Say no to Chin Peng the ‘former terrorist’, say yes to Communist China!

I applaud the decision by the Malaysian government to dismiss and not entertain any idea of allowing Chin Peng the ‘former terrorist’ to return to this country.

Government Will Not Allow Chin Peng To Return, Says Najib

PUTRAJAYA, May 27 (Bernama) — The Malaysian government will not allow former Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) leader Chin Peng to reside in the country.

Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said the return of the former terrorist would lead to dissatisfaction among the people, especially those who fought the communists and families who lost their loved ones during the CPM’s revolt from 1948 to 1981 (known as the Emergency).

(Source: Bernama)

The government is absolutely right, many victims suffered during the communist insurgency, Chin Peng and his commandos killed many people in the past and they certainly do not deserve any consideration from us. No, I didn’t say that. Our very wise, informed and cultured Datuk Datuk Seri Utama Dr. Rais bin Yatim said that.

Several quarters and individuals, including Information, Communication and Culture Minister Dr Rais Yatim, have opposed the idea.

“Chin Peng and his commandos killed many people in the past and they certainly do not deserve any consideration from us,” Rais had said.

“The communists abused this country and we had been shackled through killings and terrible actions committed by them,” he added.

(Source: 1Malaysia)

We should never allow Chin Peng to come back to Malaysia. Thanks to our sensitive Defence Minister Datuk Ahmad Zahid Hamidi for putting it in context.

Defence Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi had said his return would be an insult to the families of nearly 50,000 British colonial and government troops who died during the “Malayan Emergency”. (psst, the 50,000 figure is a crap is you ask me)

But I have some disturbing questions.

1. Isn’t Chin Peng was just a puppet for the Chinese Communist Party? His party, Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) was supported by its China main counterpart throughout their four decades in Malaysia. My question is, why punish the puppet, but not the master? Obviously we should punish China!

Let’s severe our all our diplomatic and bilateral ties with China to show our sensitive considerations to the suffering families that went through killings and terrible actions committed by the communists. Let’s show them Malaysia is serious about its past history, goddammit!

2. If I am not mistaken, China is ruled by Communist Party of China (CPC). So, let me get this right, China is ruled by a bunch of communists and why the hell we are courting them now? What happened to ‘the communist abused this country’ and ‘they certainly do not deserve any consideration from us?‘

What is our beloved Prime Minister doing frolicking in China then? Is he not worry that his visit would lead to dissatisfaction among the people, especially those who fought the communists and families who lost their loved ones?

I repeat, let’s severe our all our diplomatic and bilateral ties with China to show our sensitive considerations to the suffering families that went through killings and terrible actions committed by the communists. Let’s show them Malaysia is serious about its past history, goddammit

3. If I remember correctly, the British and Japanese  also killed a lot of people during their occupation of Malaya no? The British sure killed and injured a lot of people back then.  Remember the fights by Tok Janggut, Dato’ Bahaman, Mat Kilau, Maharaja Lela? I bet my last cent the British killed more people here during their occupation compared to the emergency period.

How about the war crimes and astrocities the Japanese commited against the people of Malaya during World War II? Wait, did the communists kill less people than them?

Let’s severe all our diplomatic and bilateral ties with Japan and British (now Great Britain) to show our sensitive considerations to the suffering families that went through killings and terrible actions committed by the Japanese. Let’s show them Malaysia is serious about its past history, goddammit!

Well, I do not agree and I don’t really care if Chin Peng was a freedom fighter, but that’s beside the point. Just how much longer we want to live in the shadows of the past? May 13th, Malaya Emergency etc. often quoted by our leaders to ‘remind’ us, about what? You should know better. Selective issues, don’t you think? Why it is only Chin Peng not allowed to come back to Malaysia? How about other CPM leaders?

Conclusion: Only in Malaysia, it would seem like history has to dictate how we we live tomorrow. Rather sad.

ps: I am sure Chin Peng was not a freedom fighter. He’s taking arms for fun, just like how I shoot people for fun at my Counter Strike game. Okay, Let 4 Dead lah, nobody play CS now. Okay, bad joke.

pss: What is this ‘my father’, ‘my father’ and ‘my father’ crap keep repeated by Najib? He has no backbone to stand on his own? To claim his own credit, other that relying on his father’s name?

I remember an Englishman I once met.

As I ponder, with abated breath, upon the event slated today: the Candlelight Vigil for ISA Detainees, scheduled this evening 7.00 p.m. at, aptly, Dataran Merdeka, or its English translation, Freedom Square; my mind raced back some four years back, when I had the occasion to encounter upon an Englishman who I have known, at that time, only by reputation.

