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| English: Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore, being escorted by United States Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld through an honour cordon and into the Pentagon. They met to discuss bilateral security issues including the war on terrorism: see DefenseLINK news photos. US Department of Defense (). Retrieved on . (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
मधेस स्वतंत्रता संग्राम मा सहभागी हुनु पहिलो कदम छ। त्यस पछि राजा जनक का सन्ततिले आफ्ना दुई कान बीचको मांसपेशी (muscle) को सक्दो प्रयोग गरेर ज्ञान आर्जन गर्नु पर्छ। आर्थिक क्रांति हुने नहुने त्यसमा निर्भर गर्नेछ।
मधेशमा छ प्रदेश होइन, छ प्रदेशमा मधेश बाँडियो
संघीयता को विवाद: कमिला र मौरी हरु बीच को विवाद
जटिलता र स्पष्टता
अम्बेडकर को निष्कर्ष
प्रत्यक्ष निर्वाचित प्रधान मंत्री का पक्ष मा भर्खर गएका मुख्य सचिव
चिन्ता को एक मात्र विषय: प्रत्यक्ष निर्वाचित प्रधान मंत्री
पहाड़ी महिलावादी लाई मधेसी महिला को मतलब छैन
६ अंचल को नक्शा: सुधारिएको एकात्मक व्यवस्था
शेखर गोल्छा, Public Space, Private Space, नेपाली नागरिकता र मधेसी पहिचान
चितवन: थारु हरुको काठमाण्डु
देश मधेसी क्रांति ३ तर्फ लम्केको हो?
मधेस र सौर्य उर्जा
Singapore Separates From Malaysia And Becomes Independent
On 9 August 1965, Singapore separated from Malaysia to become an independent and sovereign state. The separation was the result of deep political and economic differences between the ruling parties of Singapore and Malaysia, which created communal tensions that resulted in racial riots in July and September 1964. At a press conference announcing the separation, then Singapore Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew was overcome by emotions and broke down. ........ Prior to the signing of the Malaysia Agreement in London, there was a week of “arduous and gruelling negotiations” over the more thorny issues of a common market between Singapore and Malaya, and the portion of Singapore’s revenue and taxes that would go to the federal government. With these issues settled, Singapore began its journey as part of Malaysia. ........ Even before the proclamation of the formation of the Federation of Malaysia on 16 September 1963, Singapore and Malayan leaders were mindful that the differences in the political approach and economic conditions between the two countries “cannot be wiped out overnight”. This, however, did not prevent sharp exchanges between the leaders of both countries throughout the period of the union. The slow progress of the creation of a common market and the difficulty in getting pioneer status from Kula Lumpur for Singapore industries frustrated Singapore leaders, while Kuala Lumpur was dissatisfied with Singapore's dogged response to the federal government’s clamour for increased revenue contribution to combat the Indonesian Confrontation, and for an agreed loan to develop Sabah and Sarawak. ......... At the political front, the grossly imbalanced Malay-Chinese population in both countries made each vulnerable to
communal prejudices which were played up by political leaders. The two major political parties in Malaysia, the People’s Action Party (PAP) and the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), were soon accusing one another of communalism. The accusations escalated into tensions until they erupted into racial violence
in Singapore on 21 July and 2 September 1964. Despite agreeing to a two-year truce in September 1964, the acrimony between UMNO and PAP soon flared up again. At the heart of the rift was Lee’s multi-racial slogan, “Malaysian Malaysia”, which sowed deep distrust among UMNO leaders, especially
the “ultras”, who viewed his vision of a non-communal Malaysia as a challenge to their party’s raison d'être of undisputed Malay dominance.
.......... He then moved a resolution to enact the Constitution of Malaysia (Singapore Amendment) Bill, 1965, that would allow Singapore to leave Malaysia and become an independent and sovereign state. The bill was passed with a 126-0 vote and given the royal assent by the end of the day ............. Filled with emotions and his eyes brimming with tears, Lee had given Singaporeans a glimpse of their leader’s “moment of anguish” ...... Many rallied behind the news of the separation with relief although the manner of its announcement came as a shock and was initially greeted with disappointment and regret. ...... when merger came, the greater share of it was marked by constant differences and bitter political wrangling between leaders of the two nations. Although all signs were pointing to trouble, very few were prepared for the dramatic end to Singapore’s union with Malaysia.
