I returned to Malacca last night with my children Guan Eng, Hui Ming and Hui Ying for an evening with comrades who have shared with my joys and sorrows for over half a century since I started my electoral and political journey as Member of Parliament for Bandar Melaka in 1969.
The evening, organised by the DAP MP for Kota Melaka, Khoo Poay Tiong to celebrate my 82nd birthday, was most nostalgic as it invoked memories going back to the sixties.
I became an MP when I was 28 and the first thing that happened to me was to be detained under the Internal Security Act (ISA).
I was in Kota Kinabalu when May 13, 1969 riots took place in Kuala Lumpur and I was as shocked as anybody else.
I was forewarned that I was on the list to be detained under ISA and advised by family members, party comrades and friends not to return to Kuala Lumpur but to remain outside the country until the political crisis was over.
I could not accept the advice. I felt that I had just been elected MP by the people in Malacca town and when the people were facing a crisis, I should be with them instead of running away from the country.
I came back to Kuala Lumpur and was detained under the ISA and started my first ISA detention 17 months.
There were three things which were the highlights of my three parliamentary terms as MP for Malacca town – the” Save Bukit China” campaign, the Malacca General Hospital infant deaths scandal but most important of all, the pursuit of the Malaysian Dream.
I must thank the former Inspector-General of Police, Hanif Omar, who got a police document under Official Secrets Act (OSA) declassified in 2020 when I sued him for defamation – a 54-year-old report of police interrogation of me when I was in police custody during my first sixty-days of the ISA detention in the Kuala Selangor police lock-up in 1969.
This declassified document showed that as far back as 1969, we were in pursuit of the Malaysian Dream. This is what I told the police in 1969:
“My Political Stand
83. Like any colleagues in the DAP, I believe:
(a) That Malaysia is a multi-racial, multi-lingual, and multi-cultural society, and that a viable Malaysian nation can only be formed if all the races and groups in the country are given an equal stake in the Malaysian sun.
(b) that in a multi-racial society like Malaysia, violence and any ideology of force, as for instance advocated by the CPM can only lead to the disintegration of the country because it quickly degenerates into racial conflict. I therefore deplore force and violence of all forms.
(c) that in a multi-racial society, if any racial group feels it is backward, either educationally, economically, culturally, linguistically, or politically, then racial antagonism will be created. Every attempt must be made to remove these imbalances between the races and groups.
(d) that poverty is not a communal problem. It is a socio-economic problem. To regard poverty as a racial problem is to increase racial antagonism in this country.
(e) that democratic socialism can close the gap between the haves and the have-nots of all races.
(f) that I want a clean, honest, efficient, incorruptible, and effective government.
(g) that only parliamentary democracy can prevent a racial clash. Any other form of government will only lead to racial mistrust.
(h) that communism is unconducive in a multi-racial society like Malaysia.
I have remained true and consistent in these goals and principles of the Malaysian Dream throughout my political life of over half a century.
In 1986, I shifted to Tanjong to make Penang the front-line state in the pursuit of the Malaysian Dream.
I have been Member of Parliament in five states, including Petaling in Selangor in 1978, Ipoh Timor in Perak from 2004-2013, Gelang Patah from 2013-2018 and Iskandar Puteri from 2018-2022 in Johore, and all the five parliamentary constituencies have become strongholds in pursuit of the Malaysian Dream.
But this is inadequate, for we do not want just five parliamentary constituencies or 40 parliamentary constituencies to become strongholds in the pursuit of the Malaysian Dream, we want the whole country to be in pursuit of the Malaysian Dream.
But this is where the trouble started.
When the DAP is regarded as a party which only attracted the support of the Non-Malays, the DAP was by and large ignored by the parties which solicited support from the Malays.
But when the DAP seemed capable of crossing the race barrier and able to secure Malay support on its own, the DAP was accused of being anti-Malay, anti-Islam, anti-Royalty, communist and lately of promoting Islamophobia and I was accused of causing the May 13, 1969 riots, although I was never in Kuala Lumpur during the relevant period.
How can DAP be anti-Malay, anti-Islam, anti-Royalty, communist and promoting Islamophobia when we want to be a political party representing all Malaysians, regardless of race, religion or region; when Lim Guan Eng sacrificed his MP-ship and went to jail for defending the dignity of an underaged Malay girl; and I have never harboured a single hostile thought against the Malays or Islam?
But we who are committed to the pursuit of the Malaysian Dream must persevere. There is no conspiracy in the country against any race or religion. We do not want Malaysia to degenerate into a War of Races or War of Religions.
On the contrary, we want Malaysia to reset and reunite Malaysians, regardless of race or religion, by returning to the original nation-building principles the nation’s founding fathers have written into Constitution and Rukun Negara, and fulfil the aspiration of Bapa Malaysia, Tunku Abdul Rahman, for Malaysia to be “a beacon of light in a difficult and distracted world”.
This is the challenge for all Malaysians – to continue to pursue the Malaysian Dream where Malaysia, as a plural nation of diverse races, languages, religions and cultures could be an example to the world of “Unity in Diversity” and inter-racial, inter-religious and inter-civilisational understanding, harmony and peace.