“YDP, you baca (read) ikrar (oath), and we follow you. Agree?”
That sentence alone makes me want to get this woman a decent education. I’m not at all claiming to have an amazing command of language myself. Then again, I don’t also claim to be supremely educated and deserving of respect that one gains from -apparently!– having a degree. Apparently what warrants you of respect these days in Malaysia is stealing someone’s microphone while they’re mid-speech. The headbopping culture certainly testifies.
Testify! 
For those who have absolutely no clue as to what I’m talking about, here’s this horrific video that accurately represents what’s going on in Malaysian society at a junior level. It however is synonymous with what’s going on at a MUCH higher level.
Suara 1 Wanita Malaysia is a body that consists of undergraduates and graduates of public tertiary institutions in Malaysia. In this video, they hosted a forum titled “Are Graduates Aligned with Politics?” which was, as the word forum suggests, an avenue to air one’s opinions and to surface suggestions as to what young people of today think could be done to improve things in our country. Now every country needs such avenues in which people can bring up constructive criticisms devoid of vulgarity, idiocrasy and definitely, devoid of racial sentiments and citizenship rights.
Sharifah Zohra Jabeen is the leader of this forum that represents young Malaysian women of today in voicing out opinions. To start off with, the society read out an oath condemning demonstrations.
“Kami, anak-anak bangsa, peneraju negara, dengan kin berikrar, menentang buddy singsong, perosak bangs, menentang demonstrate jalanan (who wrote that bit I wonder, it’s dripping in anti-Bersih sentiments!), penghancur keamanan, menentang anasi luar, yang menjadi balah, perosak anak-anak bangsa. Kami menyokong, keamanan, keharmonian, dan, kesejahteraan, sesama rakyat Malaysia, berbilang-kaum, tanpa campur tangan pihak ketiga,”
Translation: The video began with students taking an oath to go against ‘deviant culture’, ‘destroyers of peace’, ‘street demonstrations’ and support ‘peace and harmony among multi-racial Malaysians without the interference of third parties’.
Talk about a oath dripping in defense mechanisms and pro-Alliance sentiment. One wonders who started up the society, eh?

Current Malaysian Prime Minister. Known for enticing associations with a dead Mongolian model and a bad ass wife.
Scratchy scratchy!
Before I go on about this video that features Sharifah, the leader of this society, condemning and berating Bawani, a student at a public university for speaking her mind and sharing her opinions at a forum, here are bits of information that are relevant.
Not long ago, the intelligent and very much awake people of Malaysia campaigned for clean and fair elections. They held peaceful demonstrations that were not in anyway illegal and voiced out their need for clean and uncorrupted elections to take place. Their demands were simple.
Clean up of the electoral roll
Reform of postal ballots
Use of indelible ink
Minimum 21 days of a campaign period
Free and fair access to mass media for all parties
Strengthening of public institutions
No corruption
No dirty politics
Now, one would think that those things should go without saying. Alas, they don’t. Not in Malaysia.
What happened? Well like every other liberalist sentiment in Malaysia, they were slammed and the protest was broken up by tear gas and the police issued permits to deem the protest illegal. It got messy and Malaysia was once again reduced to retreat by the indirect tyranny of the Alliance.
The video that is plaguing yours truly is about a young girl, Bawani, who spoke out at the forums demanding that more money be allocated to help fund Malaysians in public universities. More money, more educated, a better society is in building. Bawani merely voiced out the opinion that there was loads of money being pumped into other sectors but that education is deserving of a whole lot more than what was already being used. Her opinion is based on a highly sensitive sentiment that I shall talk about next.
Let me tell you lot yet another story.
Once upon a time in Malaysia, when the country was socioeconomically divided by our colonizers, there existed 3 major ethnicities: the Malays – who claim to be the rightful owners of the land, the Chinese – who were brought in by the British to mine in the city centers, the Indians – who were also brought in by the British to man the rubber estates. These socioeconomic motives divided the ethnicities further into different locations in Malaysia, different jobs and designated stereotypes, access or lack of it to education and social mobility and finally, built a strong foundation for the huge white elephant in our constitution that legalizes blatant discrimination upon all non-Malays. Thankfully, this discrimination is slowly evaporating amongst the youths of today with a new and much more integrated Malaysian society upon us.
