His Excellency Dr. Elliston Rahming (right), Bahamas Ambassador to the United Nations and the Organization of American States (OAS), is pictured with His Excellency Ambassador Hussein Haniff, (centre) Permanent Representative of Malaysia to the United Nations, and Ms. Sasha Dixon, Third Secretary at The Bahamas Mission at the UN, following a meeting initiated by Ambassador Rahming to discuss scholarship and training opportunities for Bahamians.

NEW YORK -- His Excellency Dr. Elliston Rahming, Bahamas Ambassador to the United Nations and the Organization of American States (OAS), met with His Excellency Ambassador Hussein Haniff, Permanent Representative of Malaysia to the United Nations, on Thursday, January 23, 2014, to discuss the Government of The Bahamas’ interest in seeking scholarship and training opportunities for Bahamians abroad.    

During the course of the meeting, Ambassador Haniff detailed the merits of the 'Malaysia Technical Cooperation Programme, under the rubric of which a number of scholarship and training opportunities were offered by the Government of Malaysia, some of which Bahamians have benefitted from in the past.  Areas of study in which courses were available included Public Administration, Auditing and Taxation (at the Masters and PhD levels) as well as training courses in Diplomacy and International Relations.    

Ambassador Haniff further noted that Malaysia is becoming a centre for excellence in education and training as a result of high standards in educational services and relative lower cost of education to that of more developed countries.   

As a middle-income developing country, Malaysia is aspiring to reach developed country status by 2020 through focusing on cultivating a knowledge-based economy through the use of creativity and innovation as potential sources of significant wealth for the country.   

Specifying that technical assistance was an important foreign policy tool for Malaysia, he further noted that as a country having learned many valuable lessons throughout its history of social and economic development, Malaysia now wished to share these with other developing countries.    

Meanwhile, Ambassador Rahming outlined that some of the main areas of priority for The Bahamas with respect to training included Public Administration, Agriculture, Renewable energy and Criminal Justice, including Corrections.  

Ambassador Rahming also reaffirmed the existing friendly relations between Malaysia and The Bahamas as fellow Commonwealth countries and Ambassador Haniff expressed a willingness to ensure that suitably qualified candidates from The Bahamas had an opportunity to participate in any upcoming training courses organised under the Malaysia Technical Cooperation Programme, as well as to consider other opportunities that might be available in light of the priority areas indicated by The Bahamas.