RELATING EARLY MALAYSIAN HISTORY CAN BE VERY DISTURBING, -- PART II.
…THE ANCESTORS OF IMMIGRANTS CAN NEVER BE GRATEFUL FOR WHAT THE MELAYU HAD PROVIDED THEIR ANCESTORS AND THEMSELVES, EVEN WHEN THEY NOW HOW BACKWARD THE MELAYU ARE STILL WITH THEIR TRADITIONAL VILLAGES BEING TAKEN AWAY FOR DEVELOPMENT.
By Mansor Puteh
IT IS A PITY THERE ARE MANY NON-MELAYU COMMUNITY AND POLITICAL LEADERS FEEL MORE SYMPATHETIC TO THE CAUSE OF THE NATIVES, YET, WHO DO NOT CARE FOR THAT OF THE MELAYU WHOSE ANCESTRAL VILLAGES HAVE BEEN TAKEN AWAY FOR DEVELOPMENT.
THEY ARE JUST TRYING TO CREATE A WEDGE BETWEEN THE MELAYU AND NATIVES. YET, THEY DID NOT REALIZE THAT THE MELAYU ARE ALSO NATIVES WHO HAVE PROGRESSED BY THEIR ANCESTORS REVERTING ISLAM, WHEREAS THEY HAVE NOT DONE THAT TILL TODAY.
SO NOW THE INDIANS FELT THEMSELVES TO BE MARGINALIZED AND ARE ALSO DEMANDING TO BE TAKEN INTO THE MAINSTREAM SOCIETY. THEY ARE MAKING PROGRESS SLOWLY AND SURELY.
But there are some of them who insist that the process be speeded up so they can be at par with the others, especially the Chinese in business and the Melayu in politics and administration of the country.
Why are they suddenly feel this way? And how come they had not stirred before?
Did it have to take a small group of disgruntled Indian (read Tamil) lawyers who cannot be said to have not benefited from having been in this country, to create another interesting fuss?
Whereas, the long list of Indian political leaders starting surely with V. T. Sambanthan, is said to have failed their community. But so far no Indian has bothered to see it that way and blame him and the others after him for the travails faced by the Indians in Malaysia.
But alas, of the Indians in the country, it seems that only the Tamils are in dire straits. The others in the community are not experiencing similar bouts of anxiety or facing an economic dilemma, with the Sikhs who are amongst the smallest community of Indians who seem to be contented.
The problem may be due to the fact that the others in the Indian community do not send their children to the vernacular Tamil schools; and if there are, the number is very small because their parents do not want their children to later on think and consider themselves to be Tamil when they are Sikhs, Malayalees, Telugu and so on.
So Indians of these groups do not seem to face similar problems of assimilation as the others.
This is not something which is difficult for anyone to agree, including by the Melayu themselves, as their induction to the mainstream society will also be good not only for them but for the country, too.
Because the Melayu had long wondered if they are truly interested to be in such a situation, since many of them were still reluctant to leave the rubber estates and come to the fold.
So, for starters, the history of Malaya and Malaysia is very difficult to explain and BTN officials are also in a fix of not knowing how to relate it to those whom they are offering short courses, many of whom are still young and who may be very sensitive about many things, even if they are related in simple and straight forward ways.
Fortunately, those who have reservations on the courses are so few, compared to those who agree with them. And of the few who disagree and who are badly affected by them, their reasoning cannot be accepted at all.
But somehow the media has played up the issue so BTN now has to do some soul-searching to come up with better ways to give the courses. What better ways are there?
And first of all I would like to suggest that those few individuals who felt angry with the way Birotata Negara (BTN) conducted its courses, to give some lectures on the history of the country to see how they can manage it without being charged for not telling the truth.
It is not easy to talk about the history of Malaysia, from ancient times to the pre-second world war years till before and after Merdeka of 31 august, 1957.
There are many things which are not good to the ears; worse if they are depictions of the society and country in the form of films and other dramatic art-forms.
So no wonder, not many Malaysians favor watching films that are set during such times.
Historical epics are generally frowned upon as what has happened to the few films made in the country that try to deal with different aspect of its history.