Or so we thought.
There were many ways in which discrimination hit Malaysia. But one of the most profound areas it affected was education. There then existed a quota system for the distribution of races in public universities. The Malays were deemed to be at a socioeconomic disadvantage due to what they were given by the colonizers and the unfortunate circumstance that is location, location, location. As such, they were given special rights to what seemed like unlimited educational resources in tertiary institutes. It basically meant that if you were Malay, you were almost certainly guaranteed a place in a local university over someone with similar grades but of a different ethnicity.
Unfortunate indeed. The future graduates of the country determined by blanketed meritocracy. Well Malaysian politics certainly reflects this rather shamefully. Lets not get into that.
Well as you can imagine, no one sat quietly down about this. People protested and the non-Malays demanded to not be treated like second-class citizens. So the brilliant loons in Putrajaya (head government offices) decided they’d come up with the meritocracy system!
This then meant that everyone got in by their own merits. If you were good, you got in. Via A-levels, STPM (Higher certificate of education Malaysia) and – oh wait, hang on a sec, what the hell’s Matriculation?
Only another brilliant scheme introduced by the government to continue ensuring that the rightful people of Malaysia got to still have the same amount of access to their god-given-rightful seats in tertiary education. But this time, no quotas, oh no. Instead, they just limited the number of non-Malays that could enter the matriculation courses to an all time low that was in no way representative of the proportions in our society and let the Chinese and Indians fight out the remainder seats amongst themselves. How do I know this? First-handed experience. I was a government scholar. I basically somehow got myself a scholarship to study medicine and the opportunity to do my pre-university course in a college that only had 4 Indians in my course and less than 10 Chinese students. Again, nowhere proportionate to the actual ratio of ethnicities in Malaysia. AND the number of people who do ridiculously well. Basically, if you were a non-Malay, you needed to be ridiculously good to get a seat in a local university. So I meandered tirelessly in sub-standard education, I excelled, and I got myself into an institute that shed the reality of the system onto me in blinding white light that made me go, ‘doh!
In Malaysia, you enter public universities now via 2 methods: you sit for a local matriculation course in a local college OR you sit for the STPM examinations. In terms of level of difficulty, I’ll let you lot hazard a guess in which ones were tougher. (Tip: you need to make it such that MORE ‘rightful people of the land’ got in irregardless of grades).
Why do I mention this again and how is this relevant to Bawani vs Sharifah?
Sharifah first interrupts Bawani mid-speech. Bawani interjects and says she is not finished. Sharifah talks over her and insists that she ‘listen, listen, listen,’. Sharifah then silences Bawani and leers at her for being rude. Because Bawani chose to speak out and voice out some suggestions which she thought could solve educational issues plaguing the poor non-Malays who couldn’t afford tertiary education. Sharifah then tells Bawani to be respectful, talks in broken English about respecting her mother, grandmother and talks about how Sharifah herself is being respectful. Because she shook Bawani’s hand and let her speak before interrupting her. Because apparently, that was Sharifah’s way of being polite. A handshake, taking away her microphone and ‘letting her speak’. Her Royal Highness ‘let her speak’.
Boy do we need a red carpet for this woman!
Sharifah then demanded respect for herself in front of the entire forum. How this was related to the topic, we have no clue. Bawani just stands and smiles because she knows, there is no fighting this. There is no conversation with people who demand respect and to be listened to and don’t do the listening themselves. How can you? Combating an overly-emotional woman whose argument stems from pride, ego and defense mechanisms and not at all from objectivity is immensely difficult. What more when she uses animals to imply that Bawani should have higher form of thinking than animals <– an insult directed to her opinions.
