Materia Medica Malaysiana

Shafie: Cabinet to receive faculties’ expansion plans

KUALA LUMPUR: Plans to expand the various critical faculties in public universities will be presented to the Cabinet next month and allocations for it will come under the Ninth Malaysia Plan.

Higher Education Minister Datuk Dr Shafie Mohd Salleh said among the proposals being considered was the hiring of foreign lecturers, especially those from Commonwealth countries, to meet the demand for teaching staff.

“We have many vacancies but not enough people to fill them,” he said yesterday.

He added that the committee drawing up the proposals, comprising officials from the Higher Education and Health ministries, would also come up with a budget and equip universities with enough facilities to meet the increasing demand for places.

“The Cabinet has directed us to come up with a working paper,” he told reporters after opening the Universiti Malaya (UM) dental faculty’s new pre-clinical building here yesterday.

At present only three universities offer dentistry – UM, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia and Universiti Sains Malaysia. Plans are underway to open two private medical faculties – one in the Asian Institute of Medicine, Science and Technology and another in the Penang Medical College.

In his speech, Dr Shafie reiterated the ministry’s plan to rate the various faculties of public universities so the public would have a better gauge of the strengths and weaknesses of each university, and to promote healthy competition among them.

Earlier, the minister visited the new pre-clinical dentistry building – which cost RM13mil – named Balai Ungku Aziz, after UM’s former Vice-Chancellor Royal Professor Ungku Aziz.