The Parent Action Group for Education (PAGE) said the rule was more self-destructive than progressive as it meant that most schools would not be eligible for the DLP.

PAGE chairman Noor Azimah Rahim said the education ministry should support and assist schools that fail to meet the BM grade requirement, instead of forfeiting “the already so few DLP classes”.

“It is these very schools, largely Malay schools populated by Malay children, that are prevented from enhancing their (students’) proficiency in the English language.

“In fact, when the DLP was established, it was these very Malay children that we had most in mind to elevate their well-being and give them a better chance in life. (In) some cases, they were even brought out of the poverty trap,” she said in a statement.

Noor Azimah said 90% of primary schools in West Malaysia and Sabah did not offer DLP classes – something the education ministry should not be proud of.

She also noted that more than 40,000 SPM students had failed their English exams last year, as opposed to the 9,306 who failed BM.

“The education ministry’s focus should instead be on supporting and assisting schools that do not meet the national average for BM in order for them to apply to become a DLP school.”

Noor Azimah recently claimed that the Malay College Kuala Kangsar and Tunku Kurshiah College were planning to ignore a new DLP rule requiring Year 1 and Form 1 classes to have one non-DLP class teaching mathematics and science in BM.

DAP chairman Lim Guan Eng later questioned why these schools were granted leeway, and asked if other schools in West Malaysia could also apply to forgo the new DLP rule.

The former federal minister also urged the ministry to revert to the previous governments’ implementation of the DLP, where all science and maths classes were taught in English if parents agreed to it.