Singapore Passing Malaysia 45 Years After Lee’s Tears
Forty-five years after Singapore’s expulsion from a union with Malaysia left Lee Kuan Yew in tears on national television, the economy of the city-state he led to independence is poised to overtake its neighbor..... Singapore’s gross domestic product will cap its fastest annual growth this year since independence, rising as much as 15 percent to about $210 billion, while the economy of Malaysia, a country 478 times its size, will expand 7 percent to $205 billion ....... The island that former economic adviser Albert Winsemius once said was considered a “poor little market in a dark corner of Asia” is now ranked by the World Bank as the easiest place to do business, has the world’s second-busiest container port, and boasts the highest proportion of millionaire households ..... “Malaysia was struck by the curse of resource-rich countries: It didn’t optimize its human capital.” ..... Singapore has become the world’s fourth-largest foreign-exchange center with a S$1.2 trillion ($932 billion) asset-management industry. ..... Smaller than New York City and the only Southeast Asian nation without natural resources, Singapore has grown 189-fold since independence in 1965, helping boost GDP per capita to $36,537 last year from $512. Malaysia’s economy expanded at one-third the pace during the same period and had a GDP per capita of $6,975 in 2009, up from $335 in 1965. ....... “Development is like a marathon and all policies geared toward it must be sustainable and continuous” ... “Malaysia runs the marathon like a 100 meter event, so you see the initial spurt but not continuous progress in the race.” .......Truth behind expulsion of Singapore from Malaysia
Lam, 35, is one of 386,000 Malaysians who have become permanent residents or citizens of Singapore, a list that includes Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan and Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp. Chairman Cheong Choong Kong.
........ After more than 140 years under British rule, Singapore joined the Federation of Malaysia in September 1963 as Lee and his colleagues sought a bigger common market to cut unemployment and curb communism. The merger survived less than two years amid ideological differences and worsening relations between the United Malays National Organisation, which dominated the ruling Barisan Nasional coalition, and Lee’s People’s Action Party. ......... “For me, it is a moment of anguish,” Lee said on Aug. 9, 1965, the day Singapore became a sovereign state. “My whole adult life, I believed in Malaysian merger and unity of the two territories.” Lee, 87, was Singapore’s prime minister from 1959 to 1990. ...... the general opinion of Singapore in the early 1960s was a country “going down the drain.” ..... “Economic development does not occur naturally” ....... cut corporate tax rates by nine percentage points since 2000 to 17 percent, compared with 25 percent in Malaysia. ........
Singapore was kicked out of the union partly because Lee opposed Malaysia’s affirmative-action policy, which provides special rights to the ethnic Malay majority. While Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak has pledged to roll back key policies of ethnic favoritism, he told UMNO’s 61st General Assembly last month that the “social contract” that gives benefits to the Malays cannot be repealed.
....... About 350,000 to 400,000 Malaysian citizens work in Singapore, including 150,000 who commute daily via buses and motorcycles to jobs in the city-state’s factories, kitchens and offices. ..... Singapore beat 182 economies to take first place in the World Bank’s annual ranking of business conditions, which looks at property rights, taxes, access to credit, labor laws and regulations on customs and licenses. ..... The country must keep innovating to stay ahead ........ “Singapore must keep searching for new markets,” Kinoshita said. “Less developed Asian countries are all growing quickly and trying to catch up.”
“Well, first I regret having been turfed out of Malaysia. I thinkWhy did Singapore and Malaysia split up?
if the Tunku had kept us together, what we did in Singapore, had Malaysia accepted a multiracial base for their society, much of what we’ve achieved in Singapore would be achieved in Malaysia.
But not as much because it’s a much broader base. We would have improved inter-racial relations and an improved holistic situation.” ...... “Now we have a very polarised Malaysia, Malays, Chinese and Indians in separate schools, living separate lives and not really getting on with one another. You read them. That’s bad for us as close neighbours.” ...... There’s never any doubt LKY was super intelligent, a double starred first class honours from Cambridge. But one can only be too clever by half in a Malayan environment because the style of his assertive and aggressive politicking didn’t go down well with Malay culture and its more genteel style of politics. ......
