ORAL HISTORY
ITM was flexible on entry but did not compromise on outcomes:
Tan Sri Arshad Ayub
One can very well imagine the fear Tan Sri Arshad Ayub must have struck in students as he strode through the campus of ITM 1( Institut Teknologi MARA or MARA Institute of Technology), the higher education institution he helped to establish, and helmed for a decade, from 1965 to 1975. Anecdotes abound of young Malays scattering from teh tarik stalls and
1 In 1999, ITM was conferred university status and is now known as Universiti Teknologi MARA or UiTM. Tan Sri Arshad is one of its Pro-Chancellors hastily stubbing out cigarettes at the sight of this stern Director.
At almost ninety years old now, Tan Sri Dato’ Seri Utama Arshad Ayub, former director of ITM, can still intimidate but once the Perdana Magazine team got him talking, his down to earth nature became evident, as did his passion for education. Presented below are excerpts from our almost six-hour conversation with him in 2016, led by Professor Dr. Mohd Shahwahid Haji Othman, Professor of Economics, Universiti Putra Malaysia.
The full dialogue will be published in book form. The audio excerpts are already available online through our website, www. perdana. org. my / perdana-podcast.
FAMILY BACKGROUND“ I was born about 88 years ago, on 15 November 1928. For the early years of my life, including my school years at a Malay school, I lived as a kampung boy at Parit Keroma, Muar which is about three and a half miles from town. Our life was not bad; we had enough to eat, at least before the( Second World) War. My parents were rubber tappers but we had a house in which we lived with my grandmother and three of my cousins.
28 PERDANA MAGAZINE 2016