Congratulations to the five cardiothoracic surgeons who have been registered by the Malaysian Medical Council (MMC). Health minister Datuk Dzulkefly Ahmad said the registration of the five specialists marked the resolution of a long-standing issue on the implementation of the parallel pathway programme and the recognition of international qualifications, particularly in the field of cardiothoracic surgery.
When there was an urgent need in the country for these specialists, the cabinet, parliament and other agencies moved forward speedily in changing the laws to legitimise their studies and training and absorbing them into public service. This is what all Malaysians expect from a responsible government.
However, we doctors from unrecognised universities have not seen this gusto ever shown for us other than empty platitudes during election time for the past 30 years. This happens continuously although there is a severe lack of doctors in basically every government hospital and a critical shortage in Sabah and Sarawak. We have come to the conclusion that people’s lives do not matter as much as the importance of coming out from overpriced recognised universities all for the sake of saving face for the establishment.
If the Health Minister could sign a ministerial order to enforce amendments to the Medical Act 1971 to bring in these 5 cardiothoracic surgeons as stated in the FMT article dated 27th August, 2025 – “MMC registers 5 cardiothoracic surgeons under parallel pathway programme” – why can’t such an order be done to bring in doctors from unrecognised
universities?
After all, something similar was also done now for nurses due to the acute shortage for them as in the FMT article dated 3rd February, 2025 – “Entry requirements for nursing diploma eased to address shortage” – where their entry requirements were dropped from 5 to 3 credits to encourage SPM leavers to take up this humble occupation.
I’ve previously written 10 articles published in Finance Twitter regarding this matter. I have touched on various aspects of this matter. But till today there is only silence from the “caring” Pakatan Harapan government which seems to just carry on all the race-based policies of the previous BN governments. Or is it after forming the government with BN, PH has morphed into BN 2.0? Where has all the change that was promised before elections gone to now?
Right now, enrollment in medical schools are falling as many students prefer to choose other careers instead of the many gruelling years it takes to come out as a doctor and the exorbitant fees demanded. This has been observed in Western nations where they import doctors to serve there due to the lack in their countries. Malaysia is one of the nations with a brain drain problem supplying doctors to them.
Now we too are going the way of Western nations from the interest shown by our graduates. This was elucidated in “Malaysia’s Doctor Shortage: Causes And Solutions: Part 1 — Dr Sean Thum” where it was stated that “the country now faces a potential shortage of medical professionals due to declining interest in medical education and increasing brain drain to other nations.”
Add to this the way doctors from unrecognised universities are treated, why would they want to come back to serve the country when their hard working parents have saved and scrounged for their studies and they are unwelcome in their country of birth where even foreigners are treated better as long as they come from a recognised university?
Isn’t it time to treat everyone equally and welcome everyone to return and serve and be trained as houseman without only forcing doctors who don’t have their university listed in the MMC list to sit for biased exams? After the MMC entrance exams for unrecognised doctors, they start housemanship again where they are basically trainee doctors and still have pre, mid and post-tests in every department they serve in. Aren’t those department’s exams enough to weed them out?
The whole reason their universities are unrecognised was because MMC clearly stated that the recognition process is an expensive matter and they do not have the means to evaluate every university which doesn’t have many Malaysians there. In fact, MMC only does this process when MARA or JPA students are sent. They are not bothered about other foreign universities which are even older and more established than our local public universities as the majority enrolled there are mainly Indians and Chinese.
So why is the PH government still perpetuating these racist polices? Isn’t it enough that these students go overseas with their parent’s monies and come back to serve? Or is it another ploy to scrounge from these doctors more money by making them sit for the qualifying exams which are very expensive to take?
And what about those who have passed exams such as the Australian Medical Council (AMC) exams, Canadian exams, United States Licensing exams, and UK’s PLAB? Why can’t all these exams be accepted? Are these certificates also not worth the paper they are printed on in Malaysia?
Why do we still keep a list of recognised and unrecognised universities? Isn’t the list of recognised universities in that particular country enough for us to endorse and welcome these doctors? How come when foreign doctors from so called unrecognised universities enter Malaysia to do their specialist courses at our local universities, we allow them and give them a temporary license to examine patients here and often times even work here once they finish their training? How come our Malaysian unrecognised doctor’s own foreign classmates are treated like gold here but our own Malaysians are treated like pariahs by our medical establishment?
Some universities have feted the recognition team and got their recognition as this allows them to jack up their fees by double or even triple once recognition is given. In the past, MMC officials have had to resign due to these scandals. If PH claims to be a government that is against corruption, why still allow these loopholes to exist?
Any university that doesn’t play ball will have a negative report written up against them with all sorts of faults found which do not affect the clinical judgement of their medical students. Is having a nuclear medicine department a prerequisite for recognition? How will it help graduates?