The Malay right wingers were getting so heated up with LKY
that Tunku thought a cooling period, via a ‘temporary’ expulsion of Singapore, would be good for everyone. ........ Tunku imagined that Singapore outside of Malaysia would be so helpless alone by itself that LKY would come crawling back, begging to be let in again, though this time on Tunku’s terms. That was Tunku's plan. ...... "For me, it is a moment of anguish. All my life, my whole adult life, I ... I believed in Malaysian merger and unity of the two territories. You know that we, as a people are connected by geography, economics, by ties of kinship ... It broke everything we stood for ....... " ........ his resolve to stay out, stay steadfast, strategize and systematically develop Singapore into a prosperous nation. ..... it was the concept of Malaysia which saved him from being trounced by the pro-communist party, and possibly being reduced into a political nobody. What a frightening thought for Malaysia if the communists had taken hold of Singapore, when there was a pro communist Indonesia under madman Soekarno.
Singapore's PAP advocated a meritocratic, non-communal form of government that sought to treat everyone equally and reward them based on their merit, rather than their race or religion. ..... The dominant political party in the Malayan penisula on the other had believed that the Malays, being the "sons of the soil", deserved special previleges over the Chinese and Indians. This resulted essentially in the government practicing a heavily pro-Malay affirmative action policy, in a bid to bring them up to the economic levels of the Chinese. ...... The political parties at that time, (UMNO, MIC, MCA) were largely based on race, with the Malay-bssed party, UMNO being the biggest and strongest. Considering that Singapore(and the PAP) was predominantly Chinese, there was the perception that the inclusion of Singapore into the Malaysian Federation would dilute the power of the Malays and increase the influence of the Chinese. Actions by both parties only served to worsen the acrimonious relations between Singapore and Malaysia. ........ As a resource-poor, economically undeveloped territory, the leaders felt that union with Malaysia was the best outcome for the survival of the state.one of the main benefits would be to gain access to a larger consumer base to sell their goods to. However, by 1965, progress on this common market had stalled. Thus, our economic impetus for joining up slowly faltered.
The crucial speech...which split the nation
One speech more than any other was crucial in bringing Umno leaders round to the idea that Malaysia should get rid of Singapore and Mr Lee Kuan Yew with it. This was the speech that changed history, former Cabinet minister Lim Kim San said in his tribute to Mr Lee at his 75th birthday dinner celebrations on Wednesday........ He was referring to Mr Lee's speech in May 1965, when he rose to take part in the debate on the King's address at the opening of the Malaysian Parliament. Here is an account of that fateful debate, as told by Mr Lee in The Singapore Story: Memoirs of Lee Kuan Yew....... I MADE my most important speech in the federal Parliament to a hostile and tense audience, including a large number of Malay MPs who had been fed daily with anti-PAP, anti-Lee Kuan Yew and anti-Chinese propaganda by the Utusan Melayu over the past year. ..... But Dr Mahathir Mohamad's (then an Umno backbencher) speech implied that this could never happen. I quoted what he had said the day before about the Chinese in Singapore:
"They have never known Malay rule and couldn't bear the idea that the people they have so long kept under their heels should now be in a position to rule them."
