East Timor’s success in breaking away from
Indonesia encouraged other independent move-
ments. The longest running and most serious is
on the province of Aceh inhabited by 4.3 million
people on the most north-westerly tip of Sumatra.
It has gone on as long as East Timor’s struggle,
with an active guerrilla movement. Ceasefires
have come and gone. The military are determined
to resist complete independence and the resistance
will accept nothing less. In 2003 the army once
more resorted to force with tanks and bombers.
Strongman rule like Suharto’s bred corruption,
economic decline and human rights abuses. In the
more recent democratic era there have been
ethnic clashes, violence, attempted bloody sup-
pression and weak leadership. There is no national
consensus on Indonesia’s future.
Without British and Commonwealth support
Malaysia, with its relatively small population,
could not have stood up to Indonesian pressure
in the early 1960s, though its resources of rubber,
tin and timber make it one of the wealthiest coun-
tries of south-east Asia. Like some other former
British colonies, Malaysia followed a constitu-
tional, democratic path after attaining independ-
ence in 1957, but it faced severe problems of
national unity from the start. The feudal Malay
princes were jealous of their ceremonial powers.
Worse still, the country was divided into three
distinct ethnic groups: the Malays formed the
majority, but the Chinese, who were almost as
numerous, were the wealthiest and most dynamic
group; third, there was a relatively small group of
ethnic Indians. The solution was to share power
between all three in an Alliance Party. It was
dominated by the most distinguished statesman
Malaya had produced, Tunku Abdul Rahman, the
father of independence.
A conservative but tolerant prime minister
from 1957 to 1970, Abdul Rahman upheld
democratic and constitutional government and
supported an independent judiciary and a free
press. Nevertheless, the tension between the
Malays and the Chinese could not always be con-
tained. The policies designed to compensate the
Malays for their disadvantaged position bred
resentment among the Chinese. Communal riots
forced on the country two brief emergencies
when democratic rights were suspended. But,
even with renewed communist insurgencies after
the communist victories in Vietnam in 1975,
there was always a return to constitutional gov-
ernment and free elections.
The differences between the Chinese and
Malays also led to the break-up of an expanded
Federation of Malaysia, which included the two
North Bornean colonies and Singapore. The
Chinese predominated in Singapore, and the party
working for independence, the People’s Action
Party, was led by Lee Kuan Yew, who originally
suggested to Abdul Rahman the plan for the fed-
eration of the territories. It came into being in
1963, and Britain transferred to it control of
Singapore and the two North Bornean territories.
The Philippines protested and put forward their
own claims to North Borneo. More serious was
the confrontation with Indonesia. Between 1964
and 1965 fighting sporadically broke out as the
federation moved to defend its territories.
In 1965 Lee Kuan Yew withdrew Singapore
from the Malaysian Federation to form an inde-
pendent republic within the Commonwealth.
Thereafter he won every election until his retire-
ment in 1990. His authoritarian paternalism
significantly interfered with constitutional gov-
ernment, while his puritanism kept Singapore sin-
gularly free from crime, drugs and sexual licence,
which he regarded as decadent features of the
Western way of life. Without natural resources,
except fish, Singapore has been transformed into
the financial and industrial centre of south-east
Asia, its population of 2.5 million enjoying the
highest standard of living in the region (with the
exception of the fortunate people of Brunei,
whose wealth comes not from their work but
from oil). In these respects it compares with
Hong Kong. Singapore demonstrates the aston-
ishing rise from poverty that has transformed the
countries of the Pacific Rim since 1945 –
Singapore, Taiwan, Japan (the economic super-
power) and South Korea.
Malaysian wealth depends more on the world
prices of its natural resources. With its fine educa-
tional system and well-trained, British-oriented
judiciary, the roots of democratic government
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