13th May - What we should know

You should read articles from Jebatmustdie.

#1
http://jebatmustdie.wordpress.com/2009/05/13/may-13th-1969-the-correct-view-part-1/

One such book that I would like to highlight is the book by Dr Kua Kia Soong entitled : Declassified Documents on the Malaysian Riots of 1969″.

From reading the book, readers will ultimately come to three conclusions:

1) Tun Abdul Razak masterminded the May 13 racial riots as a form of coup d’etat from Tunku Abdul Rahman

2) Datuk Harun Idris led Umno Youths to spontaneously launched an unprovoked attack towards the chinese people

3) The racial riots were not the fault of the racist opposition or the subversive communist movement

These are the conclusions the author of the said book would like his readers to believe. He strengthened his thesis by providing several dockets of ‘declassified documents’ in his book.

Now, from the term ‘declassified document’, what does a layman normally associate it with?

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................And that was all he said. Consciously, he failed to include in his book the following items which fueled the mood of the people at that time. Importantly missing was the happenings between the election day of 10^th May and May 13 itself. The author somehow failed to include these facts in his book.

Background on racial tension in Malaya / Malaysia

1) To defend Malaya from Communist insurgency, the Government embarked on an effort to recruit the Chinese to join the police force. Between 1949 to 1951, the effort of the government to attract the Chinese to defend the nation against the MCP met with little success. Only 200 chinese youths volunteered. When National Service was introduced in 1950, considerable amount of Chinese and Indians sought to leave the country.

Over 10,000 chinese fled to China to avoid call-up. This further added to the resentment among the Malays and even Sir Henry Gurney commented –

“A feeling of resentment is growing among all the other communities of the apparent reluctance of the Chinese to help. These people (the Chinese) live comfortably and devote themselves wholly to making money…”

(Did I just hear RPK cough just now?)

However, I must add that there were indeed a few Chinese that stayed back and help defend the nation against the communists. Those were the brave ones. Very much unlike the opportunistic racists that we have now who would migrate overseas when times are bad and at the same time condemning Malaysia from abroad.

2) Pulau Pinang racial clash on 2nd January, 1957 resulted in 4 deaths and 48 injured. It happened on the day of celebrating Georgetown’s bestowment of a City status by the British Government. The procession was marred by a misunderstanding by the mostly chinese celebrants towards the Malay spectators. It was quickly averted from becoming a state wide riot through the quick arrival of a police party.

3) In May 1959, another Malay-Chinese racial clash happened in Pulau Pangkor. Confrontation between Malay thugs and Chinese hoodlums caused residential fire and two Malays were killed and eight were injured. The Chinese suffered one death and a couple of injured youths. Island curfew was imposed for a few days because of that racial clash.

4) In Bukit Mertajam circa July 1964, one Malay and one Chinese were killed over a petty argument. Dozens were injured. It started when a Malay market employee was hit with a cangkul by a 15 year old Chinese vegetable vendor. Subsequent to this, a spate of assaults cases and arson occurred in the Bukit Mertajam area as the employee tried to report the incident to the District Council. Eventually curfew was imposed to deter anymore racial clashes. The nation was rocked yet again by this incident.

5) In 1967 when the currency was devalued, the communist elements in the Labour Party initiated ‘hartal’ on the 19th November to exploit the issue using the anti-devaluation propaganda. They chose Pulau Pinang as their target because of the sensitive racial situation on the island. This is because, Penang’s racial tension was already brewing for the past 10 years (from the first racial clash 10 years before). Many Malays were brutally attacked by the Chinese members of the opposition resulted in many deaths and injuries while several houses and vehicles were burnt. Tunku related -

“The communists however, never left us alone. If they couldn’t carry out open aggression they at least carried out intensive and extensive acts of subversion. In 1967, we had to adjust our currency to meet our financial exigency, and so we devalued very slightly our currency – so slightly that nobody noticed. But in Penang the Socialist Front, an opposition party somewhat hostile to the Alliance Government, declared a hartal (closing of shops as mark of protest or sorrow)…

So when they declared the hartal the gangsters and thugs took it upon themselves to start trouble, and attacked the harmless Malay people whom they regarded as the favoured children of the Government. In fact these Malays were ignorant shoppers who knew nothing valuation or devaluation of our currency, and they were taken completely by surprise.”

#2
http://jebatmustdie.wordpress.com/2009/05/14/may-13th-1969-the-correct-view-part-2/

........On page 42 of Kua Kia Soong’s book, he only made a passing remark about the funeral procession and the victory parades (just 7 lines to be exact). Will this give his readers the true picture of what had happened then? I doubt it. Do you?

Here are more pictures taken from the history archives:

Provocation by the chauvinist victors

The parade that went off course than was permitted

Freedom of speech that went too far

Picture taken from Tunku's book

Before we move on to part 3, I would like to state another misdirection Kua Kia Soong did in his book.

....continue...

JMD.... Thank you!