Nation Building

Education is the passion of Tan Sri Lim’s life, but it is not the only area to which he has devoted his considerable talents in the service of his country. He has addressed and implemented a multitude of national issues and conceived and implemented numerous nation-building campaigns for the Malaysian government which have served to promote unity, change mindsets and increase awareness.

He launched a campaign to get Malaysians and private companies involved in the 16th Commonwealth Games hosted by Kuala Lumpur in 1998. His university designed the famous mascot, Wira the orangutan, and logo and composed three promotional songs for the Games. He advised the Vietnamese government in the conduct of the 22nd Southeast Asian Games in December 2003, a role which later expanded to include charting strategies to promote Vietnam to the world as a tourism destination.

He produced “The Trap”, an anti-drugs film, which was presented at a world conference by former Malaysian Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad. It was voted one of the top ten public service films in a global competition in New York. The film carried a universal message and it was made available to other countries to help them counter their own drug-related problems.

He also produced “Take The First Step” for the World Red Cross Peace Conference which was screened worldwide to promote world peace. Another filmlet “Ceasefire ’89” was used around the world as part of an international campaign against nuclear weapons.

Among this most memorable campaigns were the Global Humanitarian Appeal for Bosnia Herzegovina and the Voter Education Exercise for South Africa’s first democratic elections in 1994 which resulted in a victory for Nelson Mandela.

And he was involved in driving information campaigns to rally public support and calm fears during Malaysia’s political and financial crises in 1997-98.

He guided his students and faculty in carrying out a HIV/AIDS awareness campaign in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). He inspired his students in designing the uniforms for trainees of the National Service Programme introduced for school-leavers. And he conceptualised the “Tak Nak” (literally, “Say No") anti-smoking campaign.

The Limkokwing group produced audio-visual materials and creative content for the World Halal Forum 2006 to highlight Malaysia as a major halal food hub. (Halal is an Islamic set of standards for quality preparation of food and other items).

And the group also developed script, video, music and creative work for presentation at the World Congress on Information Technology, Texas, in 2006 to prepare for the following WCIT which was hosted by Malaysia in 2008.

Other successful campaigns included