LONG HISTORY LEADS TO STABLE NATION

Press, 31 August 1977, Page 16

LONG HISTORY LEADS TO STABLE NATION

By a staff writer

Malaysia lies in the heart of South-East Asia. A multiracial State with abundant natural resources and a burgeon i n g manufacturing sector, it has become one of the most prosperous and more stable nations of the region.

Since its independence in 1957 successive governments have adopted measures tailor-made to meet the country’s most pressing problems. Redressing the balance between the poorer, indigenous Malays and the Chinese, who first flocked to Malaysia in the 19th century attracted by work in tin mining settlements, is being achieved by sweeping legislative means.

The promotion of bumiputra (sons of the soil) interests. particularly in business, has upset some Chinese, whose economic and managerial dominance continues to generate a degree of friction among Malays.

Communist insurgency, which erupted in 1948, was officially suppressed in 1960, but acts of terrorism in 1975 and last year, have again raised the spectre of major unrest. New restrictive laws to combat terrorism have been introduced and enforced. But it is economic progress in which the present Government, like its predecessors, seems to put most faith for long-term stability.

The Government of Datuk Hussein bin Onn, Minister of Finance before he succeeded the late Tun Abdul Razak as Prime Minister early last year, has launched the Third Malaysia Plan. Described as a statement of Malaysia’s economic philosophy, its chief object is to reduce poverty among ail races. It seeks to do so by stimulating both private and public participation in the economy, although the State’s role is emphasised less in this than in the second five year economic development plan (1971-75). Populous Peninsular Malaya, always the most economically advanced region, forms the southern tip of the Asian mainland. On its west side it faces the sheltered waters of the Straits of Malacca, renowned as one of the oldest and busiest maritime highways of the world. East Malaysia — Sabah and Sarawak — on the north-western coast of the island of Borneo is considerably less accessible and with its small population is only just beginning to be developed. Export of petroleum from both states, and copper mining in norther Sabah, has given development some impetus. This is likely to be further facilitated by the renunciation by President Marcos of the Philippines’ claim to Sabah. Because of their strategic location on the important international trade routes between Europe and the Middle East, India, China and Japan the Malay states were an inevitable target for colonial domination. It was sea trade that lead to the establishment of the country’s first power base. Malacca, where a Malay Sultanate was dominated by its thriving, cosmopolitan port, was established about A.D. 1400. The last of the powerful. indigenous kingdoms of South-East Asia — and now a popular tourist attraction — its religious, cultural, and aristocratic political tradi-

tions have shaped modern i Malaysia. First the Portuguese, then the Dutch exerted their influence until the British arrived in 1786. Later, the super-imperialist, Stamford Raffles, who founded Singapore in 1819, appeared on the scene. In the Anglo-Dutch treaty of 1824 Britain retained the island of Penang — initially acquihed by treaty from the Sultan of Kedah — and Malacca and Singapore. These formed the Straits Settlements, ruled under a Crown iColony system. The British sphere also included the hin- ; terland to the southern boundary of Siamese influence. Gradually the Brooke family, the “white rajas.” came to rule Sarawak. In Sabah the British North Borneo Company, exploiting the territory's rubber-produc-ing potential, took control. Initially, the British pursued a policy of noninvolvement. until developments made remote control impractical. The modem multi-racial society of Malaysia began when tinmining passed from Malay to Chinese hands in the 1830 s, and the industry, worked by indentured Chinese labour, expanded rapidly.

Rivalries among local interests — between the Chinese secret societies and between Malay rulers and chiefs, all wanting the best deal out of the new industry — came to threaten the political and economic stability of the western Malay States in the 1860 s and early 1870 s. Meanwhile, the presence of European colonial powers in the region made Britain uneasy about the security of the Straits ports. So came calls for a “forward policy.” At the end of 1873 Britain brought the states under a British protectorate, rapidly consolidating its rule under a benign, governing “residential system.” The fine civil service which Britain bequeathed to Malaysia has been instrumental in developing a modem State. By 1909 the states of Kedah, Perlis, Kelantan, and Trengganu in the north were transferred by the Siamese to the British sphere. Johore became a formal protectorate in 1914, unifying the Malay Peninsular under British rule. The British were careful to maintain the Malay political system. The entrenchment of British “advisory” officers ensured British control over the major towns, while government officially remained in the name of the Sultan of each state. Malay rulers and chiefs retained nominal power, and the system of bringing traditional powers within the civil service extended to the rural headman and recruitment of peasants into local police forces.

