All vernacular and religious schools which are partially-aided schools in the country can be converted into fully-aided schools if the Education Ministry removes the mandatory clause that it should be on a minimum of 2.02 hectares of land.

Fully aided schools get all expenditure benefits including finance, infrastructures and teachers' salaries from the Education Ministry whereas partially aided schools only receive the teachers' salaries.

A partially aided school can hand control of its land to the Education Ministry which then pumps in the finance to uplift the school's status of infrastructure to that of a fully aided school.

rela civil suit shooting death 130906 a sivanesan In making the call DAP national labour bureau chief A Sivanesan ( right ) said this land clause defeats the whole purpose of converting partially aided Chinese, Tamil and religious schools into fully aided schools under the 1Malaysia concept propagated by Premier Najib Abdul Razak.

He pointed out that the 2.02 hectares of land clause to ensure that all schools have big playing fields is outdated as seen in countries like England, Japan, Korea and Singapore which make do with whatever space is available.

"These foreign countries have made good in the international arena of football whereas Malaysia with such a clause is still lagging way behind even behind Singapore."

"This land clause is a stumbling block to ensure that all Malaysians have a compulsory primary education with modern infrastructures and teaching facilities," he stressed.

The government has used Section 4 (for public interests purposes) of the (LAA) to acquire private land and even Malay reserve land for government related projects like highways, hospitals and national schools.

"Likewise does the BN government have the political will to use the Land Acquisition Act to acquire all the land where vernacular and religious schools are situated and change their status to that of fully aided schools?

Political wil

"Or is BN waiting for the slow natural demise of all vernacular schools in the country?" asked the DAP state vice-chairperson and Sungkai assemblyperson.

Sivanesan said that if Pakatan is voted in as the next federal government in the next general election, then all vernacular schools including religious schools will be restructured, reorganised and they will be extended the same benefits and privileges that national schools enjoy now.

He said of the 523 Tamil primary schools in the country only 35 percent are fully aided whereas the rest are either situated on private land or estate land.

The rapid development in the country has seen the sale of estates and fragmentation of other estates which has seen the migration of the Indian population into the urban or other areas.

Hence the majority of Tamil schools have a pupil enrolment of less than 100 and some schools even have less than 30 students.

"So why does the Education Ministry insist on the 2.02 hectare land clause even for such small student enrolments?" asked the DAP leader.

He said many Tamil schools that have low student numbers and are located deep inside estates can either be shifted closer to main roads or to areas which have big Indian populations.