Umno's ' patriotism ' in historical perspective
One indisputable fact of history is that the first Inspector-General of Police of 'independent' Malaya from 1958 to 1966 was the London-born Claude Fenner (left) while Chin Peng, Abdullah C.D., Rashid Maidin, Suriani Abdullah, Abu Samah and Kamarulzaman Teh were born in Sitiawan, Lambor Kiri, Gopeng, Sitiawan, Semantan and Sanggang respectively.Also, in their memoirs, Abdullah C.D. and the late Rashid Maidin recall that when Umno was inaugurated on May 11, 1946 in Johor Baru, its slogan was Hidup Melayu (Long Live the Malays), and not a call for Merdeka. The latter slogan originated from Parti Kebangsaan Melayu Malaya (PKMM) or Malayan Malay National Party, formed on Oct 17, 1945 in Ipoh by Abdullah CD, Rashid and other progressive Malays like Dr Burhanuddin Al-Helmy and Ahmad Boestamam.
Umno only changed its slogan to Merdeka after its first very pro-British and anti-independence president Onn Jaafar quit the party in 1951 and after pressure mounted by PKMM, CPM and other more progressive groupings in the Malay, Chinese and Indian communities.
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posted by James Wong Wing-On at 12:01 AM
4 Comments:
I read somewhere that PKMM was more inclined towards "Melayu Raya" or independence through merging with Nusantara or Indonesia. Two key PKMM founding members Mokhtaruddin Lasso and Sutan Djenain were both Indonesians.
Or maybe that was just British / UMNO propaganda. I can't be sure what's really true anymore...
What is certainly true is that despite so-called 'merdeka' in 1957, the IGP from 1958 to 1966 was the London-born Claude Fenner and there were 40,000 Commonwealth Strategic Reserve (CSR) stationed and operated in 'independent' Malaya under British command and the last batch of CSR only left Butterworth in 1984. So, strictly speaking, Malaysia got its independence only in 1984, not 1957 or 1963. can argue ...
In the late 1970's and 1980's the remainding RAAF units in Butterworth had more to do with Cold-War geopolitics than Malaysia's defense needs.
Butterworth was the last available "friendly" airbase facing the Indian Ocean. The RAAF flew P3C Orion aircraft on gruelling 12 hour missions out into the Indian Ocean, helping the Americans hunting for Soviet submarines.
Related to that was a top secret high-tech communications facility at the back of Penang hill, so secret neither the Malaysian or US government ever acknowledged its existence. The locals only knew the base was staffed by mysterious "Orang Putih" behind barbed wire fences.
I better not say any more - I don't wish to get your blog entangled in OSA or anything like that....
Go on to share your knowledge as long as the information does not affect any current operations in progress. Surely, the Cold War has ended 16 years ago and the Soviet Union has also been defunct since.
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