Many Chinese and Indians settled in Malaysia during the British period. Today Moslem Malays form only 53 per cent of the more than 12M population, which includes 35 per cent Chinese and 10 per cent Indians. The secret societies of the Chinese merchant class formed a strong infra-structure in the early years of immigration.

The first move towards constitutional monarchy and representative government was the formation of the State Council in the 1870s’ providing contact between the Chinese and the AngloMalay regime.

The councils lost much of their value with the formation of the federal executive of the Federated Malay States in 1896. But when the

Federal Council of 1909 was enlarged in the 1920 s it became the instrument of public opinion. It took the invasion by the Japanese in 1941 to bring about a nationalist movement in Malaysia. The Chinese and Indians had pursued their commercial interests and retained their attachment to their ancestral homelands, while the Malays regarded the British rule as a buffer against the immigrants’ expanding numbers and power.

But between the two World Wars an articulate middle class, often Englisheducated and politically orientated, was emerging. Community-based political organisations were formed in the 1920 s and 19305, including the Malayan Communist Party, and the associations which were the nucleus of the later Malay national party. Defeat by the Japanese and the occupation upset the British balancing act which had successfully maintained a status quo based on traditional loyalties. Britain had lost respect as a mediator; and national feeling grew among the Malays. Their feelings were focused on resentment of British determination, after the war, to effect a Malayan union of the peninsular. It crystalised in the formation of the United Malay National Organisation, which remains the dominant Malay political party. The compromise of the Federation of Malaya, established in 1948, brought about union but preserved the rights of indigenous Malays — what has become known as their “special position.”

The Chinese and Indian communities were alientated

from these arrangements. At the time the Chinese community was divided between a conservative approach and the ideology of the militant wing of the Malayan Communist Party. The communist leadership was divided too, between the comparative advantages of cooperation or military action as strategies for gaining power. The decision, in 1948, to follow the latter course, resulted in the 12-year “emergency” in which New Zealand forces participated. The guerrilla-style warfare which was later to become familiar in South Vietnam was suppressed by a combination of re-settlement (which proved much less successful in Vietnam) and numerically superior forces. Eventually many politically aware Malay Chinese decided to join forces with the traditionalist Malay Chinese Association. A limited coalition of

moderate leaders of the three major cultural communities prepared the way for self-government. This alliance won overwhelming majorities in the first elections for the federal and state councils in 1955.

The country progressed from internal self-govern-ment to full independence in 1957, lead by its first Prime Minister and architect of modern Malaysia. Tunku Abdul Rahman. For many years until his retirement in 1974 the senior Chinese Minister, who was also Minister of Finance, was Tan Siew Sin, president of the Malayan Chinese Association.

The strong British contingent in the civil service was phased out; the use of the Malay language and settlement of Malays on newly opened up land promoted. Although the union with Singapore proved overoptimistic and short lived, the integration of Sarawak and Sabah with the 11 Malay States — which, with Singapore, formed Malaysia in 1963 — has endured, in spite of early opposition from the Philippines and Indonesia.

The ability of the various Malaysian communities to balance their demands in compromise has provided a stability in which considerable economic progress has been possible. It was an apparent tipping of this balance which caused the serious rioting of 1969. Measures to redress the balance, including a strict Sedition Act and a written National Ideology stressing loyalty to country and belief in God and the rule of law, were enacted: the crisis passed. The energies of political opposition were re-directed into action within the new National Front, an expansion of the Alliance coalition to include former opposition parties. The major oppositon party is now the Democratic Action Party.

Both the world economic recession and renewed communist activity have brought some uncertainty to Malaysia- But with the vigorous direction of the Prime Minister, Datuk Hussein Onn, both in domestic and international policies, the prospect of any national disaster seems unlikely.

G NATIONAL G DAY 20th Year of Independence