Zainudin Maidin also criticises PM for his opportunistic response to the Chinese and Indians over the 'pendatang' issue at the expense of the feelings of the Malays.
If the Chinese in Malaysia want to shed their “pendatang” (immigrant) image, they should make the effort to become fluent in Bahasa Melayu (BM), the country’s official national language, said former Information Minister Zainuddin Maidin.
Taking to Twitter on Wednesday, Zam, as he is also popularly knowns, said it was not hard to satisfy the Malays; “if a non-Malay is fluent in Bahasa, the Malays will forget where he or she is from.”
He compared the Chinese in the country to the Indians, who according to him spoke BM so fluently that the Malays were not reminded of their immigrant heritage.
He attributed this to the fact that “most Indian children attended public schools from primary level.”
He also had a bone to pick with Wong Chun Wai, telling the managing director of The Star that instead of pushing for the return of English medium schools, it was better if he encouraged members of his own community to brush-up on BM instead.
“He’d (Wong) better focus his efforts on encouraging the Chinese to be fluent in BM instead. After 50 years of Independence, their command of BM is still poor. Shame on you sir!”
Zam, who was also the former chief editor of Utusan Melayu, suggested Wong’s newspaper run a campaign to promote fluency in BM among the Chinese, so they could shed their ‘pendatang’ identity, just like Indonesian Chinese had because they took pains to attain fluency in their country’s national language.
Zainuddin also launched an attack on Prime Minister Najib Razak, who he accused of trying to appease the Chinese and Indians at the expense of the feelings of the Malays.
“When speaking to the Chinese, Najib promises not to abolished their Chinese schools, when speaking to the Indians he reminds the Malays to stop calling them ‘pendatang’. He doesn’t care about the feelings of the Malays,” Zainuddin said.
He added, “PM Najib urges everyone to stop referring to the non-Malays as ‘pendatang’. This flies in the face of what the National Civics Bureau (BTN) director said. Najib will say anything to appease the non-Malays as the Malays have stopped supporting him.”
He also suggested Najib sack the BTN director so he could become even more popular with the Chinese and Indians.
“To garner more popularity, Najib should just sack the BTN director who dredged up the ‘pendatang’ issue. Datuk, why are you kicking a man who is already feeble?”
