Why Is Lee Kuan Yew Strutting The Length and Breath of Malaysia?
By Matthias Chang
To many anti-colonial fighters of the third world, Lee Kuan Yew was contemptuously referred to as “ivory-skin Englishman”. He was and still is perceived as the lackey of the British power elites.
Malaysians can still recall the manner in which Lee Kuan Yew tried to wrest political power from Tunku and how he tried to supplant the MCA as the political party representing the Chinese. He was derisive of Tun Tan Siew Sin as not being a pure Chinese and as such not fit to represent the Chinese community.
However, the Chinese saw through his devious schemes and rejected emphatically PAP’s politics. Lee Kuan Yew thought he could out-maneuver Tunku and become the Prime Minister of Malaysia. But Tunku beat him at his own game and he was expelled from Malaysia.
Considering himself to be intellectually superior to Tunku, he could not accept that he was defeated so resoundingly by Tunku. He was devastated. When he announced that Singapore would be separated from Malaysia, he broke down uncontrollably. This was only to be expected as his dreams of being the Overlord of Malaysia, comprising of Peninsula Malaya, Sarawak and Sabah was shattered and he has to be content with being a bully of a city state!
