Guan Eng upset about being attacked for funding private Chinese schools
(MMO) – Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng today said that several parties that are unhappy with the government’s initiative to help Chinese private schools and the New Era University College are merely trying to paint the Pakatan Harapan (PH) administration in a bad light to incite racial tensions with two weeks to the Cameron Highlands by-election.
“It’s disappointing to see certain parties attacking the government’s education initiative in order to raise racial tensions just to win a by-election.
“These actions are in poor taste as it disrupts our efforts for an inclusive education system,” Lim said in a statement today.
He said that during the tabling of the 2019 Budget, the federal government had announced a RM625 million allocation for upgrading works for 11 types of schools, including Chinese independent schools, which received the lowest allocation of RM12 million.
In comparison, national schools will receive RM250 million next year for the same purpose, while national-type Chinese primary school and Tamil primary schools will each receive RM50 million, full boarding schools RM50 million, Maktab Rendah Sains Mara RM50 million, mission schools RM50 million, government-aided religious schools RM50 million, tahfiz schools RM50 million, registered religious pondok schools RM25 million, and national-type Chinese secondary schools RM15 million.
A month later in December, Lim announced a special allocation of RM6 million by the federal government for three non-profit private colleges: the Southern University College (Johor), New Era (Selangor) and Han Chiang University College (Penang).
The money was intended for the colleges’ development budget this year.
However the initiative was seen as controversial and political opponents took to social media to question the government’s motives.
Lim said the Finance Ministry also gave RM15 million to University Islam Antarabangsa (UIM), a non-profit private tertiary education institution.
“Unlike the Barisan Nasional (BN) government before who spent between RM30 million to RM69.25 million on Tunku Abdul Rahman University College (KUTAR) between 2012 and 2018, we lowered our allocation for KUTAR to RM5.5 million to deter political influences from MCA.
“Because of that, I’m labelled anti-Chinese and pro-Malay. So if the Finance Ministry gives KUTAR RM30 million and MCA agree to drop its ownership of KUTAR will I then be labelled as pro-Chinese and anti-Malay?” he asked.
“As an administration that’s truly inclusive, we hope the people will support our education initiatives to help our economic development.
“The Finance Ministry’s RM15 million allocation to UIM should not be politicised like the RM2 million given to New Era unless you’re trying to stoke tensions and religious extremism,” he said.
