The epic story of how UiTM students hijacked a train and took over the campus in 1974

[This article was originally written in BM by our Soscili.my fam. You can read it here.]

If it wasn’t already famous enough, Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) just got famous-er lately due to several random events that occurred one after another throughout a week. Firstly, Federal Territories Minister Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor (an alumni of the University himself) unintentionally insulted UiTM students by calling them “slow learners” during a speech. The university later accepted his apology for the remark.

After that, social media users got a rude shock when UiTM promoted their charity run on the internet, because it was given a very questionable name.

Ridicule and disappointment prompted the University to quickly apologise and take down the image. Then finally, on a more positive note, there was the news about UiTM Melaka students pooling their money together to save a campus cat named Abu, after it was injured in a hit and run accident.

UiTM is an educational institute exclusive to Malay and Bumiputera students. With a total of 12 branches from Perlis to Johor, UiTM produced 26,471 graduates in 2017 alone. But unknown to most of us and even some of its own students, UiTM actually has a long and interesting history, and its students were grabbing headlines way earlier than you might think.

But before we appreciate the train bit, we have to start by understanding what led to it…

Back then, besides University Malaya, the Bumiputeras didn’t have many chances to get a degree

Back in the day, getting a tertiary education was quite a privilege, especially if you were Malay. There was no long list of universities and colleges for you to pick from, only University Malaya (UM) and maybe a chance to go overseas through the Commonwealth scholarship, but usually only a handful of Malays would successfully enroll, and it was mostly the ones who previously studied in English schools.

For everyone else, there was the Dewan Latehan RIDA, set up in 1956 and also the brainchild of Dato’ Onn Jaafar. Offering simple courses in commerce, secretaryship, accountancy, stenography and small business, its first convocation in 1962 saw only 50 graduates receiving their certificates from Tun Haji Abdul Razak Dato’ Hussein, Malaysia’s deputy prime minister at the time. By 1967, the institution was upgraded and became known as Institut Teknologu MARA (ITM) after some upgrades and more courses were added, but there was still much to be desired by the student community.

You see, at that time, the graduates of ITM were only payed as much as STPM, which is one level lower academically. The strange reason for this was because the gomen did not acknowledge ITM’s certificates!

“We were very upset. Our kings were Malay, most of our ministers were Malay, our officers were Malay, and while ITM diplomas were made for the Malays, its not recognised by our own government.” – Nik Rosli Mahmud, Ketua Keselamatan dan Kebajikan Pelajar KSITM 1974, quoted Oren TV.

ITM students formed Kesatuan Siswazah Institut Teknologi (KSITM), and frequently raised the issue to the relevant authorities. KSITM themselves made and sent a memorandum to many leaders and departments, including the Education Ministry. Their goal was for ITM’s status to be raised and recognised as a University, so ITM graduates could graduate with degrees instead of diplomas. Since ITM graduates had went on and enrolled in overseas universities like Ohio University, Boston University, and universities in Michigan and Washington, its students felt that it was justified.

But as months and years went by, their requests seemed to have fallen on deaf ears, so the students decided to take things into their own hands.

In the name of their FUTURE, ITM students hijacked an entire train and took over the campus

On the night of 22nd April 1974, about 6,000 ITM students marched 60km from the Shah Alam campus to the Parliament. According to Anuar Tahir, a former student leader of KSITM in 1974, a demonstration of this scale has not happened in Malaysia since the proposition of Malayan Union. A few hundred students even hijacked a train and set off to KL.

“Some of the engineering students, hijacked a train and they took themselves to KL. It was full of students from ITM, I was told the number was around 600.” – Ibrahim Ali, quoted from OrenTV

But before they were even close to the parliament building, their march was met by a blockade at Batu Tiga, Shah Alam. Ibrahim Ali, current President of PERKASA and former student leader of KSITM said that smoke bombs were hurled towards the students after they refused to disband. The situation escalated quickly, even though some of these students were sons of police officers, they still clashed with the FRU. In the end, about 1,500 people were arrested and around 300 were brought to the hospital. Only 300 people managed to reach their real destination.

