The prime minister suggests that racial polarisation is perpetuated by the growing vernacular schools and this draws flak from those who support vernacular education as a matter of right to mother-tongue education.

Maybe they are right too. The prime minister and all the Umno ministers will never admit that polarisation arises more out of the race-based policies and privileges one race gets over another.

The NEP has used a number of terminologies which have carved acceptance and sympathy in our minds for the necessity of so many of these policies and the manner in which these have been put to practice.

The ramifications in all this can be seen in the education demographics. Is it a surprise that hardly five percent of Chinese study in regular government schools? The Chinese educationists seem to think the demand for Chinese education has to do with its superiority over national-type education.

However, we should recognise that there was a time towards the late 1960s when the Chinese schools were in dire straits because of the preference for English-medium schools which were there for purely educational reasons - unlike today's national-type education which is there also for purely political reasons.

Leaders of MCA, MIC, Gerakan and DAP champion vernacular education as if it is something sanctimonious and sacred to maintaining their identity. However, one laughs at the hollowness of their arguments when one sees how soon new migrants to the West out of India and China are willing for their children to grow up with no link to mother-tongue education at all.

This so-called demand for vernacular education in Malaysia is more of a rejection of the alternative offered by the government than a preference for a better education system. If only all parties can come to terms with this, then maybe the polarisation factor can be stymied before it turns malignant.

Unfortunately, proponents of vernacular education prefer to romanticise mother-tongue education to the point that talking against it might even be taken to sound seditious.

Similarly, there are other areas of our daily lives where terminologies used have made us view certain practices as privileges rather than sacrifices. For instance, the bumiputera discount for houses.

When you say discount, it sounds like as if the developer gives a discount or takes a loss from the total sales. But really, that is not the case. The total sale value to the developer is still the same. It is just that the non-bumi buyer is likely to be required to pay for some of the discount given to the bumis.

Somehow looking at it this way, it may not sound savoury. But the longer the NEP's policies continue and the greater the vehemence with which Umno politicians issue threats , terminologies will change and more people will talk about these policies or practices in words that may not sound as pleasing to the ears of the beneficiaries.

Obviously, at that point we shall probably see a new round of disagreements and discriminations. Unfortunately, as long as only weak people take on leadership roles within Umno, threats will continue, NEP policies will be sustained and corruption will prevail.

That unfortunately is the legacy we have as Malaysians.