Defence Minister, Datuk Seri Hishammuddin announced changes to the National Service Training Programme (NSTP) that would substantially alter its purpose and structure. After running for 11 years and having trained a claimed 800,000 individuals, the programme was suspended in January 2015 as a cost-saving measure by the Prime Minister; apparently the suspension saved the government RM400 million. A few months later in April 2015, Hishammuddin said that a new version of the programme will be reinstituted in 2016 with changes to make it more cost effective and efficient. A pilot programme based on the new version will be conducted with 400 school leavers in October 2015.
Version 2 of the NSTP will be shortened to 8 weeks from the original 12 weeks, mainly to reduce costs. According to media reports, the proposed shorter training will bring down the per-student training cost from RM8000 to RM5000.
The content of the training is also being revised. The original programme was made up of 5 modules of instruction namely (i) physical, (ii) nation building, (iii) character building, (iv) nationalism and (v), a minor module). This will now be replaced by a two-phase programme. Phase 1 will be made up of five modules with titles like, Fit4life; Tech & Talk; Malaysia; Be Safe and Be Alert; iUpgrade and three sub-modules, on Spirituality, Volunteerism and MyFuture. Phase 2 will constitute skills training. According to the Minister, coaches for Phase 2 will be trained at skills training institutions. Somewhere in the process, an English language enhancement course is also being added.
By far the most striking change that is to be introduced is making attendance voluntary. Under the original scheme, as required by the National Service Training Act 2003, attendance was mandatory for those who were selected for the training. Failure or refusal to attend the training attracted criminal penalties. The Minister said the voluntary national service program would begin in stages from 2016, with volunteers expected to make up 30% in 2017, 70% in 2018 and 100% by 2019.
Although the Act itself sets the aims of the training programme in very clear terms in its provisions, ministers in the cabinet and those connected with its implementation have from the inception of the programme in 2003 and over the 10 years of its existence, advanced national integration as the main reason. According to these sources the main reason for introducing the training was to arrest the growing ethnic and religious polarization and support integration of the different communities. They seemed not to mind that their objectives were at variance with the aims of the Act which are ‘preparing Malaysian youths for national service under the National Service Act 1952 [Act 425]’ and as a corollary, ‘generally of creating a nation which is patriotic and resilient and imbued with the spirit of volunteerism guided by the principles of the Rukun Negara’.
In any case it was the integration aspect that caught the attention of civil society groups and which possibly also allayed the suspicions of the rest of the population. In fact, Civil Society groups that were represented in early discussions on the development of a curriculum for the NSTP, many still in their youth, were more enthusiastic about designing courses to cure ethnic tensions than with the type of training traditionally associated with national service.
The programme has run for ten years, it has involved more than 800,000 attendants, billions of Ringgit have been spent on its operations and yet, there has been no official evaluation of the programme that has been published to show if the targeted outcomes were being achieved and whether the three months spent in the company of others had made any change in the lives of the trainees after they decamped.
The decision to suspend the programme in January 2015 was made on financial grounds and not, we are led to believe from the many ministerial statements, because of any inherent weakness or shortcomings in the programme. Despite that, a new version of the programme is hatched up in the few months after the suspension that makes fundamental changes to the original version. Surely more is owed to the public by way of an explanation than the hype about what the new version will do. Why alter something that was working?
The details of the new modules are yet to be published, but their titles and the variations implicit in the new structure as publicized reveal a departure from not only the content of the training but the whole underlying policy concerning national service training. Also, the NSTP by shifting its focus may be entering into areas where it has no proven expertise or competence, not to mention the authority to carry them out. Vocational education and English language are areas that require the expertise of teachers and instructors that are not likely to be found within the present trainers, even if as proposed, the trainers themselves are to be trained. Vocational training and English language education are fraught with challenges that are only slowly being understood by the institutions that have traditionally carried the responsibility for them. It is not exactly an area that a hastily modified ‘national service programme’ wants to enter.
Under the Act, attendance for training can be imposed on any group of citizens aged between 16 and 35 years old. However, from the inception of the NSTP, the groups compelled to attend were all randomly selected from students who had completed SPM. Students who were thus selected were eligible to be exempted from the training if they wanted to carry on with their education; but exemption was given only on a case by case basis. Version 2 rules would automatically exempt students who are planning to advance their studies beyond the school. But that is not all. It also appears that the selection of students (other than volunteers) will soon be limited to those whose academic performance is seen to be weak. This is a travesty of all decent principles concerning education. Weak students need more attention and respect than what our society always rushes to inflict on them. It is this cloying view that weak students have to be relegated to menial work that has placed our workforce in the lamentable state it is. No, students will not develop to their true potential by wearing battle fatigues and living in camps.
If the proposed changes are actually implemented, the NSTP would deviate not only from its statutory purposes but also from the politically declared reasons that supported its introduction. Instead of promoting unity, the programme through its new approaches to selection would create more social divisions and a new class of outcasts – the weak students.
The details of the new modules have not been published, but their titles and the way the entire programme is proposed to be divided into two phases give cause for concern as to the direction the NSTP is taking. By embarking into vocational and skills training and English language courses, the NSTP may be entering into areas where it lacks the required competence, not to mention the authority. These are areas that require the expertise of teachers and instructors that are unlikely to be found within the present trainers, even if as proposed, the trainers are to be trained. Vocational training and English language education are fraught with challenges that are only slowly being overcome by the institutions that have traditionally borne the responsibility for them. It is not exactly the area that a hastily modified ‘national service programme’ wants to enter.
Under the Act, attendance for training can be imposed on any group of citizens aged between 16 and 35 years old. However, from the inception of the NSTP, the groups compelled to attend were all randomly selected from students who had completed SPM. Students who were thus selected were eligible to be exempted from the training if they wanted to carry on with their education; but exemption was given only on a case by case basis. Version 2 rules would automatically exempt students who are planning to advance their studies beyond the school. But that is not all. It also appears that the selection of students will be limited to those whose academic performance is seen to be weak.
If all these changes are actually implemented, the NSTP would deviate not only from its statutory purposes but also from the politically declared reasons that supported its introduction. Instead of promoting unity, the programme through its new approaches to selection would create more social divisions.