I was, at that material time, a Masters scholar at a local varsity, partaking as one of my course study, the dreary subject of comparative constitutional law. I had psyched myself up to expect a long and dull semester on the lacklustre and unexciting field of study; when, within the early weeks of the course, my professor announced that he has lined up for us a guest lecturer.

R.H. Hickling was his name, my professor said, a wry smile etched up as he made his announcement. A restrained gasp was offered in response, for we all know of him. Hickling was the man who drafted, and unceremoniously presented upon us, the Internal Security Act 1960. Yes, the dreaded ISA! On last count, 64 individuals are still being callously detained, without recourse to justice, within the confines of their cells in Kamunting; in all probability, being incessantly tortured and tormented, in body and in mind.

How could he, I thought, as I looked around my other fellow academic scholars. Looks of disgust were exchanged between us. And the gall of Mr. Hickling, an Englishman who has since left Malaysia, happily residing in a sweet Shakespearean cottage in the cliffs of Dover, to dare come and sermon us on his horrendous pen of legacy. Damn you colonial idiot, muttered someone, in a huff.

“Do bring your camera next week” my professor reminded before ending the class, “We shall pose for a shot with Professor Hickling for remembrance.”

“It’s not everyday one gets this chance, you know,” he declared.

Camera? Photos? What about rotten eggs for pelting the English twat, I thought.

I had entertained the thought of missing the lecture, perhaps as a sort of indirect activist protest, in line with the abhorred stance against the ISA. But then, lecture attendance counts to the passing rates for the course, so that would not be such a good idea after all. Let’s just see what he has to say then.

Come the week of the lecture, all of us were early, neatly seated like dutiful citizens, waiting to see the great man. “He’ll be a little late” said my professor. Yeah, sure, made us wait, you insensitive superior colonial master. Are we the least surprised? Then, within minutes, in comes this man. He is diminutive in size; old and quaint, almost like a garden gnome out of the Enid Blyton’s kiddie adventures, except for lack of pointy ears. He is wearing a faded Durban shirt, with ancient barrack slacks, something that one gets from bargain jumble sales. And he has with him, a folded black umbrella, which he quickly hid into his plastic bag. Yes, a plastic bag, one that comes from a purchase from the local super mart. No fancy briefcase, no branded sling-on; just a plastic bag, was all this man has with him. Is this the merciless and ruthless Hickling that left the heritage to the nation, in the form of the ISA? Where is that monstrous English brute that I have envisioned? This is no beast, all I see before me is Santa’s helper.

“I’m sorry for being late,” the little man apologized, “There was a slight drizzle, you see, and the buses are full.” Buses?

“Professor Hickling stays in Brickfields when he’s Malaysia. He uses the bus to get around,” my professor added, as a sort of clarification to the somewhat perplexed audience.

What, the great bad drafter of the ISA carries a plastic bag and goes around in buses, I asked myself.

“Perhaps I shall start by telling by telling a bit about myself and how I ended up in Malaysia,” said Professor Hickling, formally commencing his lecture. “Well, it was decades ago, in England, my young son died.” There was a hush silence in the hall. The professor stopped for a while as well, his eyes lost in his thoughts. “Well, my wife was very sad,” continued Hickling, after regaining composure, “.. and I told her, let’s go away, somewhere far, far away, from all these.”

We were all astounded by these early revelations. We forgot about the ISA, we forgot about the law; we wanted to hear about him. And Professor Hickling carried on: about how he then applied to join the Colonial Legal Service, how he asked to be posted to Sarawak so that he can bring his beloved wife afar from the damp memories of England. He told us about how he wanted to escape as well, how he hated the war, how he had served, previously, as a seaman with the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve; and how he, as a sub-lieutenant, commanded the landing craft tank to Sword Beach during infamous D-Day Invasion of Normandy. We were revealed on the atrocities of the war; how soldiers became mad and eat up dogs, scenes which we were only privy to courtesy of Saving Private Ryan; made real by this man who was actually present at the setting to witness it all.

Professor Hickling then proceeded to talk on the ISA. “At that time,” he said, “There were the communist. They were bad, bad men. Very bad men, you see,” he explained, in his earnest simplistic demeanour. “We had to do something, there were so many of them, we had to nab them and quickly locked them up. There wasn’t much time for trial; hence we needed a legislation to befit the occasion. Those were the insurgent times, a time of emergency.”

