.........she has to be neutralized

Those were the words of my no. 1 boss when he bid farewell on my day of retirement from the civil service. Would you take that as a compliment or would you take that as parting words to someone you are happy to rid off. I don't know but of course I took that as a compliment because he said it right in front of me, right beside me.

I was not surprise at all that he finally got it out of his system. After that he would not have me say another word to annoy him or to cause discomfort to his high office. I smiled when he said that. I left for retirement with a mixed feeling of happiness and bitterness, although to be honest I was more bitter than I was happy. I have more reason to be bitter about than to be happy about. The only reason I was happy is because I could now move to doing something else that I would be happy about, or at least be at peace with myself.

"She has a lot of ideas in talking about change, but there are many things around us that are not suitable to the kind of change that she was talking about. Therefore we have to neutralize her."

I remember that many policy decisions need to be reviewed and many action plans need to be reversed. Some of the things I still remember are the following:

• That we need not follow the education structure of the West. If we need to integrate Fardhu ain and Fardhu kifayah subjects and therefore we need more tuition time, we must be ready to extend up to 6 or 7 years of secondary school as the case may be. It should be a "touch and go" policy. It must be really effective. "integration" should not be for the sake of politics.

• The custodian of the Arabic language must be the Federal Government and not the state government. This is because it is the Federal government that has the required funds for additional budget. And if the government is really serious to promote and implement Islam and make Malaysia an Islamic country, then the Arabic language must be given due importance. More teachers must be trained in the subject and there must be at least one subject to be taught in Arabic. This is possible because after all science and mathematics is already taught in English.

• Besides Science and technology, it is the teaching of Islam that will give Malaysia the cutting edge advantage over other countries. Malaysia should have more faith in Islam and not "be held at ransom" by other world power.

• We should have a policy where by the Chinese can learn the Malay language and the Malays can learn the Chinese Lanuage i.e Mandrin. That wii strengthen the position of the Malays, not weakened it.

• Why are restricting Muslim Malays to study in othe Islamic countries, especially in the Middle East but do not restrict others to study any where they choose to, example Singapore, Japan, Korea,china etc etc. Why must we be skewed in our world view.

• The teaching of science and maths in English is not a smart policy if the objective is to make Malaysians to be conversant in the English language. The teaching of History may be a better alternative considering our teachers themselves are not good in English.

I will add to this list at a later date as and when I remember. I will end this note by stating that my boss actually has his hands tied and survival is the only reason why he has to neutralize me. In life you cannot win all. Win some, lose some as the saying goes. But now Iam happy because I am in the business of interacting with people, young and old to have strong Faith in Islam and real success in life can only be achieved through a strong committment in Islam. It is not fundamental Islam, it is not extremist Islam, it is not liberal Islam it is not moderate Islam. It is ISLAM.