UMNO Youth Chief, Dr Akmal Saleh, is well aware of the news regarding the upside-down Jalur Gemilang at an SJKC in Port Dickson, as well as the possibility that it was installed by a disabled (OKU) employee of the school.
If the claim is true, Akmal said that the management of the school should be punished for leaving the disabled employee unsupervised while hoisting the Malaysian flag.
Akmal also mentioned that the employee shouldn’t be tasked with such a responsibility if the person is disabled, and said the management of the school was ignorant for leaving the upside-down Jalur Gemilang for a while before it was noticed. The UMNO Youth Chief also said that Malaysians should stop accepting apologies and “OKU” excuses when it comes to the national flag.
In his Facebook post, Akmal urged the Ministry of Education (MOE) to take this matter seriously and told the ministry to investigate if the person, who is allegedly an OKU, is mentally or physically disabled.
“If the person is mentally disabled, is he allowed to work in a school?”
“This is about patriotism, enough with the disrespect towards Jalur Gemilang.”
Additionally, Akmal also said that the Jalur Gemilang blunders have nothing to do with politics but respect and patriotism. The management of the school issued a public apology for the matter, but Akmal is not fond of the same cycle, where a simple apology follows after committing a huge mistake.
“It has always been like this! Commit a big mistake, then apologise. Enough is enough! I’ve been saying that we need a stricter punishment for those who disrespect the Jalur Gemilang!”
“The flag should be respected, not insulted!”
Before Akmal’s statement, MOE said it would take stern action against the school. Following that, a politician clarified that the flag was put up by a disabled worker at the school, and the blunder should be forgiven because it was a small mistake.
The position of the flag was corrected after the upside-down image went viral.