With that short statement, Professor Hickling ended his lecture on the ISA. No grandeur, no fanfare, no sermon, no defence, no arguments; just a brief historical proclamation. He did not defend what he did, nor did he lay down lengthy credence of his actions. There was no boisterous reasoning on his part as to how relevant the ISA is then, as it should be today.

I never saw Professor Hickling again after that; but after that memorable lecture, I knew more of him as a person than just as the drafter of the ISA. I received news that he passed away three years thereafter, in Worcestershire, England, leaving behind his beloved wife and 3 other children.

A check on the internet search on Professor Hickling shows a record on what he wrote in the NST in 1989:-

“I could not imagine then that the time would come when the power of detention, carefully and deliberately interlocked with Article 149 of the Constitution, would be used against political opponents, welfare workers and others dedicated to non violent, peaceful activities.”

Communism and Malaysia (exposing the unseen)

Communism is almost a dirty word in Malaysia and world wide, however very few comprehend the original socialistic purpose of communism. In Malaysia, the thought of communism immediately conjures up gun-totting, merciless Chinese men with cruel laughter ‘hyuk hyuk hyuk’.

The image most Malaysians have in mind of communism is synonymous to barbaric militarism and dictatorship. Communism preaches about social equality not blood lust. It is the Western media propaganda and to a certain extent, our unbalanced historical lessons. Mind you, ideologies can take a blood lust approach even for democracy. Take a look at US, it is a democratic gun-totting nation invading oil rich Iraq and establishing an American ‘dictatorship’ in Iraq in the guise of Iraqi democracy (using the current Iraq government merely as a figurehead).

Communism fights for the working class while working hard to eliminate social and class inequality. Let’s take a real world example, a kampong boy and the son of a prestigious lawyer are both going to universities. Both want to study engineering. The kampong boy can only afford to go to a messed up local, public university, while the son of the prestigious lawyer get to go to MIT, even though both have the same grades. The one who has the privilege to go to MIT does so because he has a rich father who can fund his overseas studies. He is better exposed and gets better opportunities in MIT than the kampong boy just because he is given a head start by just being in a better social class. And it can be sometimes viewed as inequality in life chances. Communism strives to eliminate this class and economic differences. Karl Marx viewed these differences as barriers to fulfilment of human freedom. Without social and economic differences, there will be no one who wishes to exploit another (since it doesn’t help them to stay a class ahead of the rest). With no exploitation, people are freer to do what they want without having some ambitious people to restrict other people’s endeavours.

Now, can anyone tell me if the ideology shows at all an ounce of evil? One of the main reasons, the democratic and capitalistic nations fear communism has more to do with self-interest. They wouldn’t be able to invest in communist countries as economics in communist countries are state planned and micro-managed without being controlled by foreigners. Communists view capitalism as just another form of imperialism. They view capitalistic ventures as parasites that invest for the sake of sucking out all the available natural resources without giving many benefits to the local populace. Do many Malaysians know about this? No, because of bias history and world wide propaganda.

Communism can sometimes be good for the early part of a nation’s history. China was fractured firstly from the toppling the last dynastic government, civil war between communism and democracy, then long drawn out strive with the Japanese, then civil war again between two contrasting ideologies. Most of the populace was impoverished, and democratic government was viewed as a corrupted one with elitists few. Communism was the force that was able to unite the nation, the peasants were disgruntled at the democratic but corrupted government.

Same goes for the Vietnam War. The population was impoverished partly attributed to militaristic approach to gaining independence from the French. Most of the population was supporting the communist north. Most of the American aids for the democratic south never reach the poor due to gross corruption and the Vietnamese knows that hence they support the communist north. The Americans weren’t in there for the Vietnamese, they were they out of pure self-interest.

So let’s talk about communism right back into our own backyard. Malaysia is different, luckily not as unfortunate as Vietnam or China. Malaysia was slightly better off and it was never in a pro-longed conflict like what Vietnam and China faced. The un-militaristic approach ensures that most of the infrastructure was/is still there, people can live a slightly better life. Capitalism is not all that bad either and in this context, I favour capitalism more than communism. Capitalism ensures that people have to work hard to achieve better life without being state-controlled to how well you can achieve in life. I believe that a little self-centred and self-motivated approach to a better life makes people more productive. It will be better to the society in the long run. After all, survival for the fittest rule always apply, and capitalism helps us to remain competitive and serves as a subconscious reminder that the world does not owe us a living, that we have to eke a living for ourselves the way we want it to be. Competition is what makes a species survive and not go extinct.