Ong Kian Ming says he was shocked to read the statement claiming that English in Malaysia was of a higher standard than in Singapore.
Despite claims by a Deputy Minister that the Malaysian standard of English has surpassed that of neighbouring nations, scepticism abounds as many glaring examples exist to the contrary.
An opposition leader today slammed the government for over-estimating the standard of English in the country – using glaring grammatical mistakes by the a government website to illustrate his point.
Serdang MP Ong Kian Ming in a statement today presented a few examples of poor grammar found on the Prime Minister’s Office’s website.
A screenshot taken of the website described Prime Minister Najib Razak and his wife paying their last respects to the late Singapore Premier Lee Kuan Yew, the text read:
“Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak and his wife, Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor present to pay their last respects to the late first Prime Minister of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew, who had died in Parliament today. Also seen the Prime Minister of Singapore Lee Hsien Loong (right). Funeral service will be held at 2pm, Sunday, at the University Cultural Center, National University of Singapore, followed by cremation a Mandal Crematorium closed.”
After corrections made, there are still some errors with the grammar on the site.
Ong says that this was the original text, which was later amended following numerous complaints from netizens – albeit maintaining some errors (Pic).
Another passage in the website describing Najib at Lee Kuan Yew’s funeral reads:
“Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak signed a book of condolences for the death of the Prime Minister of Singapore Lee Kuan Yew, at the Singapore Embassy, today. Also seen is the Singapore High Commissioner to Malaysia, Vanu Gopala Menon. Kuan Yew died at 3:18am yesterday at the Singapore General Hospital after being detained in hospital since February 5 for pneumonia severe. He was 91 years old”
Ong Kian Ming says he’ll leave it up to the Deputy Education Minister to correct the grammar in this post.
These examples, according to Ong, were raised to draw attention to the poor standard of English in the country which contradicts a recent statement from Deputy Minister of Education P Kamalanathan who reported said that the standard of English in Malaysia was higher than in Singapore (quoting a reply compiled by a Swedish based company, Education First).
“I leave it up to the Deputy Education Minister to identify the grammatical errors.”
Apart from the official page of the Prime Minister’s office, Ong also threw in an example of an MCA event , which had a banner that read: “For our secular democratic constitution, we strongly defends.”
MCA President Liow Tiong Lai can be seen in the picture speaking from a podium.
Added to that, Ong also shared a picture of a Medical Certificate diagnosing a patient with “Chicken Chop” sickness – which had gone viral early this month.
“The doctor in question probably diagnosed the child as having Chicken Pox but I cannot say for sure. The child may have accidentally swallowed an entire chicken chop and had to be sent home as a result,” Ong quipped.
The doctor probably meant “chicken pox”, says Ong Kian Ming
Ong opined that these were not isolated incidents, and that the level of English amongst English teachers should be improved by gradually increasing the difficulty of English exams.
He also urged Kamalanathan to stop making inaccurate comparisons which gives a false impression of the problem at hand.
-The Rocket
