Malaysia always boost her multiculture where the three main races namely Malay, Chinese and Indian live in harmony and work together to create a prosper and developed nation. The Malay in the country is so generous and they have granted millions of citizenship to immigrants from China and India during her pre independence day. The Chinese and Indian were grateful of the Malay generousity and worked hard in building the country an envied nation of the world.
Australia is predominantly Anglo-Saxons until late 1970s where they discarded the white policy and accepted migrants from other parts of the world beside Europe. Despite that Australia still has the close tie with Britain where the Queen of England is also the Queen of Australia and the adoption of the Union Jack as Asutralian flag. Even now the Whites still accounted for 90% of Australia population. In terms of multiculturalism, once shall notice in a busy street in Australia, there are at least residents descented from more than one hundred countries of the world.
I would like to put my thought and observation of perception of multiculturalism bewteen residents of these two nations.
1. Assimilation
In Australia, oversea born residents will require two years of stay in order to apply for Australian Citizenship. What is required is a simple test and filling of forms and the approval is within two months. Migrants integrated with the main stream society well, adopted English as their language and there is merely a small amount of isolated communities. All schools are of single stream although study of mother tongue and second language is always encouraged. Malaysian Chinese migrants have been quoted as invisible in Australia and they have integrated well with the main stream by the Department of immigration. There is also high degree of intermarriage with the locals.
In Malaysia, granting Citizenship nowaysday is nearing impossible. Even some locally born are not granted citizenship until their old age. There is even more humiliating that an elderly has only been granted permanent resident or red identity card when he died of old age despite he was Malaysian born.
Communities live in isolation. The Chinese will not live in a Malay area due to fear of racial riot. Similarly, the Malay will not live in a Chinese area because the Chinese eat pork and drink beer which is non halal to the Malay. Despite this, they do interact during work. Even job wise, the Chinese are mainly working for the private sector and the Malay for the government.
Intermarriage between Chinese and Malays is rare. This is mainly due to Islam require the partner of muslim to be converted and most Chinese are resisting Islam. It is a phenomenon least understood by the government and they used to argue that Muslim in China is more than the total population of Malaysia. The muslims in China are not "Han" whereas Malaysian Chinese are "Han". Muslim in China is a minority race.
Although Bahasa Malaysia in the national language but the Malaysian government is open minded to allow schools and universities of other language like Tamil, Chinese and English to be freely established. The government also finance the primary school in Tamil and Chinese. This has make non Malay Malaysians multi-lingual. Despite that Bahasa Malaysia is seldom use unless dealing with the government. The government has also keen in promoting the use of the national language but it was not recieved very well by the public. For the Chinese, the main reason is that the language has no economical value. You can't abosb real knowledege, doing business with other countries etc with the national language.
2. Race
In Malaysia, a person race is very important. For example, only the Malay can become prime minister or ministers holding important port folio, Universities Chancellor, chairman and CEO of government linked companies. University placements depend on race quotas. Government contracts can only awarded to Malays Contractors. Even you are good, you are not given the opportunity because of your race.
In Australia, race is a very sensitive issue. Opportunity depended on merit and awarded accordingly regardless of race. The race or origin of a person is played down. There are anti discrimination laws on race and it has to be very careful in handling or mentioning racial issue. One might lose his or her job and even criminally charged if found guilty of racial discrimination. Austrlians generally will get very angry and frustrated if you mention to them one race is surerior than others or shall be given priviledge.
3. New years and Holidays
Malaysians celebrate three or four new years depended on where you live. There is a spirit of open house for other races to visit each other during a particular race new year which is good for integration.
In Australia, only one new year is recognised and declared public holiday. The new year is mainly quiet and celebrated by close family members. The Chinese New Year will pass by unnoticed in Australia. Despite that you might hear fire crackers burning and lion dance in Chinatown.
4. Racial issues
There are some racial issues in Australia like beating of non European residents. That happens occasionally, one or twice a year and mainly the act of group like Neo Nazies. The coward atc is condemned by the general public.
Surprisingly, Malaysia with its three main races is having the racial issues hitting newspaper headlines frequently. There are issue on dividing the economic cake among the races, previledge and miss treatment of certain race.
Fortunately Austrlian with its population constitute of races from more than one hundred nations in the world do not have similar racial issue.
As a conclusion, I like the Australian altitude of having a common goal to work hard, being recognised and build a better future. There is a lot of respect and protect to an individual by the Constitution and the race and origin of a person is invisible.
