haunting the West
should leave Asia unperturbed? Is it any wonder that Asia will have
nothing to do with anti-communist fronts? For that is not our problem.
We need peace and freedom. The solidarity of Asia is the solidarity of
the suppressed. This alone is our fight and we will fight be our fight
and we still be dragged into no other. Our sympathies are with all
people like us who are thirsting for peace and freedom. We are
therefore comrades of the African struggling for the most elementary
human rights, of the Indo-Chinese fighting for his freedom. Our enemies
are those who would deny us these rights.
Malaya, however, cannot choose. It is one more pimple on the face of
Asia where a Colonial Power rules with the help of quislings. As such
our interests will always be sacrificed to imperial expediency. Thus we
see our country being committed into a military alliance, the SEATO,
without the sanction of its people. Our young men are being
conscripted; our land is being turned into a military base. Our country
is to fight in wars over whose making it will not have any say. We must
collaborate in crushing the Indo-Chinese people. We are to be the
allies of petite fascists like Syngman Rhee, Chiang Kai Chek and hibun
Songgram who stand for totalitarian tyranny. We would rather stand with
Republican Indian, Republican China, Republican Burma and their allies
in Asia and Africa. The people of this country do not identity
themselves with the actions of the Colonial government.#
This article, originally published in Fajar, organ of the
university
socialist club, Singapore, on 10th may 1954 was written by
M.K. Rajakumar and Poh Soo Kai, then students at the university. Those
thought to be responsible were charged in court by the British colonial
governent but were acquitted by the magistrate, Mr F A Chua
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