THE recent appointment of the Education Minister Maszlee Malik as president of the International Islamic University of Malaysia (IIUM) certainly ruffled some feathers amongst many.

Despite the assurances given by the Pakatan Harapan (PH) government to not encourage political appointments to GLCs and by way of extension also to institutes of higher learning, this choice seems like another broken promise which one could argue is becoming a trend.

However, an appointment such as this also raises three other questions:

Is the talent pool in Malaysia so small?

There is no doubt that “brain drain” is a problem in Malaysia and we seem to lose many of our talents to foreign nations. Even then, from among the many Malaysians that occupy more than the 70 public and private universities in Malaysia, could we not find someone equally capable or perhaps even more capable than the honourable minister?

The appointment of a person who can influence others to certain positions for the purposes other than purely academic is not totally a new ball game. Even the University of Cambridge appointed Lord Sainsbury, a politician, businessman and philanthropist in 2011, recognising that funds for institutes of higher learning are running dry and people in this category increases the possibilities of “financial returns”.

If the intention is to make Malaysian universities great and competitive in the world, it must be supported by the government and surely not by appointing someone from the government or even a business entrepreneur.

Has the minister too much free time to also spearhead the affairs of a university?

Many people would agree that the state of public education is in a mess and needs much attention. It is not just that the curriculum needs revamp but the whole system of education in Malaysia needs to be looked into. I was recently at the barber shop and overheard this conversation between the barber and a student who was surely not more than 15 years old.

The student wanted the barber to style his hair in a particular way and the barber asked him whether his school would allow this. To my shock, the boy’s reply was, “No, the school does not allow but I can ‘kow-tim’ (settle) with the discipline teacher”. I sat at the next stool totally dumbfounded… a reflection of the dire need of a total overhaul to our system.

Perhaps, the honourable minister should devote his entire time into looking at the more urgent needs (other than changing the colour of school shoes), than spreading himself too thin even though choosing not to be paid for being the president. However magnanimous this may sound, it is certainly not worth arguing down this road.

What about intellectual freedom?

If any university is to flourish academically, there must be intellectual freedom to explore. Curtailing the creativity of the mind in no way will make any university great. With the appointment of a “political figure” as the head, any curbing of intellectual creativity, for whatever reasons, will be seen as political interference.

We have had an era where the universities were controlled to an extent that the word “intellectual freedom” did not exist among many Malaysian academicians. Those who courageously walked that path were either told to toe the line or find another job.

If there is going to be some change in the ways this country is going to be governed, then we need to start maturing and allowing people to think creatively and the university is an ideal locus for this.

We say, “justice should not only be done, but also seen to be done”, and therefore it is not enough for this new government to say that we want a new Malaysia but the policy decisions must also reflect a new Malaysia, a new way of thinking.

If we want to make Malaysia great again, we must not curtail intellectual freedom and allow creative minds to be at work.

There is so much to be done to rewire the Malaysian mindset and I am sure many of us would want to help in some way to achieve this. But if this going to be left only to a small pool of people, a sort of “political inbreeding”, we will not be going very far with the reforms that many Malaysian are hoping and expecting.

So, let politicians be politicians and academicians be academicians, there is much to be achieved for a better Malaysia. – September 17, 2018.

* Dr Clarence Devadass is a Catholic priest and director of the Catholic Research Centre in Kuala Lumpur. Moral education is an issue close to his heart. He focuses on paving resourceful ways to promote virtues for living in a multireligious society, for a significant life together.

* 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.