Malaysian Islamic Youth Movement (Abim) president Faisal Abdul Aziz, who attended a dialogue organised by the education ministry earlier today, said the NGOs wanted Putrajaya’s assurance on the matter.
“There were some requests for a circular to be sent to schools as a written guarantee (from the ministry).
“And the ministry said they had no issue with the request,” he told FMT. Faisal, however, did not identify the NGOs.
The dialogue which was chaired by education minister Fadhlina Sidek was attended by 16 NGOs. Apart from Abim, others who took part were Chinese educationist group Dong Zong, Aliran and Pertubuhan Ikram Malaysia as well as several non-Muslim religious associations.
News of the module being introduced had raised concerns among leaders of non-Muslim religions that non-Muslim children might be required to take the course.
The education ministry later clarified that only Muslim students would be enrolled in the new module.
At the dialogue this evening, Fadhlina again emphasised that the module was vital in combating radicalism and extremism as well as projecting universal Islamic values and their implementation in the multiracial society.
Faisal went on to call for more dialogues between the education ministry and civil societies when it came to matters such as the education syllabus in the wake of the recent controversy.
“Dialogues like these are important to clarify confusion and misunderstandings.”
Malaysia Hindu Sangam treasurer V Rajendran said his association had no objection to the implementation of the module after the explanation by the ministry which he said was “satisfactory”.
“They (education minister) said, this (module) has been specially designed for the Muslims to take it up as a way of life,” Rajendran said.
Tajuddin Rasdi, a professor at UCSI University who often speaks about race relations, revealed that Fadhlina agreed that the module was not about increasing Islamic content in school but to promote the nation-building aspects of Islam.
“I also agree this is not about ‘more Islam’ but is about ‘correcting’ what has been missed in the present syllabus,” Tajuddin said in response to some worries from the non-Muslim groups that the introduction of the module would increase the Islamic elements in the syllabus.