“It was like watching a fireworks display. I ran and hid in the marshes beside the train station at Batu Tiga.” – Ibrahim Ali, Presiden KSITM 1972-1974. Petikan dari Oren TV.

Though their marching attempt has failed, the KSITM leadership was far from giving up. Hence, with the unofficial blessing of ITM’s director (who was absent during the incident), the students decided to take over and occupy ITM’s campus in Shah Alam and Jalan Othman. The authorities cut off electricity and water supply to the campus in an attempt to disband them, they even brought in the parents of the students to persuade them to go home, but to no avail.

Meanwhile, the students helped each other survive in the school, with hotel catering students cooking food for everyone, and mass communication students designing their media battle plan for their cause. The occupation lasted for 10 days, and it came to an end when the gomen finally agreed to a negotiation with the students. Though not all of their demands were met, some changes were made:

1. A few ITM diplomas were given the same status as degrees, and its holder is entitled to an equivalent pay.
2. Graduates who were already working would receive compensation equal to the amount they should have received

And with that, ITM entered a time of peace. It eventually got upgraded to “University” status in 1999, thanks to Ibrahim Ali. He made the request during a speech when Tun Dr. Mahathir was present to officiate a ceremony. The PM simply agreed, no grand theft auto or occupation needed.

But in 2008, some 5000 UiTM students took to the streets again

Fast forward to 12th August 2008. More than 5,000 students sounded the marching drums again in Shah Alam to protest Khalid Ibrahim’s (Selangor MB at the time) suggestion to impose a 10% quota for local and foreign non-bumiputera students to enroll in UiTM. His reasoning was so that UiTM could become more competitive, and greater work opportunities would be provided to its graduates. Dyana Sofya Mohd Daud, a DAP politician and alumni of UiTM also once suggested that UiTM be equally opened to all.

This issue has actually been debated even in 1976. At the time, it was Dr. Tan Chee Khoon, Lim Kit Siang & Lim Kiam Hoon that called for UiTM to be opened to all Malaysians on the basis of promoting national unity. Tun Dr. Mahathir rejected the notion, citing the hypocritical requests by the very same politicians to increase Mandarin and Tamil schools, and suggested that they should send their children to kebangsaan schools if they were serious about unity.

Most recently in 2015, UiTM’s very own Pro Chancellor Tan Sri Arshad Ayub suggested that UiTM be opened to non-bumis, but in small percentages to study only Masters and PhD. He says that this is to prevent Bumiputera graduates from being just champions at home, and prepare them to face an increasingly challenging global market. But at the same time, he said that diploma and degrees should remain exclusive because the bumiputeras are more in need of the support.

Whatever the fate of UiTM, there’s no denying UiTM’s legacy in Malaysia

Much like how University Malaya had Anwar Ibrahim, UiTM too had cultivated famous leaders, and some were mentioned in this article itself. Perhaps most famous is former ITM student leader Ibrahim Ali, the renowned and self confessed “King of Frogs” (we’ve already written about him more than once). Anwar Ibrahim and Ibrahim Ali have completely different reputations now, but they were once best friends in Kamunting prison after they were both arrested under ISA!

Their stories were not too different from student leaders today, just ask Muhammad Safwan Anang and Adam Adli Abdul Halim, who were both charged for breaching the Peaceful Assembly Act and causing public nuisance. Though only Safwan expressed desire to become a politician, Adam was less keen about it, (he said politicians are sometimes forced to do things against their will) but reckons that he wouldn’t end up too far away from politics either.

But beyond that, UiTM is also ranked the 9th best university in Malaysia, and ranked 3rd best in Malaysia in terms of job placements, according to QS World University rankings. UiTM students also showed us what they got when their debate team managed to beat teams from Oxford, Harvard and Cambridge university, so maybe now you might know better to think that UiTM is just another university.