Malaysian history, therefore, cannot be described in its colorful ways; it has to be told only in polite way so much so that the history is distorted beyond recognition.
Even the only feature film made by a Malaysian-Chinese company called ‘Kinta 1881’ which depicts Chinese immigrants who are at war with each other factions failed at the box office with the older Chinese not showing any interest in it, and the young Chinese feeling alien to the story.
The Chinese in Malaysia seem to care only for those costume or historical epics produced by film companies in China and Hong Kong which glorify ancient China.Most films from Taiwan which are in Mandarin and sometimes a mixture of Hokkien are also not favored as they are too strong on modern social issues.
On the other hand the films set in modern times from Hong Kong are favored because they are too fantastic and far-fetched and also too western, are liked the most as well as their unending soap operas.
Especially the history of Chinese and Indian immigration to Malaya and Nusantara Melayu or ‘Nanyang’ or South Seas Lands, as the Chinese describe this region.
And no wonder not many Chinese and Indians in Malaysia like to see themselves on television so much so that they still crave to see the Chinese and Indians from elsewhere particularly from China, Hong Kong and India.
This explains the dearth of local film and television drama productions that are shown in the cinemas and on television.
Ironically, just south of the Melayu Peninsula, Singapura seems to be happy telling everybody how the country came about, especially to its citizens when they can ignore the fact and pretend that their ancestors had been in the country since the land was formed when it cracked from the tip of the Melayu Peninsula.
The Singapura government does not deny that the Melayu were the original inhabitants of the land while the Chinese were coolies who had come from South China mostly. They do it without feeling any sorry for themselves; they were just telling the truth. And they show it in colorful and large floats that are paraded during their National Day in August.
And they did not make it a policy to replace the original names of the places in the republic with new ones, so much so we could still have a hospital named after a caribou shed or ‘kandang kerbau’. Only much later they renamed the hospital as KK Hospital using its initials.
And when they had to replace the name of an island south of the main island called Pulau Belakang Mati or Dead-end Island, the chose Sentosa Island instead.
It is also quite ironic how I see it that giving way to the demands and dictates of the Chinese and Indian community leaders in the country will in the end cause them to be absorbed into the mainstream society which in end can result in them not having their own voice like they do today, especially if all of the demands and dictates are met.
By Mansor Puteh
IT IS A PITY THERE ARE MANY NON-MELAYU COMMUNITY AND POLITICAL LEADERS FEEL MORE SYMPATHETIC TO THE CAUSE OF THE NATIVES, YET, WHO DO NOT CARE FOR THAT OF THE MELAYU WHOSE ANCESTRAL VILLAGES HAVE BEEN TAKEN AWAY FOR DEVELOPMENT.
THEY ARE JUST TRYING TO CREATE A WEDGE BETWEEN THE MELAYU AND NATIVES. YET, THEY DID NOT REALIZE THAT THE MELAYU ARE ALSO NATIVES WHO HAVE PROGRESSED BY THEIR ANCESTORS REVERTING ISLAM, WHEREAS THEY HAVE NOT DONE THAT TILL TODAY.
SO NOW THE INDIANS FELT THEMSELVES TO BE MARGINALIZED AND ARE ALSO DEMANDING TO BE TAKEN INTO THE MAINSTREAM SOCIETY. THEY ARE MAKING PROGRESS SLOWLY AND SURELY.
But there are some of them who insist that the process be speeded up so they can be at par with the others, especially the Chinese in business and the Melayu in politics and administration of the country.
Why are they suddenly feel this way? And how come they had not stirred before?
Did it have to take a small group of disgruntled Indian (read Tamil) lawyers who cannot be said to have not benefited from having been in this country, to create another interesting fuss?
Whereas, the long list of Indian political leaders starting surely with V. T. Sambanthan, is said to have failed their community. But so far no Indian has bothered to see it that way and blame him and the others after him for the travails faced by the Indians in Malaysia.
But alas, of the Indians in the country, it seems that only the Tamils are in dire straits. The others in the community are not experiencing similar bouts of anxiety or facing an economic dilemma, with the Sikhs who are amongst the smallest community of Indians who seem to be contented.
