FNC calls for urgent action to boost national identity

NATIONAL PRIDE: A new long-term strategy is needed to promote pride in Emirati culture, FNC committee says. (Getty Images)

Emirati identity is being eroded and the government must take swift action to preserve both the local culture and Arabic language, a committee of federal ministers has said.

The warning was made in a report issued on Tuesday by a Federal National Council (FNC) committee on education, youth, media and culture that will be discussed by the FNC before summer recess.
    
The report calls for more coordinated action between federal and local governments to develop initiatives to promote the Emirati culture and history.

And adds that the ministry currently in charge of promoting national identity has failed in its basic task.    
 
It goes on to recommend that the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Community Development draft a three to five-year plan to ensure national pride amolng the local population, according to a report in UAE daily The National.

The new strategy should be subject to annual revision and include measures to promote the “concept of national identity” through the media - a running theme throughout the 18-page report.

School curricula must also be adapted to include local language and culture, it adds - a recommendation that falls inline with a recent call by the FNC’s education committee.

The committee wants federal programmes in coordinate with local authorities to ensure Arabic language in used in primary schools – a move that has still not been implemented despite cabinet approval in 2008.

However, parents also had to take responsibility in encouraging the use of Arabic, said Dr Obaid Al Muhairi, a deputy from Ajman.

“We (parents) are responsible for marginalising the Arabic language. I sent my children to English schools because I want them to learn English while I talk here about national identity, that’s why I say we are the problem,” he told the newspaper.

Meanwhile, Bilal al Budoor, who heads the Arabic Language Protection Association, admitted in evidence to the committee that his sons spoke English at home and they could not read Arabic properly.

The report was drawn up over the past year and involved 16 committee meetings and a number of panel discussions where experts such as Al Budoor were quizzed by committee members.

In September the committee invited more than 200 people, including some of the country’s leading intellectuals and social and political scientists, to the FNC chamber to take part in a discussion on the issue.

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