MALAYAN BANDITS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27166, 23 August 1949, Page 5

MALAYAN BANDITS

WORK BY GOVERNMENT SETTLED CONDITIONS SOON DUNEDIN MAN’S OBSERVATIONS A return to settled conditions \in Malaya before long is forecast by Mr G. H. Fairmaid, a mining engineer, who has returned to Dunedin on leave after spending 25 years in Malaya. “ The bandits have caused the British Government in Malaya a great deal of work,” Mr Fairmaid told the Daily Times yesterday. He added that the Government had settled down to the task and was doing a wonderful job. Operations against the outlaws, whose numbers were believed to be as high as 10,000, were costing the Government about 350,000 dollars a day. The air force had been used to bomb bandit hide-outs, and a'force of 25,000 special constables had been raised for guard duties at the mines and estates. There had not been a great deal of trouble at Sungei Lembing, the mining village where Mr ana Mrs Fairmaid live, although several people, including some Europeans, had been killed.

The bandits’ claim that they were a nationalist organisation was nonsense, Mr Fairmaid said. Most of them had fought against the Japanese, and had become used to the life. They were led by a small number of Communists, the vast majority of whom were Chinese. The state of affairs in Malaya was probably part of the world-wide Communist plan for disrupting industry, Mr Fairmaid continued, and added that their tactics were to set fire to rubber stores and mine buildings. Occasionally they held up buses and attacked passengers, and consequently it was not safe to travel in isolated areas without an armed escort. Fortunately. there was a good air service, and a great deal of travel was done by this means, Mr Fairmaid continued. He had not been able to use his car for the past year, and had been forced to travel by an armoured railcoach and an armoured launch when he wished to leave the village. The native Sakais had also been molested by the bandits, Mr Fairmaid added. He thought they had been attacked because they had given information to the police. The lack of information about bandit movements was a vital problem, and if the Government could win the support of the squatter class of Chinese in Malaya the bandit problem would be ended. Manv Chinese squatters supported the bandits, keeping them in supplies and giving them information on all troop movements, in spite of a great number of deportations by the Government. Mr and Mrs Fairmaid will remain in New Zealand until November.