KUCHING: The Association of Churches in Sarawak (ACS) is deeply concerned with the Ministry of Education’s plan to introduce khat into the Bahasa Malaysia subject syllabus for Primary 4 pupils next year. ACS chairman and Archbishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Kuching Simon Poh, said the association acknowledged that the official language of the country is Bahasa Malaysia, which has been written in Jawi or Rumi. “Jawi uses modified Arabic script to write Malay words. Rumi uses Roman alphabets to spell Malay words,” he said in a statement.
He added that khat is a form of calligraphy in Arabic script but it is not Jawi or Rumi. “Linguistically, Malay and Arabic languages are unrelated since Malay is from the Austronesian language family while Arabic is from the Semitic language family,” Poh explained. “What is more significant is that the script used in khat is Arabic and not Jawi.”
Accordingly, ACS requested that khat or the “khat lessons that have been renamed Jawi scripts”, be not introduced nor made compulsory for non-Muslim students in Sarawak who are learning the Bahasa Malaysia national language in Rumi. Poh asserted that ACS was not against learning of Arabic, Jawi or khat. “The latter is more appropriate as an art form rather than within a language subject,” he stated.
Furthermore, he believed that for the rural primary schools in Sarawak, the immediate priority should be to repair the dilapidated schools and to improve the education standard of the rural children.
As such, ACS appeals to the Federal Ministry of Education to give priority to Sarawak for the deployment of more trained teachers in Mathematics and Science subjects instead of new teachers for khat or Jawi scripts.
“We believe that investment in Science and Mathematics subjects will provide the foundation for our children’s future secondary years and for a better Malaysia,” Poh said. “ACS is committed to working for peace, harmony, unity, integrity, social development and well-being of all Malaysians as we celebrate our National Day and Malaysia Day 2019 with the theme ‘Sayangi Malaysiaku: Malaysia Bersih,’” he remarked.
