He was commenting on a recent viral post on social media about a Form Five history reference book that carried the photograph of EEC “Clough” Thuraisingham, but had captioned it as VT Sambanthan, who was one of the signatories of the 1957 Merdeka Agreement.
“Firstly, I would like to explain that our checks revealed that the book in question was published by a private company and not by the ministry.
“We only have jurisdiction over books published by the ministry. The main focus of the ministry is to do our best to ensure the books contain data and facts that have been verified,” Bernama quoted him as telling the media after launching the Kamus Dewan Perdana here.
FMT reported that Sambanthan’s daughter, Deva Kunjari, had expressed shock over the book which mentioned her father, but used a photograph of Thuraisingham, colonial Malaya’s first education minister.
“I am appalled, not only do they address my father without his title, but they have placed someone else’s photo. And this is a textbook. The publishers and MoE (education ministry) will be hearing from me,” she said in a Facebook posting. “God knows what other inaccuracies this book contains.”
The page in the history book concerns the Member System of Cabinet government introduced by Henry Gurney in paving the way for Malaya’s self-governance in 1951.
The page bears photographs of Onn Jaafar and Thuraisingham but the latter’s photograph has the caption “VT Sambanthan”.
Onn and Thuraisingham, who were friends, were among the first members of Malaya’s self-governing Cabinet before independence. Onn was the member (minister) for home affairs and Thuraisingham the member (minister) of education.
Sambanthan was Malaya’s first labour minister before Merdeka. He was the first MP for Sungai Siput and held the seat for 18 years from 1955, and also the fifth president of MIC.
Meanwhile, on the Kamus Dewan Perdana, Radzi said the newest edition of the dictionary contained over 120,000 root words and showcased the development of the Malay vocabulary in over a century.
“InsyaAllah, we will see the dictionary becoming the main reference for the Malay language. There have been certain improvements done to the dictionary, including introducing jawi words that will benefit the future generations,” he added.