Malaysia has regressed in English

PETALING JAYA: Malaysia has lost two generations of English speakers in the country and will lose out in the long run if the government does not heed the call by the Sultan of Johor for the use of English as a medium of instruction in schools.
Former chairman of the Early Childhood Care and Education council (ECCE) Datuk Dr Chiam Heng Keng stressed the importance of the need for the English language to be the medium of instruction in schools around the country as it is the universal language and she fears Malaysia will miss out if it is not implemented.
"We have regressed. While other countries around the Asean region are embracing the language to catch up with the rest of the world, we seem to have gone in the opposite direction," she said in an interview with theSun.
She said that she knows of cases where the older generation speaks fluent English but their children can't cope with the language.
She said that without the English language, many children will be deprived of a wealth of knowledge in the world because of the language barrier.
"As we know, the internet is a great tool for knowledge these days, but our children are being deprived of that knowledge because many things on the internet are in English," she said.
Chiam, who is the current Malaysian representative to the Asean Commission on the rights of Women and Children (ACWC) and a former Social Psychology lecturer in the University of Malaya, said that there is no reason why students cannot be fluent in two languages, namely Bahasa Malaysia and English.
"The English language shouldn't just be taught as a second language but as a medium of instruction and communication," said Chiam.
She also felt that Mathematics and Science should be taught in English.
"We lost two generations of English speakers and I feel we are losing out with the rest of the world," she said.