Ng said that sections on the country’s fight for independence had been left out.
KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 13 — The Education Ministry will order an investigation into claims that history textbooks are biased, factually wrong and used as political tools to propagate a false sense of nationalism.
When told of the allegations, made by two local history textbook writers in a news report today, Deputy Minister Dr Mohd Puad Zarkashi admitted he was unable to provide an immediate response.
But he gave his assurance that he would speak with director-general Datuk Abdul Ghafar Mahmud on the matter.
“I am sorry I cannot comment [yet]. I will call him and ask him to respond immediately about this,” he said when approached by reporters in Parliament this afternoon.
When pushed for his opinion on whether the allegations were a cause for concern, Puad hesitated before insisting that the matter should be handled by Abdul Ghafar after the latter investigated the complaints.
“I think it is better for the DG to comment because it involves our curriculum division, they have to give their full report to me,” he said.
In a report front-paged in theSun today, textbook authors Dr Ranjit Singh Malhi and Ng How Kuen alleged that school history textbooks were littered with factual errors and distortions, adding that these failed to give fair recognition to the country’s non-Malay nationalists.
Dr Ranjit, who is currently an advisor to the ministry on history textbooks, also claimed that secondary school history textbooks have been used to promote political interests.
He further claimed that when he once pointed out the errors and distortions, a ministry official had labelled him as “anti-national”.
“Secondary school history textbooks have been used to promote political interests. It should be a scholarly pursuit and not politically-motivated.
“Five out of 10 chapters of the Form Four history textbook deal with Islamic history as compared to only one chapter in the earlier textbook. The intention of the earlier syllabus was to expose our students to World History,” he was quoted as saying.
Dr Ranjit added that historical personalities like Yap Ah Loy (third Kapitan Cina of Kuala Lumpur), Gurchan Singh (the “Lion of Malaya”) and Sybil Karthigesu were not given sufficient recognition in the local textbooks.
Ng added that in the stories on the country’s fight for independence, the contributions of the communists had been left out.
“Students do know the truth but as textbooks are written according to approved curriculum, students end up learning history that is skewed,” Ng was quoted as saying.
Both men had been commenting on the announcement that the history syllabus would be reviewed and that the subject would be made a compulsory pass in the Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) from 2013.
The newspaper also quoted Dr Ranjit as saying that it was inaccurate to assume that the new policy would instil a better sense of patriotism in students if the syllabus was inaccurate and failed to provide them with a sense of belonging to the country.
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