Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad is looking to resurrect his Vision School model in a bid to develop national unity and integration among Malaysia's school-going youths.

He stated that the new Pakatan Harapan government will look into a system to enable all three types of schools currently operating in the country - national, Tamil and Chinese-type schools - to operate in shared complexes.

This, he was quoted saying by the Malay Mail, was as the government could not afford "politically" to get rid of the current multi-school system as "that is what the people wanted".

“Because we have three types of schools, achieving national unity and integration was difficult because the political situation was based on racial needs.

“We politically cannot afford to get rid of these three types of schools unless the request comes from the people,” Mahathir said.

Elaborating on the proposal, the premier stated that all three types of schools could maintain the medium of instruction in their respective mother tongues, but could share in sports and extra-curricular activities.

This is similar to the Vision School programme conceptualised by Mahathir in 2000 and implemented during his first stint as prime minister - where vernacular and national-type primary schools were placed under one roof in order to promote racial integration.

It was, however, met with resistance from education lobby groups who feared the move would encroach on minority groups rights to mother tongue education and force a monolingual system for all.

Mahathir is in Indonesia in his first official visit to the neighbouring country since the 14th general election and had been fielding questions from audiences during a dinner with Malaysians living there.

During the dinner, Mahathir also reportedly called on the need for a revamp on the "out-of-date" education system in order to reduce reliance on teachers.

This was as, he said, not all teachers were of the same calibre and efforts should be made to shift their role towards those of facilitators.

He was quoted by the Malay Mail as saying: "I am aware that our education system is out of date and not suitable for the modern world. We are still too dependent on teachers but not all teachers are of the same strength. If students get a good teacher, then all is well. But if they get a weak teacher, then that’s where the problem starts.

“We want experts to teach our child via discs or thumb drives which contain the materials for students to learn from. Then all students are taught through the same standards. Teachers will end up as facilitators."

When contacted, Education Minister Maszlee Malik told Malaysiakini that he would seek further clarification from Mahathir on the proposals.