All BN parties support Vision School concept: Aziz
All parties in the ruling coalition, including MCA and Gerakan, have pledged their full support for the governments controversial Vision School project, reports said today.
Deputy Education Minister Abdul Aziz Samsuddin said the government hoped MCA and Gerakan would explain in detail the Vision School plan to the Chinese community to allay their fears over the issue.
When our ministry tried to implement the Vision school programme, we realised many people were still prejudiced against it, so we felt there was a need to solve this problem, said Abdul Aziz quoted by the Nanyang Siang Pau Chinese daily.
It was reported that Abdul Aziz had yesterday met representatives from ruling parties to discuss the Vision School concept a government proposal to place primary schools from different language mediums under one roof to promote racial integration.
The minister said the views given by the Barisan Nasional component party representatives at the meeting would be compiled into a report to help towards the implementation of Vision Schools.
The report would not be presented to the Cabinet as it has already approved the programme, he added.
Strong protests
Among those who attended yesterdays meeting were MCA secretary-general Dr Ting Chew Peh, Gerakan deputy president Kerk Choo Ting, and Deputy Education Minister Hon Choon Kim, who is an MCA central committee member.
Primary schools in the country are divided into two categories, national and national-type. The former uses Bahasa Malaysia as its medium of instruction while the latter use either Mandarin or Tamil.
First proposed in 1995, the Vision School concept has met with strong protests from Chinese educationists who claim the government wants to gradually rid the country of Chinese and Tamil schools. The government has denied this charge.
The issue became controversial when the opposition took up the cause of the Chinese educationists.
MCA and Gerakan then joined the fray with pledges to highlight to the government the Chinese communitys concern over the plan.
Autonomy guaranteed
Todays Sin Chew Jit Poh daily, meanwhile, quoted Abdul Aziz as saying the people were wary of Vision Schools because they had been influenced by certain quarters who did not fully understand the project or who were out to create trouble.
He explained that under the Vision School concept, schools of different language mediums were equal in all rights granted with the autonomy of each school administration guaranteed.
He said his ministry may also seek a meeting with several Chinese education movements which have been vocal against the Vision School concept.
They include the United Chinese School Committees Association of Malaysia or Dong Zong and the United Chinese School Teachers Association of Malaysia or Jiao Zong, said Abdul Aziz.
Sin Chew also quoted Ting as saying that yesterdays meeting was just an exchange of views between all BN component parties over the issue.
The final implementation of Vision Schools is up to the Cabinet, he reportedly said.
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