Singapore's Senior Minister Angers Malaysians With First of 2 Volumes : Lee Kuan Yew's Controversial Memoirs
International Herald Tribune
September 17, 1998
Michael Richardson

Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore's senior minister, marked his 75th birthday on Wednesday with the launch of memoirs that have caused fresh tension in relations with Malaysia even before they appeared on sale in bookstores.

The most politically sensitive part of his book, the first of two planned volumes, deals with events surrounding Singapore's stormy and ultimately abortive merger in the Malaysian federation from 1963 to 1965.

Mr. Lee accuses Malaysia's dominant party — the United Malays National Organization, known by its initials as UMNO — of instigating bloody riots between ethnic Chinese and Malays in Singapore in 1964 as he worked to strengthen an opposition movement in Malaysia that aimed to end Malay dominance of politics by creating a multiracial party of Malays, Chinese, Indians and other groups.

"Resisting Malay hegemony," he wrote, was "the root cause of our dispute."

Malaysian politicians have already voiced strong objections to the book, complaining of its "insensitive" approach and the timing of its release during a period of economic and political turmoil in Malaysia.

After excerpts on the merger period were published in the Singapore press on Sunday, Prime Minister Mahathir bin Mohamad, who heads UMNO, said that Mr. Lee was publishing his memoirs now to exploit Malaysia's difficulties.

Singapore had prospered by "taking advantage of the weaknesses of its neighbors," Mr. Mahathir said, adding that by raising racial issues during merger Singapore contributed to conditions that led to race riots in Malaysia in 1969.

Three quarters of Singapore's population is of Chinese descent, while in Malaysia Malays and other indigenous groups constitute a little over half the population.

Singapore was expelled from Malaysia in 1965 and relations since then have frequently been marred by friction, jealousy and mutual suspicions.

Mr. Lee has denied trying to take advantage of Malaysia's difficulties. He said on Tuesday ahead of the book's publication that he started writing it in 1995 and settled on the timing of the launch last year.

In a preface to the 680-page volume, he said that he decided to write his memoirs because he was troubled by the apparent overconfidence of a generation of young Singaporeans that had only known stability, growth and prosperity.

"I thought our people should understand how vulnerable Singapore was and is, the dangers that beset us, and how we nearly did not make it," he wrote. "Most of all, I hope that they will know that honest and effective government, public order and personal security, economic and social progress did not come about as the natural course of events."

His memoirs have drawn praise from a number of prominent international political leaders, past and present, who have written comments for the book. Most are from Western countries.

Chancellor Helmut Kohl of Germany wrote, for example, that Mr. Lee's "resoluteness, energy and vision have left a deep impression on Singapore, making it a political and economic powerhouse whose influence extends far beyond its own region." But analysts said Wednesday that by underlining the deep differences between Singapore and Malaysia, Mr. Lee's memoirs were likely to prolong divisions rather than bridge them.

Mr. Lee said Tuesday that unlike Singapore, Malaysia was organized along racial lines, with the United Malays National Organization in control of the Malay political constituency while other parties were not allowed to encroach on that base.

"It's a fault line that is not being closed," he added.

He insisted Tuesday that his account of UMNO involvement in the 1964 race riots in Singapore and the subsequent eviction of the island-state from Malaysia was confirmed by reports quoted in the book from U.S., British, Australian and New Zealand diplomats who were stationed in the region at the time.

But Hishammuddin Hussein, deputy chief of the party's youth wing and son of a former Malaysian prime minister, said that Mr. Lee's book was selective in its use of sources, deeply biased and a work of self-aggrandizement.

"At this juncture, it is crucial for both countries to turn aside from history and look to the future" by "stressing our mutual strengths and our underlying similarities," Mr. Hishammuddin added.

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