A SARAWAK deputy minister wants the Malaysia Agreement 1963 (MA63) included in the school history textbooks and will be actively pushing for it.

Deputy Law, MA63 and State-Federal Relations Minister in the Premier’s Department Sharifah Hasidah Sayeed Aman Ghazali said Malaysian children should know what the agreement is all about, how the federation of Malaysia came into being and Sarawak and Sabah’s special rights in the agreement.

“This is one history we cannot deny ever taking place. It happened and, therefore, should be added to the school curriculum and be studied,” she said told reporters after opening a seminar on the history of Sarawak in Kuching today.

Earlier in her address, she said the early history of Sarawak and the historical Malay fishing village of Santubong, which was once an important trading post in Southeast Asia, was only included in the national curriculum in 1982.

She said what was in the textbook then was minimal and “not much could be presented until the curriculum overhaul in 2014 and 2017” when Sarawak’s history became a key element in the development of the school history curriculum.

Then, the Education Ministry took the initiative by inviting Sarawak historians as reference experts in jointly formulating the national history curriculum to ensure that the content in the syllabus aligns with Sarawak’s historical context.

Sharifah Hasidah said in facing the era of volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity, historical events should not be overlooked but rather serve as a reflection for the Sarawak people to identify the weaknesses and strengths faced by the generations that came before the present ones.

Her call came on the heels of a viral video of a group of law students, including one from Sarawak, who in an interview on the MA63, showed they did not have an idea of what the agreement was all about. – September 13, 2023.