On 1st May 2011, I caught an “interesting” infomercial on the television. It showed a Malay lady and her daughter having conversations at home and at the hypermarket while doing some grocery shopping. At the end of their shopping trip the mother, while pushing her shopping cart, asked around to get the parking ticket paid. Lo and behold, the strangers (note, the strangers are adults) she approached looked puzzled as if they did not understand what she was asking! It was then that the daughter stepped in to ask the strangers in Bahasa Malaysia (BM) that only the stranger understood and promptly responded in BM where to get the parking ticker paid! And, the infomercial ended with the song “Gunakanlah Bahasa Kebangsaan kita, marilah amalkan ramai ramai…”
I was shocked! What an incredulous way of encouraging the use of BM! The mother asked a simple question “Where can I pay the parking ticket?” I do not think this question is too difficult to understand by an adult! It is after all basic conversational English. And, to think that this infomercial was produced by our ministry to encourage the use of BM! Why encourage the use of BM by bringing down and demeaning the use of English? Or, mock the people who are practicing English in their everyday life? Just when our whole nation is gearing up to improve the use of English at all levels, here comes this “brilliant” infomercial to “help” achieve this goal. Well, good job at shooting yourself in the foot!
The powers that be should remove this infomercial. It is an insult to our intelligence and an embarrassing representation to the world on how serious we are at improving our command of English. I am sure there are better ways to promote the use of BM, but until they find the right strategy, please do NOT educate the public this way. It will only be detrimental to our future.
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