Wong Ching Yong – Photo by Peter Boon
SIBU (Sept 11): Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP) Central Assistant Publicity and Information Secretary, Wong Ching Yong, has urged the Ministry of Higher Education (MoHE) to review the admission process for public universities, warning that systemic flaws are exacerbating the nation’s brain drain crisis.
The call follows the case of Edward Wong, a top Sijil Tinggi Persekolahan Malaysia (STPM) scorer with a perfect 4.0 Cumulative Grade Point Average (CGPA), who was denied a place in the Universiti Malaya (UM) accounting programme.
Reports indicated the rejection was due to the faculty offering only 85 places, despite his exemplary results.
“This is absurd, and I fear this may not be an isolated case. There could be more outstanding students who are turned away unfairly because of flaws in the admission system,” Wong said in a statement.
“For a straight-A student not even to be given an interview opportunity is something the international academic community would laugh at.
“Even if Edward is the only case this year, failure to address it fairly and to improve the admission process will result in more excellent students being victimised in the future,” he said.
Wong dismissed the Higher Education Department’s explanation that Edward ranked 1,129 among all UM applicants as “unacceptable”.
He argued that this general ranking is irrelevant unless the specific ranking for the accounting course is disclosed, asserting that not all applicants ahead of him would have chosen the specific programme.
He expressed deep concern that such incidents demoralise high-achieving students and undermine confidence in the national education system.
“Malaysia is already struggling with talent loss. If public universities continue to operate under such a cloud of injustice, more of our brightest youths will inevitably be absorbed by foreign universities and remain abroad after graduation,” he emphasised.
The SUPP Dudong branch chairman also questioned the sudden reduction in UM’s accounting intake, noting that between 2011 and 2024, the university previously produced nearly 200 graduates annually.
“For UM, regarded as the country’s top public university, to restrict its intake to less than 100 is unreasonable. Is UM scaling down its accounting faculty, and for what reason?”
Wong also highlighted that Edward later received an offer for the same accounting programme through UM’s direct admission pathway (SATU), but with tuition fees nearly ten times higher than the standard rate.
“Why is it that a place can be offered if one pays much higher fees, but a perfect score cannot secure admission under the regular system?” he questioned.
Wong also criticised Democratic Action Party (DAP) leaders for their silence on the issue, contrasting it with the vocal support from Malaysian Chinese Association (MCA) president Datuk Seri Dr Wee Ka Siong.
He recalled that Pakatan Harapan (PH) leaders had previously criticised university admissions as unfair and pledged to abolish race-based quotas.
“Yet now that PH leads the federal government, the situation appears to have worsened,” he said.
“DAP won the largest share of Chinese support in the last general election and holds the most parliamentary seats in the unity government.
“When bright Chinese students face injustice in university admissions, DAP should be the first to speak up. Instead, they have let the community down,” he added.
The post Review flawed varsity admission system to curb brain drain, says SUPP man appeared first on Borneo Post Online.