The results from last month's nationwide campus election, which saw pro-establishment student groups win control of all but one university, meant 'nothing', according to former Malaysian Youth Council (MYC) president Saifuddin Abdullah.

Describing the affair as sekolah menengah (secondary school) standard, Saifuddin said that the manner which the elections were carried out has degraded over the years and has driven away potentially good student leaders.

"To me the results doesn't mean anything. You can already predict the results before the elections was held.

"It was not really an election that befits to be called a university election. It was more a sekolah menengah election," he told malaysiakini after speaking at a seminar organised by the Abolish UUCA Movement (GMA) in Gombak, Kuala Lumpur today.

Last month, student groups representing the pro-establishment, or the 'Aspirasi' camp, won a total of 16 of 17 universities that held campus elections. Only Universiti Islam Antarabangsa (UIA) bucked the trend, winning 28 of a total of 32 seats.

The closest to mounting a challenge was Johor's Universiti Teknoloji Malaysia, where the anti-establishment student group won 18 seats to Aspirasi's 27 seats.

Saifuddin ( photo, right ), a former student activist, said the heavy-handed approach by university authorities, coupled with student apathy have resulted in a drop in the quality of student leaders.

"There are good candidates who did not stand for election because they know that this is not really a free election."

"Because so much of the election process is controlled, potentially good student leaders will ask themselves 'Why waste time? I might as well do other things."

Too much constraint

Since 2003, anti-establishment groups have cried foul over election regulations that were introduced by university authorities nationwide.

The regulations, which are said to be stricter with each passing year, include restricting campaigning to one day, limiting speeches to five minutes for each candidate and shutting down hostels the night before elections.

"There is too much constraints. A good university student leader would be able to speak on average of 15 minutes with solid points and facts. If you restrict them to only five minutes, this is like debating in (high) school."

Saifuddin, who is a columnist with Berita Harian , said while election committee needs to be managed by university authorities, he said it should be expanded to include professors, former student leaders and alumni.

Meanwhile, Saifuddin said he was 'sad' over think-tank Asian Strategy and Leadership Institute (Asli) director Dr Lim Teck Ghee's shock resignation who quit in protest over the controversy involving his research findings on bumiputera equity.

On Tuesday, Asli president Mirzan Mahathir issued a apology over a report based on last year's Bursa Malaysia, which stated that bumiputera corporate equity was at 45 percent, thus nullifying the need for the affirmative action-based New Economic Policy (NEP). Mirzan had described the report as "flawed" and not "vigorously justified".

Asli issue very sad

In immediate response, Lim, who was the director for Asli's Centre for Public Policy Studies resigned, but said he stood by his findings.

"I think this is a sad thing. This simply shows that we don't have a culture where we don't accept differences of opinion. There is no such thing as absolute truth in terms of the numbers of equity issue.

"We must have a culture of accepting differences of opinion. To me, it is not a matter of accepting Lim was right or whether Asli's statistics was right or wrong. If you want to debate, debate. Let's argue it out."

Saifuddin said Lim should not have resigned: "A researcher in Malaysia is a rare species. We should congratulate him for doing the research. He may be wrong, but that is okay, we can always refute. The fact that somebody has to resign, because his research and his opinion, that's just plain sad."