The Singapore Story: Memoirs of Lee Kuan Yew (53 page)

Selkirk, the second son of a Scottish duke, was tall, lanky and slightly bowed, and looked an aristocrat. He had grizzled curly hair, a gaunt face that often wore a puckish expression, and a distracting habit, when seized with a problem, of toying with his denture, one of his upper front teeth, flopping it about with his tongue. He did not have a powerful mind, but had keen social intelligence and the charm of a nobleman out to put a plebeian at ease. He meant well and we got along; but his deputy, Philip Moore, must have sensed my impatience from time to time, and suspected that I did not regard him as a heavyweight. To underline his importance, therefore, he repeatedly reminded me that Selkirk had been a cabinet minister and still had direct access to the prime minister.

Three months later, Sir Geofroy Tory, the UK high commissioner to the Federation of Malaya, told me that the Tunku had confided to him that he found it very embarrassing whenever I, or any other Singapore spokesman, made a public statement implying that union was a possibility. For one thing, it gave comfort and encouragement to his opponents, the socialists, who were mainly Chinese, and who were longing for the day when they could join forces with the PAP across the Causeway. For another, it tended to strain his relations with the Malay nationalists, since any hint that the Alliance government was toying with the idea of some form of
rapprochement
with Singapore might well increase their fears that his policies would allow the Chinese in, to swamp the Malays. Despite all efforts, the Tunku, Razak and Ismail just would not sit down and talk seriously with me about the long-term
future of Singapore and Malaya. They did not want to think about the horrendous consequences for Malaya if Singapore were independent and under communist control.

Finally – to keep my hopes alive, I thought – the British encouraged me to put up a bigger formula, a grand design for a federation that would include not only Singapore but also their three dependencies in Borneo (North Borneo, Brunei and Sarawak), so that the ethnic arithmetic would not upset the Malay electoral majority. Selkirk and Moore suggested that I prepare a paper, not for the Tunku, to whom the subject was obviously anathema, but for Razak. I assumed that, through Geofroy Tory, they had talked Razak into considering the concept, and I had a paper ready in early May 1961 to give to Ismail for him. The British had indeed worked hard on him with the support of Robert Thompson, a Malayan Civil Service officer who was secretary of defence in Malaya and had worked closely with Razak as his minister.

But the man who broached the subject with the Tunku, boldly and frontally, was Duncan Sandys, secretary of state for Commonwealth Relations. He came to Singapore in January 1961 on his way to the Federation, to tell both governments that Britain was about to make an application to join the European Common Market. I took this opportunity to spell out to him the danger we faced if there were no merger by 1963, when constitutional talks were due – an independent Singapore that would go communist would be the inevitable result. I must have made an impact on him. Moore told me afterwards that Sandys said he had never met a leader in power who was keener to hand it over to another centre. British records show that Sandys spoke to the Tunku, and Selkirk reported that Sandys had told him the conversation had gone smoothly, although he had no details.

Later, I got to know Sandys well. He could be direct and brutally frank. Son-in-law of Winston Churchill, he did not lack self-confidence. He had enormous determination and courage. He had suffered a leg
injury in a car accident during the war and was often in pain, but he took painkillers, limped around with a walking stick, pressed on with life and busied himself with his work. He was a likeable, admirable man if you happened to be on the same side as he was. It was my good fortune that I was. He pushed hard for merger within a greater “Malaysia” and must have got Harold Macmillan, the British prime minister, to support him and to urge it on the Tunku.

Out of the blue, on 27 May 1961, the Tunku when speaking to the Foreign Correspondents’ Association of South East Asia in Singapore said:

“Sooner or later Malaya should have an understanding with Britain and the peoples of Singapore, North Borneo, Brunei and Sarawak. It is premature for me to say now how this closer understanding can be brought about but it is inevitable that we should look ahead to this objective and think of a plan whereby these territories could be brought closer together in political and economic cooperation.”

He said it was the natural tendency of the Chinese in Singapore to try and make the island “a little China”. It would be a good thing for all concerned if the people of Singapore and the Federation could decide to make Malaya what it was – our one and only home. This was a bombshell. There had been no earlier indication of any change in his consistent stand that Malaya could not take Singapore in. The moment I read what the Tunku had said, I knew that the Plen would think I had deceived him when we met in May, that I had lied when, in reply to his question, I said that merger was not likely for many years because the Tunku distrusted the Chinese in Singapore.

The Tunku did not explain then why he had changed his mind. Later, in October, he told parliament in Kuala Lumpur that originally he had not favoured merger because integration would spell danger to
Malaya’s security, but times had changed. He did not explain how. I could only surmise that the British had convinced him that he had to control security in Singapore in order to safeguard Malaya itself, since the Chinese-speaking majority on the island were susceptible to communist appeals. I believed that Ismail already understood that the problems of subversion in the two territories were closely linked. He had been shown, for example, that although only half of the students at Nanyang University were from Malaya, they formed the bulk of the left-wing leaders and troublemakers, and would cause more trouble after they graduated and went back to the Federation.

Even Selkirk and Moore had not expected the Tunku’s volte-face. It came as a “joyful surprise” to them. The British had long discussed the concept of a greater “Malaysia” as one solution to their long-term aim of bringing their colonies in the region together in a federation before they were given independence. But the crucial question had been, would the PAP government in Singapore turn out to be communist-led? They believed I had answered that question when I publicly insisted on merger as the way to achieve independence for Singapore, since this would prevent the MCP from ever winning power. It was then that they began to take the project seriously.

