Dr Rajiee Hadi, president of PENDIDIK, the Malay acronym of the Education Practitioners Association, said the government-financed pre-school programme had undermined the existing pre-school programmes by the Education ministry.
“Permata Negara project aims to train children who are categorised as smart in pre-school. This project seems to dispute and belittle the existing pre-school programmes organised by Education Ministry.
"This also includes other pre-school programmes run by the Women, Family and Community Development ministry under its children's nursery (Kemas),” said Dr Rajiee.
According to Dr Rajiee, the Permata project mimicked the now discontinued practice of accelerating 'smarter' children to bypass classes, an idea mooted by Rosmah's husband when he served as the Education minister years ago.
“Is this a manifestation of a return to such a practice??” asked Dr Rajiee.
Rosmah's infant Permata programme received RM111 million in the 2011 Budget
Saying Permata's objectives have long term implications, Dr Rajiee warned the programme would widen the gap between the poor and rich children and contradict the national education policy which aims to close social gaps and forge unity.
“We do not want this project to isolate children from the realities of the world,” he said, adding that education was "a life-long learning process" and being smart at the early stage would not determine the end results.
He said young children should not be taught to remain in different social classes, with gaps "between the rich and poor, between the urban and rural, between minister’s and civil servants' children, between the smart and not so smart".
He also questioned the huge budget of RM111 million recently allocated for Permata.
"Imagine if this RM111 million is channeled to help poor students at the higher institutions of learning," he added. (sumber: Harakahdaily,6/3/11)
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