As expected......
PUTRAJAYA, Aug 11 – Attitude problem among the public, especially the Chinese community, is the main challenge faced by the enumerators in the ongoing Population and Housing Census of Malaysia 2010, Chief Statistician and Census Commissioner Datuk Wan Ramlah Wan Abd Raof said today.
She said some of the Chinese residents even claimed that they only spoke Mandarin and not Malay or English language.
“That should not happen because as Malaysians living in Malaysia which had been an independent country for almost 53 years now, they must at least know one of the languages,” she said.
The census questionnaires which comprised 51 questions in four segments were made available in Malay and English language.
The national census has now entered the third and final phase which began on Aug 7 and will end on Aug 22.
The first phase of the census was conducted from July 6 to July 22, while the second phase took place from July 23 to Aug 6.
During the first phase, Wan Ramlah said about 70 per cent of non-response participants were from the Chinese community.
“We’re not being racist in exposing this issue. Even the prime minister (Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak) said that the 1 Malaysia concept means benefits for all irrespective of ethnic and race groups.
“If we want to implement the concept to everyone, it should follow the statistics by race, by ethnic group,” she explained.
Wan Ramlah said she could not believe how the Chinese community could say that they did not understand the census questions because most of them were living in major towns and had every access to education.
“We are afraid that if they did not respond to our census, the community population in the area will be under-counted and the development could not be accurately planned and implemented for the area.
“It goes to the other states as well. If the states did not respond, they are the ones who will be at a loss,” she said.
Wan Ramlah said she had personally faced the “attitude” problem during one of her visits to a particular residential area where a resident purposely released her dogs to chase them away.
She said if the department wanted to take legal action to such an uncooperative residents, they could simply do so as stipulated in the sub-section 17 of the Census Act 1960.
“Most people don’t know about the action that we can take against the uncooperative residents. We can do so if we want to. Legally, we have the right,” she said.
Under the sub-section 17, a resident who purposely gives incorrect information or take out the yellow census list card from his or her residence within a year, could be fined with RM100 or jailed for a month. – Bernama
Strange country we live in.........its as if there is another Country within a Country
The time has come people for us to face this issue head on.....
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