Raja Petra Kamarudin
Khir Toyo has asked HINDRAF not to provoke the Malays. It seems
SMSess are floating around saying that HINDRAF is planning to
organise a gathering in Kampong Baru. This is what The Star reported:
The Indian community has been advised not to heed an SMS that claimed
Hindraf would hold a gathering in Kg Baru, said Selangor Mentri Besar
Datuk Seri Dr Mohd Khir Toyo. He said the messages were sent out with
the intention of causing anger among the Malays and create racial
tension.
"The Indian community should also ignore the messages. I hope the
police will take action against those who are spreading false
information," he told reporters after attending the opening of the
heritage building of the Sultan Suleiman Club by the Sultan of
Selangor Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah yesterday.
"Hindraf should not provoke the Malays in Kg Baru, which was where
many Malays struggled for the country's independence and where they
protected themselves during the May 13 incident in 1969."
Khir said that the SMSess are about HINDRAF planning to organise a
rally in Kampong Baru, Actually, the SMSess said that PERKIDA, not
HINDRAF, was going to organise the gathering.
Khir has totally distorted the whole thing. The SMSess never said
HINDRAF, it said PERKIDA. And why would HINDRAF want to commit
suicide by organising a gathering in Kampong Baru? Would any Indian
with even the smallest brain want to organise a gathering in a Malay
enclave? That would not only be inviting trouble but would be a sure
recipe for a massacre.
The police have called up the PERKIDA people to ask about their
planned gathering in Kampong Baru. The PERKIDA people have denied it
of course and said that the SMSess are false and that no such
gathering has been planned. The police then warned the PERKIDA people
that if they went ahead with the gathering they would be picked up.
Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi also called the PERKIDA people
to advice them to cancel the gathering. This means even the Prime
Minister believes that a gathering is being planned and he wants it
aborted. Surely the Prime Minister, who is the patron of PERKIDA,
would know whether his organisation is planning the gathering or not.
And the fact that he has asked PERKIDA to cancel the gathering means
that one had been planned.
Another distortion of facts by Khir was the part where he said that
Kampong Baru was where the Malays struggled for independence and
where they protected themselves during the May 13 race riots in 1969.
Now, there are many things wrong with this statement. First of all,
Malaya was never colonised by the British in the true sense of
colonisation. What we had was the Straits Settlements that was
managed by the East India Company, a public company listed on the
London Stock Exchange. The Straits Settlements comprised of Malacca
(Melaka), Penang (Pulau Pinang) and Singapore (Singapura). Penang and
Singapore were two islands leased from the Sultans of Kedah and Johor
respectively while Malacca was given to the British by the Dutch. The
British never sent in their army to take these three territories by
force. Penang and Singapore were a commercial arrangement while
Malacca was a territory that the Dutch gave to the British in
exchange for British territories in Indonesia. The Dutch and British
owned territories in both Malaya and Indonesia. They then decided
that the British would make their presence in Malaya while the Dutch
would just be in Indonesia.
We also had the Federated and Unfederated Malay States which were all
independent and under the rule of the Sultans. The British, however,
did position British Advisers in these states, especially to assist
in matters of policing and maintaining the peace as most of the
states were plagued with rebellions or civil wars, or were at war
with one another, basically territorial claims and disputes over the
rich tin fields.
The Malaya situation was actually quite unique. The British
government was not really managing the many independent states
directly. The states were being managed by a company and it was the
company that paid the salaries of the administration personnel, which
included the police and army. And there was no country called Malaya
yet at that time. It was a collection of states, each under its own
separate government headed by Sultans, except for the islands of
Penang and Singapore which were leased from the Sultans and therefore
managed by the company. And Malacca was not acquired or annexed from
the Malays or the Sultan but was handed to the British by the Dutch.
In a way the British 'freed' Malacca from Dutch control, not from
Malay control.
The establishment of the Straits Settlements followed the Anglo-Dutch
Treaty of 1824 between the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, by
which the Malay Archipelago was divided into a British zone in the
north and a Dutch zone in the south. This resulted in the exchange of
the British settlement of Bencoolen (in Sumatra) for the Dutch colony
of Malacca.
Secondly, the Malays did not struggle for independence alone. What
happened was that the Malays, Chinese and Indians got together to
meet the British to discuss the possible date of the proclamation of
independence for Malaya. Earlier, Umno sent a delegation to Britain
but the issue of independence was never discussed. Later, when the
British could no longer manage the Malay territories, they suggested
the many states merge into one nation, initially to be called the
Malayan Union, and when this was opposed by the 'Orang Istana' who
lodged a protest with the Rulers, into the Federation of Malaya.
We must remember, Britain was bankrupt because of the Second World
War and the new Labour government was keen to withdraw its forces
from the East as soon as possible. Colonial self-rule and eventual
independence were now British policy. The British were therefore very
happy to 'get rid' of Malaya which was a drain on its financial
resources. In way, Britain was 'forcing' Merdeka upon us. We really
did not have to fight for Merdeka as much as Merdeka was shoved upon us.
You could say that the creation of the Federation was not really to
grant 'independence' to this country, as there was no country as
such, but to merge all the independent states into one nation in an
effort to 'dump' us. You can probably also say that the British were
not giving Malaya independence, as Malaya did not exist yet then, but
were trying to create a nation called Malaya by uniting all the
independent states under a Federation. This would be more viable than
the British just going home and abandoning this country to civil war,
rebellion, wars between the states, not to mention skirmishes between
the different races, which were the reasons for British intervention
in the first place. For example, Negeri Sembilan, which did not exist
yet then, was carved out of Selangor after the war between the Malays
and Chinese that saw entire villages massacred, the Sultan of
Selangor's family included. The Selangor-Perak war was another
example where the Bernam River was eventually agreed as the Selangor-
Perak border to settle the territorial dispute and Kampar and Tapah
ended up as Perak territory.
