From Malaysia-Today: Read here
- Read here related articles in Far Eastern Economic Review (1969 & 1970) and HERE and HERE
At his residence in Penang, 1972 :
From The Sun: Read here letter to Editor“It was clear to me as well as the police that in the highly charged political atmosphere after the police were forced to kill a Chinese political party worker on May 4th, 1969, something was bound to happen to threaten law and order because of the resentment towards the Government by the KL Chinese on the eve of the general election.
This was confirmed at this man’s funeral on the 9th May when the government faced the most hostile crowd it had ever seen.
Therefore, when the opposition parties applied for a police permit for a procession to celebrate their success in the results of the general election, I was adamant AGAINST it because the police were convinced that this would lead to trouble. I informed Tun Razak about this and he seemed to agree.
Now, WITHOUT my knowledge and actually “behind my back”, there were certain political leaders in high positions who were working to force me to step down as a PM.I don’t want to go into details but if they had come to me and said so I would gladly have retired gracefully.
Unfortunately, they were apparently scheming and trying to decide on the best way to force me to resign. The occasion came when the question of the police permit was to be approved.
Tun Razak and Harun Idris, the MB of the state of Selangor, now felt that permission should be given knowing fully well that there was a likelihood of trouble. I suppose they felt that when this happened they could then demand my resignation.
To this day I find it very hard to believe that Razak, whom I had known for so many years, would agree to work AGAINST me in this way.Actually, he was in my house as I was preparing to return to Kedah and I overhead him speaking to Harun over the phone saying that he would be willing to approve the permit when I left. I really could not believe what I was hearing and preferred to think it was about some other permit. In any case, as the Deputy Prime Minister in my absence from KL, he would be the Action PM and would override my objection. Accordingly, when I was in my home in Kedah, I heard over the radio that the permit had been approved.
It seems as though the EXPECTED trouble was ANTICIPATED and PLANNED FOR by Harun and his UMNO Youth.After the humiliating insults hurled by the non-Malays, especially the Chinese, and after the seeming loss of Malay political power to them, they were clearly ready for some retaliatory action.
After meeting in large numbers at Harun’s official residence in Jalan Raja Muda near Kampong Bahru and hearing inflammatory speeches by Harun and other leaders, they prepared themselves by tying ribbon strips on their foreheads and set out to kill Chinese.
The first hapless victims were two of them in a van opposite Harun’s house who were innocently watching the large gathering. Little did they know that they would be killed on the spot.
The rest is history.I am sorry but I must end this discussion now because it really pains me as the Father of Merdeka to have to relive those terrible moments.
I have often wondered why God made me live long enough to have witnessed my beloved Malays and Chinese citizens killing each other. ”
Learning the truth about May 13
I didn't get it in primary school, neither in secondary school, nor in university either. And all this while I have studied locally. I think somebody somewhere thought that by not exposing young Malaysians to this chapter of the nation's past, we would be better off.Thank you for your feature on the 1969 riots. This was the first informative article about the event that I have read in my 24 years of life. Never before have I encountered such a revealing account of that episode.
But they should realise that history has a tendency to repeat itself.
Thank you for printing the truth. Now we all know what really happened and can learn to avoid it.
Azlan Roni
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