United States as the largest in the not too distant future. And now imagine that country as France.

Will our leaders then be scrambling to have French taught in our schools?

The leaders in Umno have to rid themselves of past prejudices and distrust for anything Chinese. We need them to be magnanimous enough to see beyond race and do the right thing, for our future is in their hands.

PS, I do not write or speak Chinese.