I urge Minister of Education Dr. Mazslee Malik to merge Sijil Tinggi Persekolahan Malaysia (STPM) with matriculation program and abolish racial quota in pre-university admission system. This is to respect our constitutional rights to education for all without discrimination.
DAPSY is pleased with the offer made by Ministry of Education on 1,000 special places for outstanding Chinese Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) students from the B40 lower income group to the 2018/2019 session matriculation program. This initiative should be praised for improving equality within the education system. However, it is not a long-term solution that will be sustainable.
In 1974, UKM started its own matriculation program to address racial imbalance issue in public universities. This initiative aimed at enrolling more bumiputra students in public universities and was adopted by the others like Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM), Universiti Malaya (UM) and so on. In 2000, the Ministry of Education took over the and standardize all the matriculation programs.
To resolve racial imbalance in public universities, the previous government had implemented racial quota admission system for matriculation program. However, this affirmative action was not ended even though racial imbalance issue was resolved long ago. The existing racial quota admission system to matriculation program has been used for 45 years and it is seriously depriving non-bumiputra’s constitutional rights to education. Looking at the present situation, racial quota in access to education is no longer justifiable, fair, reasonable and lawful.
Article 12(1) of the Federal Constitution states that “there shall be no discrimination against any citizen on the grounds only of religion, race, descent or place of birth in the administration of any educational institution maintained by a public authority, and, in particular, the admission of pupils or students or the payment of fees.” The abuse of racial quota admission system is not only against the principle of the Federal Constitution, but also violates the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).
DAPSY urges the Pakatan Harapan Government to merge Sijil Tinggi Persekolahan Malaysia (STPM) with matriculation program and to implement merit-based & need-based admission system that will assist qualified students from B40 regardless of their race.