KUALA LUMPUR, May 1 — Umno president Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi has called for Islamic religious education and moral‑values development to be strengthened within Malaysia’s mainstream schooling system, stressing that both should not be treated as peripheral streams.
He said the party backs the creation of a National Tahfiz Council to coordinate and elevate Islamic and tahfiz education nationwide, adding that he will take the proposal to the Cabinet for approval.
“We support the proposal to establish a National Tahfiz Council, and I will bring this matter to the Cabinet for approval.
“Our goal is to produce Huffaz who are not only memorisers of the Quran, but also professionals, engineers, doctors, technocrats, entrepreneurs, and leaders,” he said in his concluding remarks at the Umno education congress here today.
Zahid, who is also the deputy prime minister, added that he aspired to see future national leaders, including a prime minister, who are Hafiz of the Quran. A Hafiz is a person who has memorised the entire Quran.
He then said this ambition should be embedded within a structured national education agenda.
He also stressed the importance of building what he described as a “knowledge society” that not only values learning but also uses it to shape national development.
“In this context, education must build human beings, the complete and balanced human person.
“Knowledge without values will produce individuals who are intelligent but not wise, capable but not civilised,” he said.
He then went on to say that education must therefore return to its core purpose of developing character, ethics, discipline, patriotism and respect for parents.
He further proposed that ethics and character education be made a compulsory subject at all levels of schooling.
“An educated society must also be a society with strong moral values. Knowledge without ethics creates emptiness,” he said.
