The powers-that-be should not try pulling wool over anybody's eyes. It is rather nauseating to be barraged with claims that entry to local universities is now based o­n merit.

It is based o­n set criteria which are hardly based o­n merit. In the first place, students with STPM spent two years studying after their SPM, while those who sit the matriculation examination spend just o­ne year. Just compare the SPM results of those who succeed in getting places in choice faculties and see how they fare.

Take the intake for the University of Malaya medical faculty and disclose the SPM results of the successful candidates - we will see many with o­nly average results.

Can the matriculation course, over a period of o­ne year, transform these students to be more qualified than others with better SPM results and now sitting the STPM examination? If so, there must be some grave fault with the STPM course, and it should be scrapped.

Until and unless the admission criteria is really merit-based, and until and unless deserving non-bumiputera students get their places in universities, please do not try to force this ridiculous notion of meritocracy down our throat.