In defence of my race Part 3

The exertions and pressure on the British and Malayan Union was never weakened and relented.

Malayan Union on the other hand was facing difficulties as it was discarded by the Malays and the Malay Rulers working hand-in-glove to ensure unrelenting pressure to the newly formed government under the British Queen continued incessantly.

Back in England the Conservatives were keeping on the pressure on the ruling Labour to protect the indigenous Malays and warned the government that the Malays were going to revolt and any length to ensure their future were protected.

Meanwhile the Malays through tens of organizations and movements converged in Johor Baru on the 11 and 12th of May 1946 for their 3rd Malay Congress at Istana Besar Johor Baru.

The congregation of many Malay leaders representing various Malay movements was to reinforce the Malay struggles against the Malayan Union by forming one single body called UMNO.

Dato' Onn was unanimously elected to be the chairperson for the Congress and his fiery speech he reminded the delegates of the resolution of the 1st Congress to form one political body to unify the movements of the Malays under one entity.

The first Congress which formed a committee to originate the Constitution was headed by Onn Ja'afar.

The other members were Dato’ Panglima Bukit Gantang Abdul Wahab, Dato’ Nik Ahmad Kamil and Dato’ Hamzah Abdullah and the committee was prepared to face the 3rd Congress with proposed draft of the Constitution.

The draft of the Constitution was tabled to the Congress for the approval of the delegates and as expected after a long perusal of the meticulous delegates.

It was unanimously accepted and from then on UMNO was officially formed on that auspicious date of 11th may 1946 slightly over a month after Malayan Union was formed.

The 3rd Congress was immediately dissolved and after brief refreshment the 1st UMNO delegates’ meeting was called and the first agenda in hand was to choose one of the proposed slogans and ‘Hidup Melayu’ was the chosen one.

Dato’ Onn was unanimously elected to be the President of the newly formed UMNO. The Congress also decided to elect 3 of its members to represent the Party to join the Malay Rulers in the planned entourage to London to protest against the Malayan Union.

The 3 elected were Dato’ Onn Ja’afar, Dato’ Panglima Bukit Gantang and Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra.

However the planned delegation to London was aborted as the British by then had already resolute to dismantle the Malayan Union and to form a Federation of Malaya in place of the short-lived government and its constitution.

Many may ask why the British decided to disband Malayan Union. The answer was found by the British themselves.

The British while they were too obsessed in forming the Malayan Union they worked together with the immigrants to admonish the Malays and their Rulers.

The British realized that the immigrants were quietly playing politics of underworld. Parti Komunis Malaya (PKM) was already active subverting the people especially among the Chinese immigrants.

PKM had already managed to extend their tentacles down south even to Singapore and they were influencing the left wing Malays from Kesatuan Melayu Muda (KMM), Parti Democratic Malaya and the labour organizations and the peasant Chinese immigrants in the hinterland of Malaya.

Chin Peng and PKM members were already in the jungle together with the tiny KMM leaders like Rashid Maiden and other few Malays to fight the British who just came back after the Japanese surrender in the 2nd World War.

These movements were supported by foreign political parties like Kuomintang, Congress Party of India and few more left wing parties from Indonesia to go against the British administration in Malaya.

The Chinese who stayed at the fringes of the jungles were the regular source of food and financial supplies to the communist activist in the jungle.

The British was suspicious of the immigrants and they realized that the British were at odd with every race which resided in Malaya.

The British felt the danger of insubordination from the immigrants in Malaya as they were fighting for foreign power while the Malays through UMNO were fighting to regain their country.

The British realized that the Malays were more trustworthy as the fight against them (British) was the fight to gain back their land while the fight of the immigrants were for foreign elements.

Cutting long history short, the British ultimately agreed to do away with Malayan Union in June 1946 and worked for the formation of the Federation of Malaya.

Within 5 months the formulation of the detailed Federation’s Constitution was completed and the Federation of Malaya was formally formed on the 1st of February 1948.

Let us focus on the processes of the formation of the Federation of Malaya, as it is very interesting to envision how it can help us to fortify our feel of affection for the country and appreciate the impeccable co-existence among us, Malaysian of all races.

If we were to read in detail the struggle the past leaders, they were having one common attribute that made them successful in their comings and goings for their race and nation; they were not corrupted with personal politics.

There were some clear attempts on the side of the British to wheedle and persuaded the Malay leaders not to persist the resistance with some form of corrupt elements, but all those were rejected vehemently and their struggles were pure and untainted.

This is the value which has been long absent in our politics and government.

This was one of the main issue that made the Malays and Malaysian alike distancing themselves from the ruling BN in the last General Elections especially among the middle class population who suffered serious injury as the result of mishandling of politics and government by BN leaders.

All that will be in my next posting in 3 or 4 days time.


Thanks……………………………………………………………….Aspan Alias