I'm "BODOH", it seems

I sent a previous post on the UUCA as a letter to Malaysiakini. Apparently, someone took it seriously (other than no name) and called me the most "BODOH" citizen in Malaysia and said that my mother should have been banned from giving birth to me.

I don't hold anything against EC for not getting satire but instead I applaud him for feeling incensed that someone would actually think like this. I'm sure that there are those within the Ministry of Higher Education who would prefer that students don't touch anything that smells 'political' with a 10 foot pole. The point I was trying to make was that if we follow the Minister's line of reasoning to its logical conclusion, we'd be banning students from doing 1001 things and in ways which are obviously absurd. In a way, EC's reaction (as well as noname's) was perhaps the exact kind of reaction I was looking for, from those who didn't get that it was satire, that is.

On a more serious note, Prof Shad Faruqi pointed out that Article 10(3) of the Federal Constitution, allows laws to be written that prohibits students from joining political parties.

Article 10(3) reads as follows:

(3) Restrictions on the right to form associations conferred by paragraph (c) of Clause (1) may also be imposed by any law relating to labour or education.

This means that the government has the right to pass laws which prohibit all members of trade unions, for example, from being members of political parties. In addition, the government also has the right to prevent employees of any educational institution, be it at the primary, secondary and tertiary level, from being members of political parties. Think about that.