Dong Zong seeks dialogue with clan associations on mother-tongue education
The United Chinese School Committees' Association of Malaysia (Dong Zong) will seek to meet with seven Chinese community groups which were seen openly supporting the government's policy on Chinese education in recent months.
Dong Zong deputy president Dr Yap Sin Thian said the association was "appalled" by the statements made by the seven organisations, particularly one made during last month's Ketari state by-election.
The seven organisations had reportedly said then that they were satisfied with the government's assurance about not shutting down Chinese schools and that the issue should not be debated in the open due to its sensitiveness.
"Maybe they were given a shallow depiction of how Chinese schools are treated in the country. Perhaps the dialogue session that we propose will give them a better understanding of the issue," said Yap when contacted.
Yap added that Dong Zong has yet to send an invitation to the seven Chinese organisations, each representing one dialect clan in Malaysia Kwang Tong, Hokkien, Teo Chew, Hainan, Hakka, Kwang Si, and San Jiang.
The call for a dialogue session was among the five resolutions adopted at a Dong Zong quarterly meeting in Selangor yesterday, which also saw the organisation reaffirming its support for converting a newly completed Vision School in Subang Jaya into a Chinese primary school as demanded by local residents and, the reopening of the original site of SJK(C) Damansara which closed down early last year.
The other two resolutions opposed the implementation of Vision School, a government proposal to house schools of different teaching medium each in the same compound; and urged the government to drop the 'ultimate objective' of using only Bahasa Melayu as the teaching medium from the 1996 Education Act.
Loggerhead
When asked, Yap said Dong Zong, which has been at loggerhead with the government over the status of mother-tongue education on different occasions, was confident that all parties concerned will be able to "clarify the issue of Chinese schools" among themselves.
"After all, many of them were working closely with us on the Suqiu," he said.
Suqiu, or the Malaysian Chinese Organisations' Election Appeals, was a 17-point memorandum presented to the government before the 1999 general elections urging for a fairer and more just Malaysia. The key leaders subsequently backed down when certain appeals, especially one which called for the abolishment of bumiputra privileges, came under fire from the Umno-led government.
Meanwhile, Federation of Hainan Associations of Malaysia president Chiang Jwee Min told malaysiakini that they welcomed Dong Zong's proposal for a dialogue.
"It is possible that Dong Zong misunderstood us based on the news reports. I'm sure that we can work out the differences," he said.
Last month, the seven clan organisations had jointly held a gala dinner in conjunction with Chinese New Year celebration for Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad and praised the premier for his moderate administration.
In January, the same clan leaders, a day after meeting Mahathir, also declared Chinese education off-limits as a by-election campaign issue and asked the opposition Keadilan, which was contesting for the Indera Kayangan state seat then, not to use it as campaign fodder.
Mahathir, who once likened "certain Chinese education groups" to communist extremist two years ago, had reportedly met different Chinese community leaders in the past few months.
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