By Wong Tai-Chee

Not long ago, the historian Ranjit Singh Malhi strongly criticized the content of Malaysia’s latest high school history textbook, saying that it seriously lacks the reflection of the country’s ethnic diversity because it favours the dominant position of the Malays and Islam as the core of society. Ranjit also took the economic aspect as an example. The textbooks understate and sweep away the huge contributions of the Indians who had made to the rubber industry and the Chinese to the tin mining industry. He called on the Ministry of Education to correct the unfair and inaccurate content of the textbooks. It is strongly felt that during the revision process, the Ministry of Education must recruit scholars of all ethnic groups to participate and seek consensus before reaching a conclusion to reflect the true face of history.

It should be noted that history textbooks are fundamental to shaping national consciousness. Its content and opinions can affect the hearts of young and innocent school children, and may leave a deep and lingering imprint in their minds for a lifetime. However, what is frustrating is that the state system established by any regime tends to use mainstream culture to incorporate other sub-mainstream cultures to achieve the national goal of unification and even assimilation. Teaching of history is one of the important means. Even countries that belong to the same cultural foundation may have very different historical versions on both sides due to division. Mainland China and Taiwan are a good example.

Since the Democratic Progressive Party came to power in Taiwan, it has insisted on using historical education to pave the way for Taiwan's "de-sinicization". The average person understands that this is a preparation for "Taiwan independence." Taiwan has made major revisions to its history education several times. After 2006, the "National History" in Taiwan's textbooks was divided into two different textbooks, "History of China" and "History of Taiwan", which basically established the two concepts of mainland Chinese and Taiwanese residents. In addition, looking at Mainland China, the content of its history textbooks and that of Taiwan are vastly different. In addition to the admiration, derogation, or description of modern politicians, they each have their own opinions on internal affairs, accounts of anti-Japanese war, and diplomatic relations with the United States. It can be said that it is basically in a state of opposition. Under the influence of their respective teachers' persuasions, imagine the extent of shock that the students from both sides would have when they come into contact with each other about history after their thoughts and cognitive instinct are shaped at young age.

Over the past 20 years, China's rapid rise has been met with resistance and confronted by many Western countries, especially the United States. In addition to strengthening military research and development and improving the quality of foreign trade products’ competitiveness in the international market, the countermeasures taken by Mainland China is to intentionally uplift the “patriotic enthusiasm” of students and citizens in the field of education. Indeed, patriotism, as a cohesive element, is used as a safeguard for national sovereignty and reinforcement for nation building. Speaking of building "patriotism", we might as well explore whether the Malaysian federal government, which is dominated by Malays, has this agenda hidden in the newly compiled history textbooks.

After the May 30th coup in Indonesia in 1965, the Suharto government launched a "patriotic movement" as an argument for closing Chinese schools and banning Chinese publications. In recent years of international politics, "patriotism" has been distorted from its original implications by politicians to serve their political goals or party politics. In Malaysia’s Malay-dominated government, patriotic behaviour could have been interpreted that ethnic minority groups should cooperate with the ruling majority’s intentions. Failure to cooperate can be regarded as a non-patriotic behaviour. For example, Grab, an e-hailing car sharing company founded by Malaysia’s Anthony Tan and Tan Hooi Ling in 2012, has grown rapidly. Its business today has expanded to more than 300 cities in Southeast Asia, and its total company value is estimated at 160 billion ringgit, surpassing the total asset value of 90 billion ringgit of the country’s largest state-run Malayan Banking Corporation. Reportedly, when Anthony Tan applied for funding from Khazanah Nasional (Malaysian Government Investment Corporation), he was reluctant to accept the condition that a substantial proportion of the investment had to be allotted out to be the usual "Bumi-shares or indigenous shares". Anthony Tan then negotiated the terms of cooperation with Temasek Holdings of the Singapore government, and the business has flourished under his leadership. In the eyes of the Malay-dominated government, Anthony's actions can be regarded as non-patriotic, although it was not said as such publicly.

Let’s go back to the fact that Malaysia is compiling history textbooks. As ethnic minorities, Chinese, Indians and those from East Malaysia, we can accept the key position of the Malays in the textbooks, but we cannot accept minimizing the existence and historical contributions of ethnic minorities, or the distortion of their due status and merits. The deeds of ethnic minorities, must be presented accurately in the textbooks to students of all ethnic groups in a reasonably acceptable coverage, so that they can understand the true history of different races from an early age. On that basis, our children will obtain the message for mutual respect, and the need for inter-ethnic cooperation to achieve a shared prosperity. I think this is the key element for cultivating students from all ethnic groups to be truly patriotic and promoting a deeper understanding of each other.

Looking at the current world where racism is raging and mutually exclusive disputes between nations are common place, Malaysia is no exception. The racial party politics practised in Malaysia over the past 60 years has led to social disharmony, and it has led to mutual suspicion and extremism among races. This is not good for the future political and economic developments of the country. Revising the history textbook to give all ethnic groups a true face not only shows the government's courage to face history with honour, but it is certainly an important step in alleviating the current dilemma.

(Wong Tai-Chee has his B.A and M.A degrees in Urban and Regional Planning from the University of Paris, and earned his PhD in Human Geography from the Australian National University. After teaching 20 years in Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, he retired in 2013. He then worked as Distinguished Professor for two years at Guizhou University of Finance and Economics, China, and as Dean and Professor at the Southern University College, Johor until the end of 2018. He was Visiting Professor to University of Paris (Sorbonne IV), Visiting Fellow to Pekin University, Tokyo University and University of Western Australia. His main research interests are in urban and economic issues, and more recently on Malaysian politics. Besides his 15 self-authored and edited book volumes, he has written over 100 academic articles and published widely in international journals.)