Hou Kok Chung is the new Deputy Minister of Higher Education

One of the two new Deputy Ministers of Higher Education is Dr. Hou Kok Chung, who ran under the MCA ticket in Kluang in Johor. He's a former UM academic in the Chinese Studies department, if I'm not mistaken and was heading the Institute of China Studies (ICS) before being called up by the MCA to contest in the 2008 GE. He got his PhD from SOAS, London and has a pretty extensive publication record (even if most of them are local journals or books). Hopefully, having a former academic in the MOHE as a Deputy Minister will help the new Minister, Khaled Nordin, improve the state of higher education in our country since Dr. Hou should know the weaknesses (many) and strengths (few) of the public university system.