[ST Forum] UN Official’s Remarks

I think this was one of the most cogent and persuasive responses I’ve seen to the UN Special Rapporteur Githu Muigai’s comments – in stark contrast to the MFA’s own disappointing response.

UN official’s remarks
Don’t be too quick to dismiss views

Rather than adopt a knee-jerk response to United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur Githu Muigai’s proposals on Singapore’s policies on race, meritocracy and related issues (‘UN expert’s comments draw swift govt reply’; last Thursday), should we not, instead, have signalled our open-mindedness to reflect on the proposals, especially coming from an experienced official with UN credentials?

Mr Muigai’s recommendation to consider offering Malays a ‘stimulus package’ within a specified timeline, particularly in education, should be mulled over rather than dismissed hurriedly.

I would certainly have disagreed if he had called for abandoning meritocracy or implementing a permanent policy of affirmative action, practised, until recently, by Malaysia.

While meritocracy has benefited Singaporeans, it has been less successful at resolving the educational and economic gap between Malays and non-Malays. The disparity has persisted since independence; Malay progress is slower and less than that of Indian Singaporeans whose population is half that of Malay citizens.

Official data on students’ performances in the Primary School Leaving Examination and the O and A levels in a 25-year period from 1980 to 2005 showed that while students from all ethnic groups have progressed, Malays still lagged behind Chinese and Indian students in all these exams, and in mathematics and science.

So too with median household income (2005) and occupation (2007): The Malay figure of $3,050 was the lowest among all ethnic groups, and Malays held a mere 2.4 per cent of administrative and managerial jobs compared with Indians (11.4 per cent) and Chinese (14.6 per cent). It is imprudent of us to stick rigidly to meritocracy.

After all, government pragmatism has seen meritocracy fine-tuned. The rule barring Malays from sensitive appointments in the Singapore Armed Forces and the adoption of group representation constituencies to prevent qualified Malay candidates from defeat are evidence of this.

That our brand of meritocracy can do with a bit more equitable tweaking is apparent if we reflect on this poser: Why, after 45 long years, have the socio-economic gap between Malays and non-Malays and the jarring absence of Malays in senior positions in the civil service still not been resolved adequately?

One can think of two possible answers to this conundrum, both of which cannot be true: First, Malays (acknowledged in our Constitution as the indigenous people) are being discriminated against, and second, non-Malays are simply smarter than Malays.

Associate Professor Hussin Mutalib

Prof. Hussin is right to suggest that there is a middle way between pure – and increasingly inequitable – meritocracy, and affirmative action. I think the government has done too good a job of making affirmative action look evil, so much so that even any hint of it becomes unpalatable without question. The fact that the Malays are under-represented at the top of our society, and like the elephant in the room it goes quietly unaddressed and unnoticed. What Prof. Hussin leaves unsaid in the last sentence is particularly sharp – is there a third option? what’s the right answer? And coming from a Malay, this shouldn’t be ignored.