....... To rule them? I drew a distinction between political equality and the special rights for the economic and social uplift of the Malays. I accepted the special rights, but if the other peoples of Malaysia were denied political equality with the Malays, we would not need Indonesian President Sukarno and Confrontation to crush us. ....... Waving a copy of the Malaysian Constitution in my right hand, I said: "Once you throw this into the fire and say, 'Be done with it', that means you do it for a long time; and history is a long, relentless process." I said Syed Ja'afar Albar (then Umno secretary general) wanted us to secede and leave our friends in Sarawak, Sabah, Penang, Malacca and other parts of Malaysia to Umno's tender mercies; we would not oblige. ...... I demolished the accusation that we were pro-Chinese. If we advocated a Chinese Malaysia; we could not attract majority support, as the Chinese were only 42 per cent of the population. If I had been going around saying about the Chinese what Albar had said about being a Malay -- "Wherever I am, I am a Chinese" -- where would that have led us? ...... On the contrary, I kept on reminding people: "I am a Malaysian, I am learning Bahasa Kebangsaan (the national language) and I accept Article 153 of the Constitution (on the special rights of the Malays)." ...... Having reached the most sensitive part of my speech, in which I would expose the inadequacy of Umno's policies, I decided to speak in Malay. Although my Malay was not as good as my English, I was fluent compared with other non-Malay MPs. .... I said that while I accepted Malay as the sole official language, I did not see how it could raise the economic position of the people. ..... Would it mean that the produce of the Malay farmer would increase in price, that he would get better prices? Would he get improved facilities from the government? I added that if the Alliance did not have real answers to current economic problems, it should not stifle the opposition. ....... Because we had an alternative, and it would work: "In 10 years we will breed a generation of Malays, educated and with an understanding of the techniques of science and modern industrial management." ...... It was at this point that I quoted what Dr Mahathir said earlier in the debate: "It is, of course, necessary to emphasise that there are two types of Chinese ... the MCA supporters to be found mainly where Chinese have for generations lived and worked amidst the Malays and other indigenous people, and the insular, selfish and arrogant type of which Mr Lee is a good example. This latter type live in a purely Chinese environment where Malays only exist at syce level ... They have in most instances never crossed the Causeway. They are in fact overseas Chinese first, seeing China as the centre of the world and Malaysia as a very poor second." ......... I continued: "What does that mean, Mr Speaker, sir? They were not words uttered in haste, they were scripted, prepared and dutifully read out, and if we are to draw the implications from that, the answer is quite simple: that Malaysia will not be a Malaysian nation. I say, say so, let us know it now." ...... As for the Malays "only existing at syce level", I said that the Tunku had frequently said in public and in private that the Chinese were rich and the Malays poor, but I used some simple examples to highlight a few points, still speaking in Malay. ...... Special rights and Malay as the national language were not the answer to this economic problem. If out of 4-1/2 million Malays and another three-quarters of a million Ibans, Kadazans and others, we made 0.3 per cent of them company shareholders, would we solve the problem of Malay poverty? ......
"How does the Malay in the kampung find his way out into this modernised civil society? By becoming servants of the 0.3 per cent who would have the money to hire them to clean their shoes, open their motorcar doors?
...Of course there are Chinese millionaires in big cars and big houses. Is it the answer to make a few Malay millionaires with big cars and big houses? ......... "How does telling a Malay bus driver that he should support the party of his Malay director (Umno) and the Chinese bus conductor to join another party of his Chinese director (MCA) -- how does that improve the standards of the Malay bus driver and the Chinese bus conductor who are both workers in the same company? ......... "If we delude people into believing that they are poor because there are no Malay rights or because opposition members oppose Malay rights, where are we going to end up? You let people in the kampungs believe that they are poor because we don't speak Malay, because the government does not write in Malay, so he expects a miracle to take place in 1967 (the year Malay would become the national and sole official language). The moment we all start speaking Malay, he is going to have an uplift in the standard of living, and if it doesn't happen, what happens then?..." ......... "Meanwhile, whenever there is a failure of economic, social and educational policies, you come back and say, oh, these wicked Chinese, Indians and others opposing Malay rights. They don't oppose Malay rights.
They, the Malays, have the right as Malaysian citizens to go up to the level of training and education that the more competitive societies, the non-Malay society, has produced. That is what must be done, isn't it? Not to feed them with this obscurantist doctrine that all they have got to do is to get Malay rights for a few special Malays and their problem has been resolved..."
............ Such arguments put in down-to-earth social and economic terms, and in Malay, had never been heard before in the Malaysian political debate. ...... The PAP had brought crucial, sensitive issues into the openin a rational way to expose the shallowness of Umno's political argument, that because Malay leaders (mostly the aristocrats and educated elite) worked together with Chinese leaders (mostly the successful merchants) and Indian leaders (mostly the professionals), all would be well.
