In storm over booze money, support for Fadhlina comes from outside Cabinet

A prominent public health expert and educational activists have urged Putrajaya to stick to its current rule prohibiting alcohol companies from participating in school fundraisers, as Education Minister Fadhlina Sidek defends herself against pressure from DAP, apparently without any allies in Cabinet. 

Former Pahang state health director Dr Zainal Ariffin Omar said there was no need to review the education ministruy's 2018 circular banning tobacco, gambling and alcohol-related companies from donating to schools.

"Alcohol, cigarettes, vaping and gambling are elements that destroy the young generation.

"There is no need to promote it to children, especially in educational premises and facilities," he told MalaysiaNow, adding that allowing beer brands to make their presence known set a bad precedent.

He said the education and health ministries should join hands in taking action against those behind such programmes. 

However, he said he was not surprised by the reactions to the recent controversy.

"They are always looking for opportunities and legal loopholes," he added.

A source close to PKR circles in Putrajaya told MalaysiaNow that frustration had been increasing at the education ministry over the Anwar Ibrahim administration's lack of support for the government's own policy, after the prime minister's deputy defended a beer brand's involvement in raising funds for a Chinese school.

Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi had repeated claims by Tiger Beer, whose display of a logo during a school event sparked the current controversy, that its involvement was merely in arranging for local artists to participate in fundraisers under the Chinese Education Charity Concert.

The source said that education ministry officials were puzzled by the lack of will by government leaders to implement the 2018 circular banning donations from alcohol, gambling and tobacco companies.

"The prime minister himself should have come to the fore and put his foot down, as the circular on the ban is clear," the source told MalaysiaNow in exchange for anonimity.

An official at the ministry declined to respond to the claims, but said that since 2018, politicians had complicated the "implementation of a simple policy that had been universally acceptable" by bringing in elements of race and religion.

"Many non-Muslim countries in the West have clear policies on the sponsorship of alcohol companies for schools. So why the noise here?" she said.

On Friday, DAP chairman Lim Guan Eng launched a scathing attack on Fadhlina over her stance urging schools to comply with the directive, despite pressure from DAP leaders including the party's secretary-general and Transport Minister Anthony Loke who openly called for the ban to be reviewed.

"She is not the PAS education minister, and should not listen to PAS. She is the education minister of Pakatan Harapan, the unity government and the country as a whole," Lim was quoted as saying during a press conference attended by the Chinese-language press.

Lim's attack elucidated no response from any of Fadhlina's Cabinet colleagues.

Instead, the former senator whose late father was Anwar's ideological mentor during their days in the Malaysian Islamic Youth Movement, received support from PAS and Umno Youth.

Dr Akmal Salleh, the Umno Youth chief, urged Loke not to question the existing rules, and slammed him for his "insolent" remarks to Fadhlina.

Meanwhile, experts and education groups urged the government to put its foot down on the issue.

A popular online pressure group slammed the fundraising programme displaying the Tiger Beer logo. 

"As a preventive measure, a stricter policy should be imposed to limit alcohol advertisements in areas frequently visited by teenagers such as schools, shopping malls, and sports complexes, as well as in the case of sponsorships of programmes involving educational institutions," Public Health Malaysia said on its Facebook page.

'Why not donate discreetly?'

PAGE, or the Parent Action Group for Education Malaysia, said the public spat sparked by ministers defending the involvement of alcohol companies in school fundraisers showed hypocrisy.

"This is opening up a can of worms, in order to justify tobacco companies also donating, or for their brands being displayed in school areas.

"Now it seems that schools can be used as a promotional field for such companies even if the brand is in the form of 'trademark' or subliminal," PAGE chairman Noor Azimah Abdul Rahim told MalaysiaNow.

Azimah also criticised the argument that school programmes sponsored by alcohol companies had existed for the past three decades.

"We fully understand that funds are essential for education. However, if such a company is truly sincere and pure in its contributions to education, there would not have been an issue if their brands or trademarks were not displayed in and around the school vicinity," she said.

Chinese education activist Kua Kia Soong, who criticised the defence by DAP politicians of the beer sponsorship, agreed.

He said if breweries wishing to help Chinese schools had done so discreetly, the current controversy would not have occurred.

"They should not be seen advertising their fundraising for the schools and have their posters and banners and billboards in the schools or be associated with the schools. 

"Like other donors, they should just contribute without all that advertising razzmatazz," said the former Petaling Jaya MP and former principal of New Era College.