Beef up security at schools

Beef up security at schools
Friday, June 01, 2012 - 15:39
by Ravindran Raman Kutty
http://www.mmail.com.my/story/beef-security-schools

THE recent heart-wrenching, nail-biting kidnapping of Nayati Shamelin Moodilar while walking to the Mont’ Kiara International School (MKIS) was scary, fearsome and worrisome to every parent and more so the victim’s parents and their relatives.

Though the police must be commended for their quick and strategic intervention which led to a happy ending I certainly feel more can be done to improve school safety and security.

I urge the Education Ministry to consider putting in place firm measures to arrest this unwarranted actions and deeds of a few crooks that are heartless and cruel, harming the peace and serenity of our school, its students, teachers, parents and our nation.

At present, there is no provision for the appointment of a security guards for schools.

The government pays for the teachers, headmaster and the clerical staff.

There is no provision for a security guard or a traffic warden for all schools.

The government must ensure that there is an extra allocation so that the schools are provided with an auxiliary police personnel, who is either a trained police personnel like the auxiliary police or police bantuan utilised in organisations like Pos Malaysia, Petronas, ports and the airports in the country.

The security personnel manning school gates are only required to open and close gates.

Most of the guards are foreign workers or retirees. They are just a stop-gap measure.

Most of the Parent Teachers Association (PTA’s) are paying for the school security guard, who also doubles as the traffic warden.

If the auxiliary police is employed or mobilised, they can also reduce incidence of gangsterism and be a conduit between the police and the teachers.

Their ability and presence in school would certainly reduce the load of the teachers, especially the discipline teachers who are daily confronted with gang fights in almost every school, especially in the urban and suburban areas.

This auxiliary police can also be mobilised to the private colleges thus giving a greater impact to the well-being of the school, students and overall image of our nation.

The government must also study the student population or the size of a school, the location of every school and decide on the number or security personnel to deploy in schools.

The auxiliary police must also be trained to control traffic especially before and after school, as it’s a chaos with the overzealous parents sending and picking up their children right smack at the gates and disrupting traffic flow.

The ministry should also bring in a demerit point system to monitor and reward the schools who have keep “zero” cases of gangsterism, abduction or any untoward incidence thus ensuring the overall safety and well being of the students, teachers and parents.

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SAFETY FIRST: Ministry must quickly deploy effective measures to prevent any untoward incidents

If we have the disciplined, uniformed, controlled auxiliary police force in action, we can promote our education hub as a safe and sound state for wooing students from abroad.

The investment that we plough into this auxiliary police scheme would certainly bring long term rewards in the form of greater peace, stringent security, better national image and higher number of students from overseas.

This would certainly defray the investment costs that the government is making initially.

One or two untoward incidents like this of the poor child Nayati should be a permanent lesson for everyone to be more vigilant.

The Education Ministry and the Home Ministry must quickly deploy an effective scheme which will immediately arrest these sorts of untoward incidents.

Though “one swallow does not make a summer”, these sorts of incidents certainly put our nation’s image in poor light.


Ravindran Raman Kutty is an advocate of peace and safety. Throughout his community service, he has always contributed to the long-term and overall well-being of the award winning township, Bandar Sri Damansara