In May 1961, the Tunku seemed at least prepared to consider an association with Singapore within a wider Federation of Malaysia. But there were times during the ensuing six months when this appeared to have been a totally false dawn, for he was still to balk at actual merger. It was fortunate that during this period I was able to get on with most members of the British commission, notably Philip Moore.

By 1961, we were already on the same wavelength. The British had seen the difficulties faced by the PAP government when acting against the communists, and set out to build up momentum for Malaysia and create a sense of its inevitability. Their response to the Tunku’s proposal came after two weeks in a coordinated series of favourable statements.
First, Selkirk described it on 13 June as “a sound, long-term plan”. A week later, Macmillan, answering a question from Fenner Brockway in the House of Commons, said:

“I have observed with interest the recent striking suggestion of the prime minister of the Federation of Malaya that sooner or later the Federation should have an understanding with the British government and with Singapore, North Borneo, Sarawak and Brunei on a plan which would bring these territories into closer economic and political association. Tunku Abdul Rahman’s statement has already stimulated discussion in these countries and the government would wish to take their reactions into account in their own consideration of the suggestion … I think it is a good thing that this matter has been raised and provoked discussion.”

Next Selkirk called a meeting on 27 June of the British governors of Sarawak and North Borneo, the high commissioner to Malaya and the commissioner to Brunei. Goode, now governor of North Borneo, spoke of “the need to seize the right moment to push through the Tunku’s ‘Mighty Malaysia’ plan to ensure its success”. On 30 June, soon after the meeting, Selkirk flew to London to discuss the plan with the cabinet.

This public display of British support for merger and Malaysia must have alarmed the communists. The Tunku’s initiative was gathering speed, and the Plen would have to take this into his calculations. Their agitation quickly became plain when Lim Chin Siong came back with a series of anti-merger pronouncements. On 2 June, the “Big Six” trade union leaders – Lim Chin Siong and Fong Swee Suan, together with Sidney Woodhull, Jamit Singh, S.T. Bani and Dominic Puthucheary, younger brother of James (four non-Chinese to give it a multiracial appearance) – issued a statement calling for “genuinely full internal self-government not only in name but also in fact”, with control of internal security and the abolition of the Internal Security Council. They asked the Anson electorate to vote for the PAP for the sake of victory in the
1963 constitutional talks and the early realisation of their demands. Lim then brought the communist united front into the fray, with 42 trade unions pledging their support for a left-wing, anti-colonial People’s Action Party in the coming by-election. In other words, if the PAP were not left-wing and anti-colonial enough for them, it would not get the backing of the unions, which represented the “wishes of the people”.

It was a warning to me to play it their way. I replied, “Now independence through merger in a larger unit is clearly before us and will be achieved sooner than anyone imagined two years ago.” I made it plain that we would not seek the abolition of the Internal Security Council until our security was assured within the Federation by the electoral weight of its Malay mass base. It was up to the Plen what he would do next.

On 10 June, nomination day for the Anson by-election, the PAP fielded a Malay, Mahmud bin Awang. He was the president of the Trade Union Congress, but the choice did not suit the communists. He had been arrested briefly then released. He was with Devan Nair and therefore one of us. He would face David Marshall, who was the candidate for the Workers’ Party, and whom I felt sure Lim Chin Siong and Fong had instigated to stand. Sure enough, on 14 June, the newspapers reported Marshall as saying that he had visited the Federation after the Tunku’s announcement to the Foreign Correspondents’ Association, and he was convinced there would be no merger within ten years. He advocated independence for Singapore (which must automatically entail abolition of the Internal Security Council), arguing that once Singapore got independence, it would be easier to get merger.

Soon after the campaign began, John Linsell, the director of Special Branch, reported that some communist group wanted to assassinate me. The danger would be greatest at one of the election meetings held in the open, where it would be easy for an assassin to hit the speaker on the stage and make his escape. They left me to decide the degree of
security needed and whether I should go on making public appearances at all. I had no choice. To disappear from view during an important by-election campaign just because of an assassination threat would have been politically disastrous. On the other hand, to continue without security cover would have been foolhardy, while too much security would have looked defensive. I told Special Branch to be as discreet as possible but to take maximum precautions.

That same evening, I spoke in my own constituency. It was familiar ground, a neighbourhood friendly to me, and I felt reasonably safe. But there were other public meetings in less friendly neighbourhoods. I did feel twinges of discomfort, but accepted it as part of political life in the terrorist-plagued conditions of Malaya and Singapore of those days.

I was inclined to believe that the communists wanted to inject some fear into me and see how I reacted. I calculated that in fact it would be against their interests to assassinate me when my standing with the public was high. I was not yet regarded as the enemy of the people as Lim Yew Hock had been in 1956. And they could not want the inevitable massive security clean-up against the united front – party, unions and cultural associations – that must follow. If I had lost out in the propaganda battle for hearts and minds and been seen as a “lackey of the imperialists”, it would have been different. Bumping me off would then have been politically cost-free, in which case I might have had to decide not to take chances.

As it turned out, Special Branch and the Criminal Investigation Department had mounted a series of raids on 18 June culminating in the arrest of a big-time racketeer and ten others, during which they had found a parcel containing three hand grenades concealed in the compound of the racketeer’s residence. But interrogation revealed that an informer had fabricated the assassination plot and planted the hand grenades with the connivance of a Criminal Investigation Department detective corporal. The denouement came as an anticlimax. Nevertheless,
until the threat was found to be fiction, I was faced with the real problem of how to respond to it.