“”Do you think humans have problems? Animals have problems too,” she stressed, citing an example of cats that do not get leftovers in restaurants, along with dogs, cows and fish,”
Leftovers eh? Watch what you say woman. We know where this is going.
And in the stream of insults that follow Her Royal Egoness’s rants, is this remark:
“if you equate Malaysia to other countries, what are you doing in Malaysia? Go to Cuba, go to Argentina, go to Libya, go everywhere. Because all the students in this hall are happy with whatever the government does for them,”
And you’re expecting non-Malays to not react to this? This is the everlasting racial sentiment that is issued to us in schools, kindergartens, in our high schools, in heated debates when we voice out dissatisfaction with anything.
When I was 15, I had someone tell me that because they weren’t happy with the colour of my skin. Because they felt threatened when my ethnicity migrated to Malaysia. These people – who thankfully aren’t representative of their race as I have amazing Malay friends and know of equally amazing Malay people who in no way discriminate anyone – leered at me to my face and told me to go back – I quote – to my bloody country. Sharifah told Bawani to basically leave, because she voiced her opinion on what could be improved to help poor people get educated.
If you’re happy with what the government does for you, well fair enough. You are entitled to your own opinion. Just like Bawani is entitled to hers. Just like how I am entitled to mine. And just like the world is entitled to their viewpoint of what they will come to when they watch the video of Sharifah Zohra Jabeen berating a brave student who spoke out about sensitive issues that matter to the development of the mentality of future Malaysians and in turn, politicians.
And this is what I sent Sharifah upon watching this video.
Dear Sharifah Zohra Jabeen,
I’m a Malaysian student studying abroad. I got home today only to be plagued by this video that impinges on the right to have the freedom of speech in a forum titled ‘Are graduates and politics aligned?’
By shaking someone’s hand, you do not earn someone’s respect. By letting someone not finish what she needs to finish, you have not earned any respect but instead drained yourself deserving of any. You have denied someone the freedom of speech by demanding respect. Respect is irrelevant of age or the number of degrees you somehow earned. Your opinions are your own and everyone is entitled to their own opinions however tyrannical they may be. Imposing them on others, denying others the right to speak out, using shitty analogues to make nonsensical points and INTERJECTING someone mid-speech is highly rude and undeserving of any kind of respect. You do not use degrees, titles and the act of taking away a microphone from someone to demand respect.
If that was what your education gave you, it is no wonder people like Bawani protest and demand more funding. Your argument was based on horribly racial sentiments implying that if you’re not happy with a system, you should leave. What kind of incompetence have you based that sentiment on? Bawani is as much a citizen as you are and thus rightfully deserving to state her opinions on a forum in which such discussion is encouraged! There is no room for racially based sentiments in the Malaysia of 2013.
Lastly, your response was entirely emotional. It was purely based on an insecure defense mechanism you shielded yourself with. Here was another girl willing to speak out, a good orator who had done her research and came to the floor with well-based arguments. How did you respond? Via insults, demeaning condescendence in front of your entire forum and utter dismissal.
Because of you, I am ashamed to be Malaysian. I am ashamed you represent voices of women in Malaysia and I am thoroughly ashamed that there were people out there who voted you because based on that video, one can see what sort of person you are. And the fact that you’re in a position of leadership is horribly distressing to the future of our society. I hope you make your public apology and resign before those who are well educated enough decide to take a stand in Malaysian politics merely to counter you and anyone else with such principles and hope that for your sake you possess some qualities that make you somewhat worthy of redemption.
A Liberalist Malaysian
I am angry not because you have very pro-government principles and stances. I am angry because of the MANNER in which you responded to this was condescending, demeaning and immensely disrespectful which was a HUGE oxymoron of a thing to have done considering your very own rant demanding respect based on age, the number of degrees you own (wait, isn’t it just the one?) and on the emotional tirade that someone ACTUALLY dared to have opposing opinions to yours.
The world and international forum that is life has no place for an attitude like yours to survive. Fyi.
