By Kee Thuan Chye
The pettiness of the Government has not been so clearly
exposed as it is now over the issue of whether the former Communist leader Chin
Peng’s ashes should be allowed into Malaysia
to be buried in the land he loved and fought for. Even the police – who should
have better things to look out for like the increasing incidences of crime –
are putting out alerts to prevent the ashes from being brought back from Thailand,
where he died. As if these ashes were lethal and could, by some preternatural
means, maim the Malaysian populace.
The authorities still quibble over the trivia that Chin Peng
was not Malaysian because he could not produce the necessary documents to prove
he was so, but it seems more likely that they did not want to let him return,
full stop.
He first applied, under the guarantees of the peace
agreement, to resettle in Malaysia
in 1990, but his application was rejected the following year. In 2004, he wrote
to then prime minister Abdullah Badawi, but got no reply. That year, he
received instead a letter from the Home Ministry’s secretary-general saying
that his request to enter Malaysia
had been rejected. No explanation was given.
He took the matter to the courts. But in 2005, the High
Court rejected his application to enter Malaysia
on the grounds that he had to show identification papers to prove his
citizenship. Chin Peng, however, said he could not do so because his birth
certificate was seized by the police in 1948. In 2008, the Court of Appeal
upheld the ruling.
Just a few days ago, Inspector-General of Police (IGP)
Khalid Abu Bakar reiterated that Chin Peng was never a Malaysian citizen and,
as such, the question of his being buried in Malaysia
should not arise.
But documents are only stuff on paper. They are no match for
what a person feels for his country and the things he does in respect of that
feeling. Whatever you call that feeling – patriotism if you like – it is far
and above more meaningful than a piece of paper.
The fact is, Chin Peng fought against the Japanese when they
invaded Malaya and the British retreated. If this alone
does not automatically qualify him to be Malaysian, what will? Entering the
country illegally and agreeing to vote for Barisan Nasional, like the
immigrants in Sabah who have been given identity cards
for doing just that? In the latter case, in fact, having documents doesn’t mean
diddly squat.
More tangible than this, the Malaysian Government signed a
peace treaty in 1989 with the Communist Party of Malaya (CPM), of which Chin
Peng was its head. And in that agreement, the CPM agreed to disband and cease
all armed activities while the Government agreed to allow the CPM’s members to
settle down in Malaysia.
Since then, many have been allowed home, including leaders
like Rashid Maidin and Shamsiah Fakeh. But why not Chin Peng? Why was he
discriminated against?
The other favourite argument of the Government’s against
Chin Peng’s return to Malaysia
is that he was a terrorist and the head of a terrorist organisation that had
caused the deaths of thousands. But when you hold this up against the terms of
the agreement, you can straight away see that the argument is unfair. The man
and his comrades had given up the fight, they would no longer “terrorise”. It
was time for both sides to put the past aside and move on. For the sake of
peace. That’s what an agreement is about. So how could the Government sign an
agreement and still call the other signatory a villain? Might as well not sign
the agreement in the first place!
Why does the Government want to behave in such bad form over
this? Because it thinks maintaining Chin Peng as a bogeyman is worth its
tarnishing its honour?
But even on the issue of Chin Peng being a terrorist, the
lines are not clear-cut. To some, he was one, but to others, he was a freedom
fighter. When he served the British cause in fighting against the Japanese, he
was awarded the OBE (Order of the British Empire), but
when he consequently fought against the British to gain independence for Malaya,
he was a terrorist.
True, his Communist ideology was not everyone’s cup of tea
and the CPM did kill many people to fulfil its mission, for which it should be
condemned, but Chin Peng has also taken responsibility for the CPM’s taking of
thousands of lives. In an interview with history professor Cheah Boon Kheng in
1998, he said, “This was inevitable. It was a war for national independence.”
That this was so is affirmed by our first prime minister,
Tunku Abdul Rahman, in his book Lest We Forget: “Just as Indonesia
was fighting a bloody battle, so were the Communists of Malaya, who, too,
fought for independence.”
The Japanese, on the other hand, were invaders, and they
tortured and killed thousands more of our countrymen during their invasion, and
yet we have forgiven them their atrocities. In fact, the Japanese are now our
friends, and they are a people we look up to, thanks to ex-premiere Mahathir
Mohamad’s Look East policy. So why is it that we cut them more slack?
Is the Government hard on Chin Peng because it feels
embarrassed that Umno, the party that it has heaped so much credit on for
winning independence, did not fight any bloody battles for it, like Chin Peng
and the CPM did? And that, also, one of Umno’s revered leaders of the past, Abdul
Razak Hussein, actually worked for the Japanese?
Well, in the book Tun Abdul Razak: Potret dalam Kenangan,
a collection of reminiscences by people who knew the country’s second prime
minister, there is a mention of his having been an administrative officer for
the Japanese. It is in the chapter entitled ‘Saya Mendayung, Dia Mengemudi’ (I
Rowed, He Held the Helm), written by former Cabinet minister Ghazali Shafie.
And in a study called ‘Sejarah Penubuhan Universiti
Teknologi Mara UITM’ (http://coredev.fsktm.um.edu.my/servlet/sreport.sReportShow?report_id=154&xslFile=all),
there is a photograph of Razak with three others dressed in Japanese uniform
with the rising sun insignia pinned on their shirt pockets. This apparently
depicts the time he was being trained by the Japanese.
To be sure, Ghazali also mentions in his chapter that he and
Razak were actually nationalists. “We felt that since we had known the British
much longer … it was easier to stand up to them than the Japanese, whom we had
not got a full measure of yet … Therefore, we felt we had to master [the]
Japanese [language] and at the same time, we had to look for channels to contact
the British … so as to obtain their assistance in fighting the Japanese.”
From his account, it looks like the strategy adopted by him
and Razak was a pragmatic play-both-sides one that is different from the direct
warfare approach opted for by Chin Peng.
In view of this, do we still say that Chin Peng doesn’t
deserve to even have his ashes brought home to the country he wanted to return
to and die in?
Well, I would say that he has more right to be buried in Malaysia
than many people I could name. For example, those who have been behind the
giving of illegal identity cards to illegal immigrants in Sabah
are certainly not as worthy as Chin Peng in claiming this country as their
home. He never sold out his country; in fact, he wanted it to be free. His
problem was, his ideology was not accepted. And he was on the wrong side of
history.
I think it’s time to set the history right.
* Kee Thuan Chye is the author of
the new book The Elections Bullshit, now
available in bookstores.
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