As of writing this, Pakatan Harapan will lead a unity government in Malaysia aftermath of the 2022 General Election. This new administration needs to be held accountable for the offers that they have put forth in their GE15 manifesto. One of the promises outlined in Pakatan Harapan’s manifesto is ‘education autonomy’, which is under the theme of ‘Decentralisation of Power to the Regions of Sabah and Sarawak’. The issue of education autonomy has always been one of the key things that have been on the agenda among advocates of decentralization but it has always been ambiguous until recently, the specific form of decentralization was revealed. Here is an excerpt from the manifesto:

This article only aims to elaborate on education autonomy for i) and ii). 

There are two factors that we need to take into account when it comes to expanding or reducing regional powers: ‘license’ and ‘capacity’. Paul Manna factored this in when examining the United States’ centralization process of the education system[1]. License is the primary determinant of government involvement and interest. It alludes to the potency of the justifications offered by the administration. However, ‘license’ is not sufficient as it does not guarantee that policymakers will be able to act and act effectively. Therefore, ‘capacity’ is needed for effective policy implementation. Financial resources, bureaucratic structures like governmental regulatory agencies, and the knowledge, experience, and expertise of government employees are all examples of how capacity is expressed. Based on this manifesto, ‘license’ would be given to Sabah and Sarawak by putting education on the concurrent list, instead of the federal list. 

Offer number i) shows that the federal government realises that people in the local region are better at managing dilapidated schools due to close proximity. This also gives more power for them to oversee whatever needs to be fixed and managed. Since it is concurrent, perhaps the financial resources to fix the dilapidated schools are provided by the federal government, but overseeing and managing them will be handled by the state. But the question remains – where do they get the ‘capacity’ for local agencies to oversee and manage these dilapidated schools?

Offer number (ii) is true to the spirit of federalism. Federalism offers a framework for the acknowledgement of ethnic, religious, linguistic, or other cultural communities, reflecting their desire to be acknowledged as a people with a unique identity and distinctive interests [2]. Hence, the federalism framework is ideally advantageous to Malaysia as Peninsular Malaysia and East Malaysian states are culturally distinct. Although the teaching of Kadazandusun and Iban have already been established in schools through Education Act 1996, they still solely fall under the jurisdiction of the federal government. In addition, not all ethnic languages in these two states get the privilege of being officially taught in public schools. Therefore, by providing concurrent powers to education autonomy to Sabah and Sarawak for this aspect, more ethnic languages will be prioritized. Subsequently, this will accelerate the language revitalization process as these languages are known to be experiencing gradual language death. However, this is where the question of state capacity comes in. Will we have enough teacher training for these ethnic language teachers? Will we be able to set up enough teacher training institutions as a place for them to be trained?

Based on this manifesto, ‘license’ is soon expected to be given to Sabah and Sarawak in terms of education autonomy as an amendment will be made to the Ninth Schedule of the Federal Constitution. However, ‘capacity’ seems to be hanging in the clouds as it is not stated in the document – especially with regards to state capacity. As education enthusiasts and observers, addressing federal and state government ‘capacity’ for effective implementation of education autonomy should be the next step as well as holding them accountable for this type of government reform. 

References:

[1] Manna, P. (2006). Schools in: Federalism and the National Education Agenda. Georgetown University. 

[2] International IDEA. (2017). Federalism: International idea constitution-building primer 12. 

Written by Auzellea Kristin Mozihim