............ It was the most significant speech I had ever made in Malay, and I made it to an audience of Malay MPs, many of whom represented rural areas, and to a strangers' gallery, which was packed with more Malays. I had spoken without a script, and for that reason it had all the more impact.As I spoke, there was a stunned silence. The air was electric.
.......... "He spoke for about half an hour. There must have been about 500 or so in the House and in the gallery, but you could hear a pin drop. I think if they could have cheered, they would have. Looking back, I think that was the moment when the Tunku and his colleagues felt it was better to have Singapore and Mr Lee out." ......."The chamber was very quiet and nobody stirred. The ministers of the central government sunk down so low in their seats that only their foreheads could be seen over the desk in front of them. The backbenchers were spellbound. They could understand every word. That was the turning point. They perceived Lee as a dangerous man who could one day be the prime minister of Malaysia."
..... I had no such illusions. Malaysia would not have a Chinese prime minister for a very, very long time. ...... The Malays present did not expect me, the supposed anti-Malay Chinese chauvinist out to destroy the Malay race, to speak in Malay with no trace of a Chinese dialect accent that most Chinese would have. I had been born and bred in Singapore, speaking the language from childhood. I could trace my ancestors for three generations in Singapore. They had made as big a contribution to the country as any Malay in the chamber. And I was on their side, not against them. I wanted to improve their lot. ........ The Tunku and his deputy PM, Abdul Razak Hussain, looked most unhappy. I was meeting them on their own Malay ground and competing for support peacefully with arguments in an open debate. I was not rattled by their strident, shrill and even hysterical cries of abuse and denigration. I could hold my own. If allowed to go on, I might begin to win over some Malays. ....... They could see that among the MPs wearing the Haji skullcaps of those who had made the pilgrimage to Mecca, heads were nodding in agreement when I pointed out thatsimply having Malay as the national language would not improve their economic lot. They needed practical programmes directed in the fields of agriculture and education.
......... The speech aroused such unease among the Alliance leaders and MPs that, contrary to standing orders, the Speaker ruled I could not reply to arguments made against it. It was a backhanded tribute to my effectiveness in Malay. Instead, he called on Razak, in place of the Tunku, to wind up the debate. ....... Razak launched into a long spiel of accusations: I was out to create chaos and trouble and hoped to emerge as the leader who could save the country. I was an expert in creating situations that did not exist. I twisted facts and cast doubts in the minds of people.I planned to split the country into two
-- "one Malay Malaysia, and one Lee Kuan Yew's Malaysia". ......... Razak was at his most bitter when he concluded: "The gulf that divides the PAP and the Alliance is now clear. PAP means Partition and Perish." ....... I had not expected my speech to play so crucial a part in the Tunku's decision to get Singapore out of Malaysia. ..... Twelve years later, 1977, in his book Looking Back, the Tunku wrote: "The straw that broke the camel's back, however, was a speech Mr Lee Kuan Yew made in Parliament, when he moved an amendment to 'the motion to thank the King for his speech in May, 1965'. He brought up many issues which disturbed the equilibrium of even the most tolerant Members of the House." ........ He sent me a copy of the book, inscribed: "Mr Lee Kuan Yew, The friend who had worked so hard to found Malaysia and even harder to break it up...... Five years later, in 1982, the Tunku told the author of a book on Singapore: "He (Lee Kuan Yew) would think himself as legitimate as I was to be the leader of Malaya because he speaks Malay better than I do." ........ I did not speak Malay better than the Tunku. Even if I did, I was still not a Malay and could not be the leader of Malaysia. ........ But when he heard me that day in Parliament, he realised that I was getting my message through to his own backbenchers. That was unacceptable.
स्वतंत्र मधेस देश को अंतरिम राष्ट्रपति सीके राउत बाहेक अरु कोही हुन सक्दैन। तर देश घोषणा भएको एक वर्ष भित्र संविधान सभा को चुनाव हुन्छ। त्यस चुनाव मा मधेस स्वराज पार्टी ले बहुमत बटुल्न नसके बहुमत बटुल्ने व्यक्ति अर्को दुई वर्ष का लागि अंतरिम राष्ट्रपति हुन्छ।
