Star Q
ii. B4DL2E1
iii. Tart Buah Lagi
The papers yesterday carried news about a company director and his wife who were charged over a diesel spill in a river in Selangor. These things happen almost every day in our beloved country (or at least to some who pretend it is their beloved country!) and eventually some unfortunate bad hats get caught by the authorities.
On the one hand this seem like an ordinary run-of-the-mill case of some big shot trying to save money on the side by taking the easy and cost-saving way of dumping wastes into our rivers. But on the second hand, this case warrants a much closer attention especially when you consider the culprits are Malaysian citizens (or they claim to be!)
Firstly, if they really were Malaysian citizens and after having lived in this country for so long (one aged 55 and the other aged 56) they would probably be more than able to converse in the national language that is Bahasa Malaysia. I mean a Malaysian should be fluent in Bahasa Malaysia not only because he/she was born in Malaysia, but also because he/she was brought up, educated, worked and eventually die (unfortunately!) in Malaysia. The acquisition of the national language should have reached it's climax when Malaysians leave school at the age of seventeen, that is after Form Five. So, it came as a rather strange perception when the court decided to read the charges to these two people using the culprits' L1.
I mean, the court is a place of formal proceedings and as in any formal affairs here in Malaysia, it should be run in the national language, unless you have people from other countries being charged or in attendance; people who are not Malaysians to begin with. As a layman, I too know that the reason behind using L1 when a court reads the charges is so that the accused will clearly and fully understands what is read to him and what he is being accused of.
But here's the thing. These two people's lack of confidence (and the courts too, I presume) in using Bahasa Malaysia clearly shows that they really do not deserve to be Malaysians. It is quite sad to imagine the education opportunity these two people provide their children at home with regards to the use of Bahasa Malaysia. It is even sadder to think that their children may turn out to be less than proficient Bahasa Malaysia speakers in the future, just as they are.
Imagine what a difficult time their children's teachers will have in school trying to teach them Bahasa Malaysia and in giving them as many learning opportunities as possible. Imagine also all the teachers' hard work turn into failure when these children return home, only to find that their opportunity to use the national language has been suppressed by their parents to practically zero.
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