THE storm in a teacup last week on the education minister is a mountain out of a molehill.

This particular storm was unfortunately started by the minister himself, whose dialogue session with a group of university students started innocently enough.

But the good YB went a little off tangent and included hiring requirements for Mandarin in a discussion about university placements, which revived a dead horse – matriculation, only put to rest a week ago, after Cabinet intervention.

The comparison between Mandarin and a Bumiputra quota doesn’t make sense. One is an acquirable skill, the other a constitutionally defined group.

If anything, connecting Bahasa Malaysia to quotas would make more sense, as speaking habitually is one of the three prerequisites to be a Bumiputra.

A lack of knowledge in Mandarin can be remedied by attending a short course in nearly any public or private educational institution.

That being said, the misuse of language requirements as a smokescreen for racist hiring practices, is unethical, destructive to nation building, and must be stopped.

The tendency of parents to send their kids to schools based on race is an issue no one talks about or is willing to address, in the name of liberty of education, and historic and nostalgic ties to their alma mater, or community, apart from the obvious political ramifications.

The evolution of syllabus to cater for various vernacular schools, the explicit or implied imposition of the educator’s personal values and beliefs and the mingling of students with mostly their own community, slowly and surely corrodes the harmony built by our first few generations that studied, worked and played together.

This primary and secondary growing divide is then continued into university and if we continue to drift apart at the workplace, Malaysia could end up as a country of various peoples living apart, sharing little more than a geographic location and national infrastructure.

The first few bridges to correct this, or at least the display of political will to do it, was already announced by Maszlee Malik even last year, but the communication of it seems to have been less effective.

To its credit, the Education Ministry has done quite a lot since the change of leadership last year, but much of the attention to the minister is focused on his gaffes and political gags, mostly stemming from his tendency of being misquoted, misrepresented or poor attempts pulling of a misplaced wisecrack, or 10.

Some nagging issues, like PTPTN, needs to be put to rest. A decisive, final strategy needs to be put in place to cease the unnecessary noise and the distraction caused by it, which leaves other key issues that requires much more attention, with less.

There will not be a solution that pleases everybody, but for starters, they could catalogue the borrowers and profile them.

Those who truly cannot afford to pay could be granted discounts, partial waivers, or their payments could be staggered or placed on hold.

PTPTN itself could be restructured, instead of a revolving fund, that has a huge sinkhole in it, it could be built up properly into the investment-linked fund it was trying to evolve into under the previous administration.

The team that got the fund into its present problem should not be expected to solve it; neither would people with vested political interests.

Like the GLCs, PTPTN should be cleaned up by a team of professionals. We have such resources locally, with many successful funds that outperform their foreign counterparts, like the Armed Forces Pension fund.

Although more altruistic in nature than say, a financial institution, there should also be better form of risk management, via instruments such as co-borrowing or borrower’s insurance.

There are practical solutions for most problems we face today in New Malaysia, even those within perceived problematic areas like education.

What’s lacking is the real political will to solve it, which includes stepping out of narrow racial or communal lenses every once in a while, and solving problems as a nation should. – May 22, 2019.

* Emmanuel Joseph firmly believes that Klang is the best place on Earth, and that motivated people can do far more good than any leader with motive.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.