We are what we are today because of what happened in the past (part 1) (UPDATED with Chinese translation)

This was a complication that the British did not need. More than 80% of the businesses, tin mines, estates, and so on, in Malaya belonged to the British and 30% of Britain’s economy — which had been practically bankrupted by the war — depended on Malaya. Hence the last thing the British wanted was another India-Pakistan type of conflict in Malaya.

THE CORRIDORS OF POWER

Raja Petra Kamarudin

Since the 2008 general election, the favourite ‘war cry’ was: the Malays must wake up. They were referring to the Hindraf rally of November 2007, of course, and the Bersih (1.0) rally about two weeks before that — which for the first time since the rise of the Reformasi movement in September 1998 a rally managed to attract a reasonable level of non-Malay support.

This was followed by the most impressive March 2008 general election result a few months later (for the opposition, that is), which saw Penang, Perak and Selangor fall to the opposition, and which would not have been possible purely on Malay votes alone and unless the non-Malays too voted opposition.

Actually, for a long time before 2007-2008, the Malays had been saying that the non-Malays must wake up. The Malays realised that kicking out Umno and Barisan Nasional would be impossible unless the non-Malays also joined the ‘resistance movement’. However, in the past, the non-Malays have always given many reasons as to why they could not join the Malays to kick out the ruling party.

To understand Malaysian elections you need to analyse all the general elections since 1959 and the municipal elections four years before that in 1955 plus understand why and how Malaya was given independence or Merdeka in 1957.

Without sounding as if I am repeating myself here, when the Japanese surrendered in 1945 and Britain ‘repossessed’ Malaya, the British tried to ‘restructure’ the country. Part of this restructuring exercise was to create the Malayan Union whereby the feudal system would be eroded somewhat and the Monarchs whom the Malays call ‘Raja-Raja Melayu’ would lose some of their powers.

Now, the normal ‘Malay-in-the-street’ or Malay layman did not have any strong opinions on the matter. However, the Malay elite plus the Malays from the intellectual community could not agree to this move. They felt that to erode the feudal system plus to reduce the powers of the Monarchy meant that the Malays would lose their status as the Tuans (Lords) of the land. Thus was born the concept of Ketuanan Melayu or Malays as the Lords of the Land.

The Chinese and Indians were not too bothered about what was going on while the natives of East Malaysia were not involved since this was a Malayan issue and East Malaysia was not part of Malaya. The majority of the Chinese and Indians were not citizens anyway so it did not matter what the British wanted to do to Malaya since any system was not going to change the lot of the Chinese and Indians in any way.

The Malays did not have a political movement in which to resist the British. They did have many associations, societies and movements but these were very specific to the group that they represented. What they needed was a national movement so that the hundreds of associations, societies and movements could be combined into one national organisation.

And this was what triggered the birth of this national coalition called the United Malays National Organisation or Umno, a coalition of many groupings and sub-groupings. Hence Umno, in a way, was a coalition rather than a political party. In fact, Umno was not even called a political party, not with a name like United Malays National Organisation. Nevertheless, Umno was the new platform to unite the many smaller groupings so that the Malays could talk to the British as one voice.

If you were to look at the old black-and-white photographs of the Umno demonstrations of 1946 you can see that the people in the demonstration were not fishermen and farmers. From their dressing it is clear that these people were from the elite community. Back in 1946, only those from the elite community dressed like that.

In short, Umno was not a people’s movement as such but an elitist movement of Malays who were related or linked to the palace plus Malays who had gone to school and had received an education. And, more importantly, Umno was not set up as the platform to fight for independence or Merdeka but to resist the Malayan Union. Independence or Merdeka was never the endgame or in the minds of the Malays back in 1946 when Umno was born.

Three months after that, the Malayan Indian Congress or MIC was formed followed by the Malayan Chinese Association or MCA three years later.

MIC was called the Malayan Indian Congress because it was strongly influenced by the Indian National Congress or INC of India (or Congress party for short) that was formed about 60 years earlier. MIC, however, did not get much Indian support especially when its second President, Budh Singh, who was a Communist, opposed the Malayan Union. The Malayan Indians were more interested in matters back home in India than about matters in Malaya.

And MCA, too, was more concerned about raising money to support the Kuomintang that was fighting the Communists in China than about Malayan politics. Hence both MIC and MCA did not really have any solidarity with Umno.

It was not until some MCA leaders from Melaka travelled to London to raise the issue of independence with the British that Umno began to have similar thoughts. The Umno leaders also made a trip to London to meet the British to talk about Merdeka but only after the Chinese had first raised the issue. So now it looked like two different groups wanted to talk about Merdeka, which would have complicated matters.

It must be noted that the British already had a very bad experience in India in 1947 when India was partitioned and which resulted in an estimated one million deaths. So are we going to also see Malaya partitioned into ‘Malay Malaya’ and ‘Chinese Malaya’? What will happen to the Indians then? Will they all be sent back to India?

This was a complication that the British did not need. More than 80% of the businesses, tin mines, estates, and so on, in Malaya belonged to the British and 30% of Britain’s economy — which had been practically bankrupted by the war — depended on Malaya. Hence the last thing the British wanted was another India-Pakistan type of conflict in Malaya.

