The opposition parties in the Borneo states are demanding that control over education policy be returned to them in view of what they claim is neglect by the federal government resulting in their standard of education sharply declining.

           

“For the sake of our children’s future and their children’s future, the Sabah government has no alternative but to regain control of education in Sabah from the federal ministry,” said State Reform Party (Star) Sabah chief Jeffrey Kitingan in a statement on Tuesday.

 

He said any further delay and a whole generation of our students would be ‘sacrificed’ and their children would also be made to suffer due to the continued control over education in Sabah by the federal government.

 

The Bingkor state assemblyperson was commenting on the 2014 SPM results which showed that Sabah students performed poorly, ending up in last place for the whole country in the excellent results category.

 

Only 0.49 percent, or 158 students out of its 32,197 candidates, obtained excellent results compared to Kelantan which had 1.22 percent, or 314 students out of 31,123 candidates, scoring excellent results. Kelantan, which is in second-last position, had more than double the number of students with excellent results.

 

“This is a huge drop from the 2013 results when Sabah achieved a 1.22 percent rate of excellent results although it also finished last,” said Kitingan pointing out that Sabah also finished last in the average grade category with an average GPS of only 5.57 points which was miles below Putrajaya’s GPS of 4.03 points (top spot). 

 

This was also a decline from the 2013 results when Sabah achieved an average GPS of 5.30 points.

 

Sarawak wants control, too

 

“The downward spiral of Sabah’s education standards under the federal government leaves much to be desired and needs to be stopped with a change of administration and control.

 

“The Sabah government needs to reclaim control of education and chart the future and destiny of Sabahans on its own instead of relying on the federal government which is a proven failure,” he said.

 

In Kuching also on Tuesday, Sarawak PKR chief Baru Bian echoed similar sentiments, telling a news conference that control of Sarawak’s education policy which was surrendered to the federal government must be returned.

 

“Sarawakians were at one time known for their proficiency in English. Our forefathers who signed the Malaysia Agreement placed such a high importance on this that we maintained the right to have English as one of our official languages.

 

“This right has never been relinquished and rightly so,” he said, adding: “I repeat my call for Sarawak to take back the responsibility for the education of our younger generations as it appears that the standard began dropping when the late former chief minister Abdul Rahman Yaakub handed it over to the federal government.

 

“We will be able to do much better than the federal government which has only succeeded in producing two or three generations of Malaysians with poor English skills,” said the Ba’Kelalan state assemblyperson.

 

Students’ performance ‘scary’

 

He also expressed concern over the failure rate for English that has continued to increase.

 

Last Monday Sarawak’s Minister for Welfare, Women and Family Development Fatimah Abdullah described the failure rate in English amongst Sarawak students as “scary”.

 

“It is unrealistic to expect that next year’s results will be much different,” said Fatimah who is also in charge of state education.

 

She said that only 11.27 percent of candidates in Sarawak achieved an A minus in English in last year’s SPM compared with 13.5 percent at the national level.

 

A total of 23.16 percent of the state’s candidates, meanwhile, failed in English. The compared to a failure rate of 19.4 percent in 2013.

 

Fatimah stressed the need to make more efforts to ensure that Sarawak students mastered English in addition to Bahasa Malaysia and History.

 

This in view of the fact that beginning next year, all SPM candidates would have to pass English as well as Bahasa Malaysia and History to be qualified for an SPM certificate, she said