M Bakri Musa wrote in his article, "No one is questioning the status of the Malay language, or its importance in nation building. We all subscribe to that. It is unclear from their statement whether they are against our students learning a second language or against English as that second language."

Well, I am.

This whole debate on the language of education is a classic example of Malaysian's inability to see the big picture, failure to look to the future and plan appropriately, and failure to look at the welfare of all Malaysians and the country itself.

Instead, decision-makers look to the short term gains for themselves, which are usually assessed in terms of power and money.

Also, in classic Malaysian fashion, the end result is a mish-mash of squabbling opinions where most opinions are based solely on the circumstances of the opinionated. Nobody ever seems to give any thought to the overall effect of their decisions will have on the future of Malaysia and Malaysians.

Without exhaustive research, it appears to me that the majority of tertiary education is delivered in English. If that's the case then what on earth is the Education Department doing by sticking to Bahasa Malaysia at the primary school level?

Students arrive at university with poor to non-existent English skills and leave with very little much improvement. One has to ask, how, if they don't understand the language in which they are being taught, can they ever understand the concepts they were supposed to learn.

But looking at the big picture, its an undeniable fact that English is the language of business and science ... and of the future. Even in Malaysia, you will rarely hear Bahasa Malaysia spoken in the halls of the CBD (central business district) or the ivory towers of universities. BM is the language of the ‘kampongs' ... and the voters.

To persist with the present policy of simply keeping the uneducated voters happy while at the same time protected from the world of analytical or radical thought, is the sort of backward-looking governance for which Malaysia is famous for.

Cease the squabbling. Adopt English as the language of all education with BM at a compulsary second language. Relegate Mandarin and Tamil to optional third languages. Promote BM as the language of literature and the arts.

Then maybe Malaysians will begin to understand what 'One Malaysia' is all about.