Therefore, if anyone 'fought' for independence, it would have been
the Malays, Chinese and Indians, not the Malays alone. In fact, the
Indians under Chandra Bose, who came to Malaya during the war, had
already negotiated for independence from the Japanese during the
Second World War while the Malays under Mustapha Hussein, Ibrahim
Yaakub, Dr. Burhanuddin Hilmi, etc,. had already fixed the date for
the independence of Malaya. And the date fixed was 17 August 1945.
This is confirmed by Mustapha Hussein in his book Malay Nationalism
Before Umno:
Dr Burhanuddin and I slogged day and night to draft an Independent
Malaya Constitution and other materials related to KRIS. As we
worked, we thought of Ibrahim Yaakub and thus approached Major
General Umezu to summon Ibrahim Yaakub, but Major General Umezu
replied that it was not necessary for Ibrahim to lead this project.
As KMM vice president, I could do so. He also said it was difficult
to contact Ibrahim.
But we insisted, if not for anything, to show to the Japanese that
just as Soekarno was the leader of the Indonesian people, Ibrahim was
the leader of the people of Malaya. Not long after, Ibrahim Yaakub
arrived in Taiping, accompanied by a handsome adjutant, Lt Osman Daim
from the Malai Giyu Gun.
On 11 August 1945, HODOSHO officers took Ibrahim Yaakub and Dr
Burhanuddin to Penang to meet the Japanese Submarine Flotilla
Commodore responsible for Penang Radio Station whose permission was
vital in the proclamation of Independent Malaya. I was told he was a
communist and should gladly co operate. He openly welcomed the use of
Penang radio station and would work hard towards the materialisation
of Independent Malaya declaration on 17 August 1945. I did not go to
Penang with them as I was busy drafting the Independent Malaya
Constitution and KRIS Congress working papers.
It was already decided in Taiping, that the KRIS Congress be held at
the Kuala Lumpur Station Hotel. The proclamation of Independent
Malaya would be made on 17 August 1945 through Penang Radio Station,
not in Jakarta as it was much chronicled later.
On 12 August 1945, I was invited by the Japanese Officers to go to
Taiping aerodrome with Ibrahim Yaakub to meet the legendary President
Soekarno and his entourage which included Drs Mohd Hatta, but I had
to turn the offer down as my legs were in great pain. Descending
three flights of stairs was daunting. I had turned down a golden
opportunity, which I regret to this day
Soekarno stopped over in Taiping on his way home to Indonesia after
meeting Field Marshall Count Terauchi, Supreme Commander of Japanese
Forces in South East Asia, in Saigon. Although Ibrahim Yaakub liked
to think otherwise, his meeting with Soekarno was by chance, as
confirmed by Prof. Yoichi Itagaki who was present, "On August 12,
1945 Ibrahim met by chance Ir. Sukarno and Dr Hatta who were flying
from Saigon to Djakarta at the Taiping aerodrome and was encouraged
by them."
17 August 1945 was the date that Malaya would gain independence.
However, on 6 August 1945, the Americans dropped the atom bomb on
Hiroshima followed by another one on Nagasaki soon after. And on 15
August 1945 the Japanese surrendered, two days before Malaya's
independence could be proclaimed. Malaya, therefore, had been
'robbed' of its independence by just two days. Umno did not even
exist then. Indonesia, however, went ahead with its independence
plans and they fought a bloody battle with the Dutch to prevent them
from retaking the country after the Japanese left.
The second part of Khir's statement is about "where the Malays
protected themselves during the May 13 incident in 1969." Come on,
'protected' means that you were the victim and not the aggressor. Do
we really need to go through the history of the 13 May 1969 race
riots and prove Khir wrong? I mean, May 13 is probably the most-
widely discussed subject so there is really no requirement to talk
about it anymore. But saying that Kampong Baru was where the Malays
protected themselves is just stretching it a bit too far. Khir is
insulting our intelligence if he thinks he can spin this one and get
away with it.
Okay, let us get the facts straight. The Federation of Malaya did not
exist prior to 31 August 1957. The independent Malay states were not
united under one nation and, other than the Straits Settlements, were
under the rule of their respective Sultans. Malaya was formed as a
Federation to unite the states under one nation rather than to 'free'
the states. Independence was originally fixed for 17 August 1945 but
unfortunately the Japanese surrendered two days before the
proclamation of Merdeka. Eventually, 12 years later, Merdeka was
proclaimed but it was negotiated by the Malays, Chinese and Indians,
not just by the Malays. No one fought for Merdeka; we were forced to
accept Merdeka by a bankrupt British government that could no longer
afford to keep us. The Malays did not 'protect' themselves in Kampong
Baru in 13 May 1969. Finally, the SMSess said that PERKIDA and not
HINDRAF is planning the gathering in Kampong Baru on 16 December
2007. And because of these SMSess the Bar Council cancelled its march
today, worried that the march would be infiltrated by PERKIDA
elements who might hijack the march to trigger race riots.
That is what really happened and not as what was reported by The
Star. I wonder what else The Star distorted, what the Sultan of
Selangor said maybe?
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