Having your voice heard is a fundamental right – do Malaysian youth have it?

By IAN YEE

According to the United Nations Convention On The Rights Of The Child, being able to participate in society is one of the fundamental rights of young people around the world.

That means young people should be allowed to voice their opinions freely on matters that affect their safety and development, and have society take them into account.

While it wouldn’t be fair to say that Malaysian youth have been denied the chance to exercise their rights as citizens, just ask yourselves: How many schools do you know of have effective student councils?

How many schools allow students to be involved in decision-making processes of matters involving their “second homes”, which is what schools essentially are (or should be) to them? How many schools even ask for their opinions?

While there aren’t any solid statistics to back it up, anecdotal evidence suggests the answer is … not enough.

HELP University College A-Levels student Au-Yong Wai Leem, 18, remembers the time some students tried to form a student council when he was in Form Three. It didn’t really get them anywhere.

“I’m not too sure about the details of what happened because I was only in Form Three and wasn’t involved in it, but I know the idea was shot down, outrightly rejected,” said Wai Leem.The idea was never brought up again during Wai Leem’s time in secondary school.

A few years on, Wai Leem is now part of the Petaling Jaya Child Council (PJCC), a programme initiated by the Petaling Jaya City Council to get the youth to participate in making the city in Selangor more child-friendly.

The 24 child council members, all aged 18 and below, were inducted at the start of the year for a two-year voluntary term where they would represent the PJ child community in voicing their opinions, concerns and suggestions regarding the city and their local communities.

Issues that would otherwise have been given little thought, like the safety of local playgrounds and school bus stops, have already been highlighted by Wai Leem and the PJCC.

“PJCC is about development, about making the city safer and better for children. But the more important thing, I believe, is that it also promotes the idea that young people need to be given a voice,” said Wai Leem.

As far as he knows, none of the other students he has met through PJCC are represented in their schools by a student council; and their goal now is to get students used to the idea that they can actually speak up.

“The focus now is just getting participation from the youth,” said Wai Leem. “They all think ‘why should I speak up when nobody ever listens?’ When we gave ideas in school, the teachers always seemed to have this pre-conceived notion that we were wrong.

“But what the young people need to realise is this – you have a voice now; use it. In spite of what you’ve experienced in the past, you do have a right to use that voice.”

Getting louder

The winds of change are blowing now for young Malaysians, as more and more platforms like PJCC have emerged in recent years.

Amnesty International Malaysia’s (AI-M) youth ambassador programme is one of them.

Fifty budding young activists were selected and trained under the programme to go around the country promoting human rights causes, which they have been doing over the last four months.

They had to go through camps and workshops that gave them crash courses on human rights issues, as well as practical training on organising creative ground events, and things like how to approach refugees and the urban poor.

After the training, the ambassadors get to call all the shots. They decide what kind of activities they want to run when they reach a particular area, and they have to pull it off themselves.

Wai Leem (L) and Faisal Aziz have both been speaking up on behalf of young Malaysians through the PJ Child Council and Amnesty International Malaysia respectively.

“The activists (ambassadors) have responded well,” said Faisal Aziz, 23, assistant project coordinator for the AI-M ambassadors.

“It feels like they have something to prove, like they want to show they can help tackle society’s problems. Maybe they’ve never been given the opportunity to help before. There wasn’t a proper platform for them to execute their ideas. Now they have something meaningful, something close to home they can work on.”

Faisal adds that there are many other programmes, like Chow Kit Kita (www.chowkitkita.com/), that allow young people to be involved in the community.

“There will always be a platform for you to be involved. Some of them even give young people 100% control in what they do, like AI-M.

“And if you have no access to any of them, just create one! Find a few friends, and initiate something. To create action doesn’t require an NGO,” he said.

Training ground

One school that does have a student council is Kolej Tuanku Ja’afar (KTJ) in Negri Sembilan.

Former council member Haziq Azizi, 17, believes it has created a culture in his school where teachers respect the students’ ideas and opinions.

“It’s sort of like they feel obliged to (listen to the students), because the student council has always been there. The teachers have learned to accept their opinions.

“Plus, the teachers help with the selection process as well, so they know the council members are good students,” said Haziq.

Students at KTJ have to campaign to be part of the student council, which Haziq really enjoyed.

“It was a lot of fun. We were sticking posters everywhere, and there were lots of creative campaigns. Some got carried away with the whole thing, of course, giving speeches and promising a lot of things you knew they couldn’t deliver,” he said.

The school set up some recycling bins on the council’s recommendation during Haziq’s term, and current council recently got some new chairs for the school tuck shop. Nothing huge, but that’s not the point, according to Haziq.

“We don’t really have a lot of decision-making power. It’s not like in Britain where the student council has free reign and they can plan and manage their own events. In my school, the council is more of a sounding board.

“But what’s important is the learning process. I learned how to see different points of view. I had to explain to the students why we couldn’t work on some of their suggestions, and at the same time tell the teachers what the students weren’t happy about,” he said.

Are youth ready?

The big question, of course, is whether Malaysian youth are ready to have such a large say in society.

Despite all the resistance he’s encountered in the past, Faisal believes beyond a shadow of doubt that they are.

“Youth are more aware and sensitive towards social problems now,” said Faisal. “There is so much intellectual discussion going on with young people today. You have events like arts festivals and film screenings where ideas are exchanged.”

Sonny Lim, from NGO Community Support Network, was one of the people who helped set up the PJ Child Council, and he says one only needs to take a look at social media to know that the youth are ready.

“Most of them are tired of trying to express themselves, because adults don’t take them seriously – that’s why they express so much on social media, where they can share it with each other. We’ve had some very interesting ideas and suggestions on our PJCC Facebook page (http://on.fb.me/n4ngWb),” he said.

One of the problems, says Sonny, is that the school system in Malaysia does not encourage individual expression.

But he also adds that it is a problem that can be easily solved.

“It’s as simple as asking for the students’ opinions, and actually respecting what they say. Their perception now is that it’s still a waste of time. Teachers can change that by asking their opinions on simple things, and if they disagree, don’t just shoot it down. Discuss it. Teachers should facilitate discussion,” he said.