TO BE CONTINUED

                                                                *****************************************

以前所發生的決定了現在的我們（一）

 

這是一個英國不想看到的複雜難題。馬來亞80%的生意，礦場，田園等都是屬於英國的，而英國30%的經濟活動—-他們當時的經濟幾乎快被戰爭給拖垮了—-都是馬來亞在支撐的。故此，當時英國人最不想見到的是印度–巴基斯坦紛爭在馬來亞從現。

原文：Raja Petra Kamarudin

譯文：方宙

 

自從08年大選后，‘馬來人必須睡醒了’成了最出名的‘戰爭口號’。此口號所參照的當然是07年的興權會大集會和Bersih 1.0；Bersih 1.0是續1998年9月的烈火莫熄集會后第一個成功吸引大量非馬來支持者的集會。

在那以後我們在08年大選見證了反對黨很出色的成績；檳城，雪蘭莪和霹靂都相續地落入了反對黨的手裏，而這單靠馬來票是無法辦到的，非馬來票在此發揮了很大的作用。

事實上，早在07-08年以前，馬來人就一直說非馬來人必須睡醒了。當時的馬來人察覺到單靠他們是無法把巫統踢出局的，他們還需要非馬來人來參與他們的‘對抗活動’。無論如何，過去的非馬來人都給出種種理由來圓掉他們無法和馬來人合作踢走巫統的決定。

想要了解大馬選舉你就必須得先詳細地分析1955年的市政府選舉和自1959年以來的各屆馬來西亞大選。你也必須得去摸清在1957年時馬來亞到底是如何取得獨立的。

在1945年日本投降后英國人‘從新取囘’馬來亞。他們當時嘗試想要‘從新建造’馬來亞，而這個計劃的其中一個部分是建立馬來亞聯邦來撤銷掉當時的封建君主制系統，進而削弱馬來君主的權力。

當時的馬來平民其實對這件事沒有太大的知覺，但那些馬來精英和知識分子則對此大感不滿。他們覺得撤銷掉封建君主制系統和削弱馬來君主權力會直接把馬拉人的‘土地主人’身份給去掉。 ‘Ketuanan Melayu’這個概念就是由此產生的。

當時的華人和印度人都持著觀望的態度，而東馬的土著們則是事不關己（因爲當時東馬還沒和馬來亞合併）。當時的華人和印度人都還不是國家公民，所以對他們來説英國人要在馬來亞做些什麽並不重要，因爲他們認爲這些都不會給自己多大的影響。

當時的馬來人並沒有任何政治運動來對抗英國人。他們確實是有很多社團，協會和運動，但這些都只是很特定地代表他們自己的團員而已。他們當時需要的是一個全國性的團體來結合那上百個不同的馬來社團，協會和運動等來對抗馬來亞聯邦。

這就是巫統（United Malays National Organisation，Umno），一個很多不同的組合和小組合的聯盟，的來由。所以在某個層面上，巫統像一個聯盟多過像一個政黨。事實上，就連巫統這個名字也不像是個政黨應有的名字。無論如何，巫統結合了很多小團體組成單一的平臺來讓馬來人有辦法一致性地與英國人對話。

如果你看囘1946年巫統示威的黑白照片的話，你會看到那些示威者都不是農民或漁民。從他們的穿著你很容易能看出他們都是些精英分子；在1946年只有精英分子才會那樣打扮。

簡短一點來講，巫統並不是什麽所謂的全民運動，它是那些跟皇室有關聯的馬來精英和上過大學的馬來知識分子的運動。更重要的是，組織巫統的原本目的並不是爲了要為獨立尋找平臺而是爲了對抗馬來亞聯邦的成立。打從一開始獨立這個念頭根本就沒有在馬來人的腦海裏出現過。

在巫統成立的三個月后，馬來亞囯大黨（Malayan Indian Congress，MIC）成立，而馬來亞華人公會（Malayan Chinese Association or MCA） 也于三年后建立。

囯大黨之所以被稱之爲Malayan Indian Congress是因爲它是受到印度的Indian National Congress（INC）很大的影響。無論如何，囯大黨並沒有得到很多印度人的支持，尤其是在他們的第二任主席Budh Singh（他是個共產主義者）公開反對馬來亞聯邦后。當時的馬來亞印度人關心印度所發生的事情多過他們關心馬來亞所發生的事情。

另一方面，馬華也忙於為當時中國的國民黨募款來跟共產黨打戰而無暇顧及馬來亞所發生的事情。故此，囯大黨與馬華在當時根本就和巫統談不及有什麽團結合作。

直到後來又一組來自馬六甲的馬華代表去到倫敦和英國人談起獨立這件事，巫統才開始有這樣的想法。巫統領袖隨後也組團到倫敦和英國人討論獨立這個課題。所以當時分別有兩組人馬要洽談獨立這囘事，而這也把事情搞複雜了。

你必須了解，英國在印度曾遇過一次很糟糕的經驗；1947年印度曾因面臨分裂而導致大約1百萬人爲此喪生。所以現在我們會看到馬來亞被分裂為‘馬來人馬來亞’和‘華人馬來亞’嗎？印度人又要怎麽辦呢？是否應該把他們全送囘印度呢？

這是一個英國不想看到的複雜難題。馬來亞80%的生意，礦場，田園等都是屬於英國的，而英國30%的經濟活動—-他們當時的經濟幾乎快被戰爭給拖垮了—-都是馬來亞在支撐的。故此，當時英國人最不想見到的是印度–巴基斯坦紛爭在馬來亞從現。