Unlike some PAP losers who try to use police to threaten citizen. VOTE THEM OUT!!!
Shanmugam to file police report over misrepresentation of his comments on integration in Malaysian schools
SINGAPORE: Law and Foreign Affairs Minister K Shanmugam said he intends to file a police report over a Facebook post by activist Sangeetha Thanapal which he said "twisted" his comments made at a Singapore Press Club forum on Thursday (Aug 27).
"She unfortunately twisted what I had said and suggested that I was an 'Islamophobic bigot who thinks Malay-Muslims are a threat'," Mr Shanmugam wrote in a Facebook post on Friday evening.
Ms Sangeetha had written in a Facebook post addressed to Mr Shanmugam: "Who are you, an Indian, to be deciding what is that acceptable enough way to be Malay-Muslim?" She also suggested that Mr Shanmugam had "no problems with Chinese people becoming 'more Chinese'."
The post was shared more than 2,400 times before it was hidden from public view after 9pm.
Mr Shanmugam said at the Press Club event, he spoke on the issue of integration in the Malaysian education system.
His key points were:
1) The Chinese leadership in various local areas in Malaysia want to maintain control over the Chinese population. It suits them to have Chinese students go to Chinese schools instead of mainstream Malaysian schools. And the schools are more Chinese (because they are effectively single race).
2) At the same time, many mainstream schools in Malaysia are becoming more Malay (because the students are largely Malay) and Islamic (e.g. through the way some principals and teachers handle matters) which discourages the Chinese from going into those schools.
3) So you end up with having more Malays going to mainstream schools, and more Chinese going to Chinese schools. As a result, the different races are kept apart from a young age.
4) This makes integration more difficult.
"My point therefore was essentially that this is the predominant situation in the Malaysian education system. This is not good for integration," Mr Shanmugam explained. “The video clip of the news carried the essence of what I said, and this is also evident from the transcript of what I said.”
"What Ms Thanapal wrote is inaccurate and seditious, and attributes to me sentiments that I do not hold and have never held," he stated.
At 11pm, Mr Shanmugam reached out to Ms Sangeetha on Facebook. "Dear Madam, I hold no personal animosity towards you. Will be happy to speak with you" he wrote on her Facebook page. In response, Ms Sangeetha thanked him for agreeing to speak to her and replied: "I am very sorry for all that has happened. The post took on a life of its own and came out differently from how I intended."
On her website, Ms Sangeetha describes herself as an "independent scholar and social media activist engaged in anti-racism work in Singapore". Earlier this year, she started a petition urging the Government to make Thaipusam a calendar holiday.
- CNA/ly