What criteria was used for Russian medical graduates, such as our famous Doctor from Merlimau; where they only study medical subjects for their final 3 years and do non medical subjects such as animal husbandry and plant physiology for the initial 3 years? If they can be allowed in to serve as houseman and have proven themselves once they are in the system, why put a stumbling block for others who have done a solid 6 years of medical subjects?
Even the qualifying exams which MMC sub-cons to the local universities, why force doctors to pass both the theory and clinical parts at one go? And why allow only 3 attempts? Even the AMC exam, which is considered one of the toughest in the world; allows a candidate to take the theory part as many times as they wish and then move on to the clinical exam with no limits on the number of attempts.
Since these doctors are not local university students, why force them to adhere to these local university rules and make them take the exam with the local university students? Do they get a certificate from the local university at the end of the day? Will the local lecturers be unbiased to the overseas candidates?
How can having different role numbers and, candidates from unrecognised university being forced to answer in English while the local candidates answered in BM; be considered a clean exam? USM in court documents filed by them claimed it was a mistake on their part for doing this practice. What about having negative marking for external candidates only and no marks from course work for external candidates?
Do this seem like a clean exam? But MMC says you are “not to question them and they can’t help you”. Their famous words still ring in my ear. How come there was a quota system practiced previously when only 5 – 10% of the candidates where able to make it and now the MMC claims that 30 – 40% are able to pass?
Were the earlier candidates dumb for not making the cut or were they just used as the failure rate to pass the lowest segment of local universities candidates by using these unrecognised doctors as the failure rate? And local candidates know their result in less than a week but it takes the unrecognised doctors about 2 months to get theirs. Is this time for some hanky panky?
There is too much of a mess done previously to keep this present system in place. Immediate change to the Medical Act to take in all Malaysian doctors no matter where they came from into housemanship is what is now needed. Previously 30 doctors took a case against the Health Minister, MMC and the local universities.
The judgement of the case at the appeal court in 2010 didn’t touch on nearly all the pertinent issues highlighted and the judge basically highlighted that the doctors should have made their universities to apply for recognition. What if the students had already done that and the university had submitted 2-inch-thick documentation showing that they had met all the criteria? Any of these 30 doctors may decide to ask for a judicial review to the courts and open the Pandora’s box once again.
The present Health Minister has already met these doctors when he first held office in 2018. He knows the whole situation. Why is there a silence now? Or is PH waiting to cajole us with sweet talk during election time with the same “Anak Melayu, Anak India, Anak Cina, Anak Kadasan, anak saya” line hoping to get our votes and then keeping us in the abyss for another 5 years? Is this the grand plan? Or only when people come to protest on the streets like the Gig workers are new laws formulated to get their support?
I seem to rehash old points again and again but unless the system changes, Pakatan Harapan should remove the word “Harapan” from it’s name as it’s a mockery of the electorate. I have also been silent for the past year hoping I wouldn’t have to pen another article and giving time and space for things to be sorted out but realised that this seems to be taken as an “out or sight, out of mind” matter. My other 10 articles on this website have other nuances of this matter with various other facts highlighted.
If things can be done for the cardiothoracic specialists and nurses, it’s high time a total revamp is done for these unrecognised doctors as well. When people want to come and serve, they should be allowed to do so and contribute to the country and society as law abiding tax paying citizens.
Remove all unnecessary exams and take all doctors in no matter where they graduate from. Let them prove themselves during housemanship training. Many of us have another 30 or even 40 years left in our lives to be productive adults. Does PH dare to make our dreams come true like for the cardiothoracic specialists and nurses?
Signed,
Disillusioned Malaysian Doctor
Other Articles That May Interest You …
- What About The Plight Of Doctors From Parallel Pathways?
- Where Is The Refomasi? Just Be Silent In The Future!
- As Vice-Chairman Of WHO, Health Minister Zaliha Should Take In Malaysian Doctors From WHO Recognized Universities
- USM Medical Faculty Exam Leak – Nothing New For Unrecognised Doctors Who Have Seen And Experienced It All
- Racial Biasness In Medical Sector Is Normal And Is Nothing New! Get Used To It? – Ask Doctors From Unrecognized Universities
- Blood On Incompetent Muhyiddin Regime’s Hands – Doctors May Have To Decide Who Can Live And Who Dies
- Oversupply Of Doctors? Start Thinking Outside The Box!
- Forget Khat Jawi – Vietnam The Top Producer Of Programmers, Even Myanmar Has Started Computer Coding For Kids
- Unrecognised Doctors Wanted To Contribute & Pay Taxes But Mahathir’s Health Minister Isn’t Interested
- Obsolete Education System & Racial Politics – Reasons Malaysia Will Miss Major Spoils Of US-China Trade War
- Fake Degrees vs Unrecognised Doctors – Here’s A Second Letter From Frustrated Doctors To Mahathir’s Minister
- Close To 300 Doctors Reveal Why Overseas Doctors Do Not Come Back – Can Dr Mahathir Fix It?
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September 17th, 2025 by financetwitter
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