Malaysia History is not ‘Malay History’

The subject 'History' is a significant medium or channel for shaping the national consciousness and consolidating national unity for a country. However, the content of the history textbooks in our country has not reflected the facts of the history which is inaccurate with the factual error and half-truths found, and the appearance of the contributions of all ethnic groups to the country in the history textbooks seem to be biased and lopsided. This issue has existed for many years while it is getting worse for the latest edition of the secondary school history textbooks. Many scholars are criticizing this issue. 

The latest history textbooks for secondary school still have a strong ‘Malay dominance’ mentality shown even though the textbook has been updated for several editions. The writers of the secondary school history textbooks are having a racial disproportion where out of the writers, there is only one non-Malay writer can be found in it. This leads to the students looking and learning at Malaysian and world history through the lens of one ethnic group only. They do not provide a balanced and equitable description of the appearance and development of the ethnic groups in Malaysia. This blemish has proved the bias of the writers. 

The contributions of Chinese and Indians for nation-building in the history textbooks have been neglected and virtually silent. For example, the history of Yap Ah Loy in the textbooks just left a sentence to mention him. Furthermore, the historical facts of these ethnic groups were found to have factual errors in the textbooks. In the secondary school history textbooks, it has shown directly about the Alam Melayu and most of the history of Malaysia is revolving around the perspective of the Malays and Muslims which tells the fact of lopsidedness in the history textbooks. All of these perspective facts are to rationalize that Malays are ruling the land. But all of these are half-truths. 

The young ones are not being taught the real facts of history about nation-building but with the history that has been skewed towards the 'Malay dominance'. This has annihilated the dedications of the other ethnic groups towards the country in history. This phenomenon not only fails to strengthen national unity but is unable to establish a sense of belonging for the people towards Malaysia. There is no wrong to have the Malay narrative be the core in the history textbooks, but it is not the reason for tampering the history and marginalizing the non-Malay in history. Then, what is the point of shouting out ‘Malaysian family’ if there is only a ‘Malay dominance’ mentality shown strongly?

References
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGNMqJIo7Fs
https://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/nation/2021/04/22/biased-history-textbook-not-good-for-unity-govt-told/

https://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/nation/2021/04/12/expert-slams-history-textbook-for-errors-pro-malay-bias/