The Singapore Story: Memoirs of Lee Kuan Yew (82 page)

He said, “You have good relations with the British Labour Party, can you not get them to help us out of this difficulty? Let us be on our own. It is terrible to live like this.”

He sensed that if Labour formed the government, they would be more sympathetic to a non-communal socialist party in Singapore than to a Malay communal right-wing party in Kuala Lumpur. He shared the mood of the Chinese-speaking community who found it intolerable to
live in a constant state of fear. The first communal riots had been engineered, with emotions stoked up over months and then sparked by Malay
bersilat
groups from the peninsula. Once the senseless beating and killing of innocent passers-by had taken place, it was easy to provoke them a second time. Everyone felt this. The poison of racial suspicions had spread. Relations had become tinder-dry and it would not take much to ignite them again.

When I opened the new Chinese Chamber of Commerce building, I gave a boost to their morale. I had to exude confidence myself in order to instil confidence in them. I was certain there was a future for the Chinese in Malaysia “if we are Malaysians and as long as there is a Malaysia”, I said. I compared the two riots – in July and in September. In the first, the leaders in Kuala Lumpur might not have acted in concert with the leaders in Singapore, but in the second, we had worked in unison to fight communalism.

On the same day, the Tunku spoke at a reception given by the Singapore Alliance. On most occasions, he struck the correct note, and he now urged all Singapore leaders to play down communal differences, to come together with the Alliance “to fight in this land of ours” against a common enemy. He would be setting up peace committees, as the existing goodwill committees had not functioned properly. I wondered how this change could make any difference – I did not know what he could do that would be effective, short of arresting the extremists. But that was the Tunku’s way. He was trying to play the role of the father of the nation. I had to help him as best I could.

On 25 September, I went up to Kuala Lumpur with Chin Chye and Kim San to see him. We met for talks in the morning, and our discussions continued that night when the Tunku gave us dinner. Chin Chye said that neither goodwill nor peace committees would be effective in maintaining law and order if groups of militant youths went on the rampage. He added, “In such a situation, firm police action is necessary. We believe
that action must be taken against all those persons who were responsible for making one community fight against another.” This was the nub of the problem. If the police acted promptly and fairly, without discriminating between the races, it would be difficult for riots to gain momentum.

The next day, Chin Chye told the press that complete accord had been reached between the state and central governments after the recent misunderstandings. More in hope than in confidence, he said the discussions had helped to banish all doubts and fears about their ability to work together to make Malaysia succeed. Party differences would be relegated to the background; Malaysia’s interests must come first. I said that both sides had promised to avoid sensitive issues regarding the respective positions of the communities in Malaysia, and the greatest effort would be made to mobilise the people against Indonesian aggression and subversion. There was to be a two-year truce between the Alliance and the PAP. I had proposed, and the Tunku had concurred, that to stop the deterioration in the situation, we should both abstain from expanding our party branches and activities. I was hoping for some respite to the politicking.

At about 5:30 in the morning on 17 October, I got up at Singapore House in Kuala Lumpur to listen to the BBC. The final British election results were announced: the Labour Party had won. I was greatly relieved. Harold Wilson was to be the prime minister. My position had improved. The Tunku would have to deal with a British Labour government that would not be sympathetic to feudal chiefs who put down a democratic loyal opposition that abjured violence.

Things seemed to be working out. But my optimism was soon clouded. That same day, Tan Siew Sin said, at a dinner given in his honour by the Hokkien Clan Association, that Singapore could not secede from Malaysia as the constitution did not provide for it. He was confident the island would progress and prosper, but it could not be “the sole oasis
of prosperity in a desert of poverty”. Secede? When I returned to Singapore, I rebutted his remarks, saying that the people of Singapore were more interested in making Malaysia a success, and it was unfortunate that he had talked of secession when we had agreed to a two-year truce to halt the communal drift that could break it up. Tan responded that he had made the statement to kill strong rumours that Singapore was nonetheless contemplating separation. They were not the only rumours; such was the distrust that I had to kill another rumour that I had been detained by the federal government in Kuala Lumpur.

One week later, Khir Johari announced a major shake-up in the Singapore Alliance, designed to end PAP rule in the next state election, due in 1967. Chin Chye promptly asked the Alliance to clarify the position on the two-year truce, stressing that it could not be applicable only to the PAP. Khir denied any knowledge of the truce, and after a meeting with the Tunku the next day, the Singapore Alliance issued a statement claiming that the agreement to abandon party politics for two years referred only to communal issues; it did not mean that the Alliance should not be reorganised into an effective body. This was troubling. The Tunku expected all accords to be interpreted in his favour. Chin Chye was angry and bitter. But since Khir and the Tunku had said in effect that we were free to expand our respective political parties, Chin Chye, Raja, Pang Boon and Khoon Choy began contacting friends in their home towns on the peninsula to build up grassroots support, and Chin Chye announced that the PAP would be reorientated so that it could mobilise popular backing in Malaya; the party had members all over the mainland, and when the time came he would organise them into branches.

