We were a family of five children. The troubles started during the Japanese occupation of Malaya in 1942. Before that, I was in a Malay school, about one and a half miles from home. We walked to school barefooted. The school at the time was more of a longhouse with classes for standards one through four separated only by blackboards. Hence, what students in one class listened to, the other students could also hear.”
“ When we look at education, what is our purpose? To produce balanced people who are aware of their environment. We should know our Negaraku( national anthem), our citizenship rights, and our constitution while at the same time be accommodating towards each other.”
LIFE DURING THE JAPANESE OCCUPATION“ During the Japanese Occupation, my family suffered tremendously because no one wanted to buy rubber. We had two acres of land, but by the time I sat for my exam in December 1948, we were left with only one acre of land. My mother sold one acre to support us. During that time, too, I had to help an uncle by pedalling his trishaw, and another distant uncle by running his bullock cart for extra money. I also sold firewood. It was a tough job. We had to cut down rubber trees, saw the wood, and then sell them.
I also worked as a forest labourer. There was one advantage to that work, and it wasn’ t money as the so-called“ banana note 2” had no value. The advantage was that we received about three gallons( 27 kg) worth of rice. We used about half of that to barter for other necessities.”
THE ROLE OF EDUCATION IN MALAYSIA“ When we look at education, what is our purpose? To produce balanced people who are aware of their environment. We should know our Negaraku( national anthem), our citizenship rights, and our constitution while at the same time be accommodating towards each other. Malaysia’ s population consists of a number of races and states, so the first thing that the education system must acknowledge as important is our multi-racial, multi-state, multireligious, and multi-cultural nature.
2 Japanese government-issued currency
Respect for one another is the most important basis of education and should be instilled from an early stage, as early as kindergarten. Language also helps us unite. Every Malaysian citizen should be fluent in Bahasa Malaysia.”
ITM’ S MISSION TO PRODUCE MALAY PROFESSIONALS“ There was a gap between industry and the university. We had the University of Malaya but it was academic; the majority of its graduates, with the exception of Medicine and Engineering graduates, would become Malay civil servants, not professionals. At the same time, Majlis Amanah Rakyat( MARA) was encouraging Bumiputera to be more active in business.
ITM already had some experience preparing students to sit for the ACCS( Association of Chartered Corporate
Secretaries) exams. We then enrolled students in the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants( ACCA) course as it would prepare them for external or internal auditing jobs. ITM was the first to introduce professional accounting in Malaysia through the ACCA certification. I received an award from ACCA in the UK in recognition of contributions to the field of accounting. In ITM, ACCA is jokingly referred to as Anak Cucu Cicit Arshad( Arshad’ s children, grandchildren and great grand-children)! In the early days, we offered Diploma courses first, then Advanced Diplomas which the government eventually recognised as being equivalent to a degree-level“ Pass”. The industry didn’ t require the recognition. It was more for the Malays who were interested to join the Malaysian Civil Service. At the time, only the University
PERDANA MAGAZINE 2016 29