Wacana InstitutPendidikan, Pembangunan & Penyelidikan Melayu (IPPPM)

Last monday I was involved as AJK (committee member) at a conference (Wacana) on Malay education, research & development at Hotel Singgasana, Petaling Jaya. About 100 people, Tan Sris, Datuks, Academics, corporate, government and laymen attended. Spotted attending were, Tan Sri Abdul Rahman Arshad former DG of Education, Dr Hussein Ahmad formerly of IAB now professor of principalship at Universiti Malaya, Tan Sri Abdullah Ahmad former GEIC of the Straits Times, Tan Sri Hanafiah former DG Tabung Haji, Datuk Ibrahim of Pusat Kajian Sosial Malaysia, Prof Emeritus Abdullah HAssan, Tan Sri Arshad Ayub, Datuk AHmad Zaidee Laidin chairman IPPPM, Prof Rasid UITM, Hamdan Ahammu and others. It was supposed to be a non-partisan affair that transcends all political inclinations, doesn't matter if you are government of the day or if you are from the opposition heheh. Datuk Dr Hasan Ahmad former director-general of the National Literary Agency (DBP) gave the keynote address. Did you know that the malays had at least 700 years of culture going back to the Pasai Sultanate? Did you know that the port of Malacca was so famous and second only to the port of Venice and that the harbour pilots were malays? Did you know that the lingua franca of Indonesia when Sukarno became first president, was malay? Even though 65% of the population was Javanese? Did you know that malays were great mariners and traders during the malacca sultanate? Did you know that 2 years ago during the Singapore National Day speech by her premier then general Lee Hsieh Loong (Kuan Yew's son) was conducted in malay? I saw it on television live, in JB. To me it was a damn good spin job...cos he started the speech in superb fluent malay by saying that he was pleased with the progress made by the malay community in singapore and that there were significant decline in the number of drug users and family problems among the malays in singapore. I thought that that was a savvy positive re-inforcement strategy on his part. At a time when many a local (malaysian) leader would lament and harp on the myth of the lazy natives (malays) or sarcastically blasts about the memory lapses of the malays and the malay community. Can you imagine your own people rediculing you? I rest my case......