PETALING JAYA: The Sarawak government will not politicise education as it is not beneficial to the state and its people, says Sarawak premier Abang Johari Openg.
“The moment you politicise education, there will be no end to the reactions and counter-reactions, and the country will decline,” he said in a Malay Mail report.
“We want the county to rise. If we use education to raise our standard of living, then it is the tool by which we move forward.
“It should not be treated as a tool to be politicised.”
Speaking at the closing of the 10th Malaysian Chinese Independent Schools Ball Games Championship in Kuching, Abang Johari also highlighted the importance placed by the state government on Chinese education.
Among others, it recognises the Unified Examination Certificate (UEC) issued by Chinese independent schools and helps to construct buildings for Chinese schools.
Apart from allocating RM10 million annually to Chinese independent schools, Abang Johari said the state government had also given the schools land to generate income.
He said the state government had also set up international schools based on the Cambridge syllabus and established institutions of higher learning such as University of Technology Sarawak and the Swinburne and Curtin universities – where their assets are owned by the state government but their programmes are drawn up by their main campuses in Australia.
“If we want to increase the household income of the people, the state government must provide good quality education,” he said.
Earlier this month, Abang Johari said Sarawak is investing heavily in education as it wants to produce talented Sarawakians to help it achieve a high income state status by 2030.
Speaking at University of Technology Sarawak’s convocation ceremony, he said the state government is investing in educational infrastructure by setting up international schools to be “competent and competitive”.
–FMT