Indonesian intelligence set out to exploit these tensions, and put out feelers to me through our Chinese traders, promising that Indonesia would resume trade with Singapore if we withdrew from Malaysia. To scotch such attempts to divide us, I disclosed Jakarta’s overture in the Legislative Assembly in Singapore on 12 November and dismissed it,
saying that the Indonesians would eventually understand that Malaysia was not easily digested and learn to live and trade with it.

But morale in Singapore had sagged. The city looked scruffy. With the weakening of law enforcement, Indian herdsmen had allowed their cows and goats to graze on playing fields and even on the grass verges of roundabouts. A lawyer drove his car into a cow one night just outside the town centre and was killed. From my office window, I could see cattle on the Esplanade. After the two riots, the place was slovenly, with more litter, more cows and goats meandering on the streets, more stray dogs, more flies, more mosquitoes, more beggars. Even the grounds of the Singapore General Hospital were unkempt. I was determined to check this decline. I called a meeting at the Victoria Theatre of all officers concerned with public health, and with full press and television coverage urged them to restore standards of cleanliness and tidiness. We gave the herdsmen a few days grace to take their cows and goats back to their pens; any found at large thereafter would be slaughtered for consumption at welfare homes. This had a salutary effect. The city spruced up.

Then Tan Siew Sin struck again. In his budget speech on 25 November, he announced tough new measures to increase revenue, including a one-half per cent turnover tax on gross earnings and a 2 per cent tax on the total payrolls of all trading and other business houses. This would hit Singapore most. We needed to create more jobs, and increasing the cost of the work force would discourage labour-intensive industries. I pointed out that the measures would not help Malaysia’s industrialisation, and were likely to widen the gap between the haves and the have-nots. In his first speech in the federal parliament, Keng Swee also said that the taxes were regressive and the timing unfortunate. Singapore would be paying 25 per cent of the national turnover tax and 40 per cent of the payroll tax yields, which was manifestly out of proportion to its population and economy. And when the Singapore Trade Union Congress with well-reasoned arguments objected to the new taxes as anti-labour,
Tan accused our government of using all the machinery at its disposal to inflame mob passions against them.

Tan said he wanted our financial arrangements to be reviewed soon, claiming Singapore’s tax burdens were the lightest in the whole of Malaysia. He looked to a time when Singapore would pay 60 instead of 40 per cent of its revenue to the central government.

The Tunku himself sounded ominous at a Medical College dinner in Singapore on 9 December, saying Singapore was “full of politics. In Singapore, for instance, you will find there is less harmony than elsewhere in Malaysia. … That was why I was not very anxious to bring Singapore into the Federation.” Our criticisms of the turnover and payroll taxes had struck home, for he added:

“If we find that any particular kind of taxation appears to be either unworkable or objectionable, then we can make changes. … If the politicians of various colours and tinges and flashes in Singapore (the lightning flash is the symbol of the PAP) disagree with me, the only solution is a breakaway, but what a calamity that would be for Singapore and Malaysia.”

38. Constitutional Rearrangements?

The Tunku must have felt that Malaysia was headed for trouble. When I met him in Kuala Lumpur on 19 December, he was not his normal relaxed and serene self. He skipped his usual pleasantries and jokes, went straight to business, and talked seriously for half an hour. He was direct, and for the first time proposed constitutional “rearrangements”. He had spoken to his inner circle – Razak, Ismail, Tan and Khir Johari – about this after a cabinet meeting the day before.

He repeatedly stressed that defence was vital to him. Trade and commerce would continue as usual, but we must help to pay for defence. Singapore was to be “in partnership, independent, but part of the peninsula”. He wanted both Singapore and Malaysia to be in the United Nations. We could share embassies and perhaps our UN representations. He did not appear to be clear in his mind as to what he wanted, but he said the target date for completing these changes would be before the next budget, and in the meanwhile I could think about the problems.

I said that as long as he was alive, he could hold the different forces.

He replied, “In Singapore there are too many Chinese chauvinists, too many Chinese communists. You have to do many things for the Chinese because it’s a Chinese state but there are repercussions in Malaya. Lee Siok Yew (MCA deputy minister for education) now wants a Chinese college in Malaya. Once we separate you can be different. You can recognise Nanyang University; your language policies can be different. After we are clear in our minds we can inform the British.”

I pointed out that British interests must be protected if they were to continue to maintain their bases in Singapore and defend Malaysia.
I asked whether Singapore would be like Northern Ireland or Southern Ireland. He replied, “Somewhere in between.”

On 31 December, I met Ismail for an hour. He was more specific and logical. “The Tunku feels these things intuitively. He wants to go back to the original plan, that you will look after Singapore for the Tunku.”

When I asked for details, he said, “You can think these things out more properly. You know now what we want,” and repeated three times, “I’d better not say too much, better keep quiet. They are all so suspicious of me. I have been circulating Special Branch impartial reports but they are now being ignored in favour of our own private intelligence, UMNO private intelligence. After the Tunku there will be trouble because the extremists and chauvinists are active in all camps. As long as the Tunku is there, with his personality, people will listen to him. He is above the cabinet and rules of joint cabinet responsibility do not apply. So it is easier for the Tunku because we can do the dirty work. He can disown us if he wishes.”