The problem may be due to the fact that the others in the Indian community do not send their children to the vernacular Tamil schools; and if there are, the number is very small because their parents do not want their children to later on think and consider themselves to be Tamil when they are Sikhs, Malayalees, Telugu and so on.
So Indians of these groups do not seem to face similar problems of assimilation as the others.
This is not something which is difficult for anyone to agree, including by the Melayu themselves, as their induction to the mainstream society will also be good not only for them but for the country, too.
Because the Melayu had long wondered if they are truly interested to be in such a situation, since many of them were still reluctant to leave the rubber estates and come to the fold.
So, for starters, the history of Malaya and Malaysia is very difficult to explain and BTN officials are also in a fix of not knowing how to relate it to those whom they are offering short courses, many of whom are still young and who may be very sensitive about many things, even if they are related in simple and straight forward ways.
Fortunately, those who have reservations on the courses are so few, compared to those who agree with them. And of the few who disagree and who are badly affected by them, their reasoning cannot be accepted at all.
But somehow the media has played up the issue so BTN now has to do some soul-searching to come up with better ways to give the courses. What better ways are there?
And first of all I would like to suggest that those few individuals who felt angry with the way Birotata Negara (BTN) conducted its courses, to give some lectures on the history of the country to see how they can manage it without being charged for not telling the truth.
It is not easy to talk about the history of Malaysia, from ancient times to the pre-second world war years till before and after Merdeka of 31 august, 1957.
There are many things which are not good to the ears; worse if they are depictions of the society and country in the form of films and other dramatic art-forms.
So no wonder, not many Malaysians favor watching films that are set during such times.
Historical epics are generally frowned upon as what has happened to the few films made in the country that try to deal with different aspect of its history.
Malaysian history, therefore, cannot be described in its colorful ways; it has to be told only in polite way so much so that the history is distorted beyond recognition.
Even the only feature film made by a Malaysian-Chinese company called ‘Kinta 1881’ which depicts Chinese immigrants who are at war with each other factions failed at the box office with the older Chinese not showing any interest in it, and the young Chinese feeling alien to the story.
The Chinese in Malaysia seem to care only for those costume or historical epics produced by film companies in China and Hong Kong which glorify ancient China.Most films from Taiwan which are in Mandarin and sometimes a mixture of Hokkien are also not favored as they are too strong on modern social issues.
On the other hand the films set in modern times from Hong Kong are favored because they are too fantastic and far-fetched and also too western, are liked the most as well as their unending soap operas.
Especially the history of Chinese and Indian immigration to Malaya and Nusantara Melayu or ‘Nanyang’ or South Seas Lands, as the Chinese describe this region.
And no wonder not many Chinese and Indians in Malaysia like to see themselves on television so much so that they still crave to see the Chinese and Indians from elsewhere particularly from China, Hong Kong and India.
This explains the dearth of local film and television drama productions that are shown in the cinemas and on television.
Ironically, just south of the Melayu Peninsula, Singapura seems to be happy telling everybody how the country came about, especially to its citizens when they can ignore the fact and pretend that their ancestors had been in the country since the land was formed when it cracked from the tip of the Melayu Peninsula.
The Singapura government does not deny that the Melayu were the original inhabitants of the land while the Chinese were coolies who had come from South China mostly. They do it without feeling any sorry for themselves; they were just telling the truth. And they show it in colorful and large floats that are paraded during their National Day in August.
And they did not make it a policy to replace the original names of the places in the republic with new ones, so much so we could still have a hospital named after a caribou shed or ‘kandang kerbau’. Only much later they renamed the hospital as KK Hospital using its initials.
And when they had to replace the name of an island south of the main island called Pulau Belakang Mati or Dead-end Island, the chose Sentosa Island instead.
It is also quite ironic how I see it that giving way to the demands and dictates of the Chinese and Indian community leaders in the country will in the end cause them to be absorbed into the mainstream society which in end can result in them not having their own voice like they do today, especially if all of the demands and dictates are met.
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