Ketuanan Melayu

Ketuanan Melayu the system of indirect rule, then in 1948, using this culturally based institution, they incorporated the Malay monarchy into the blueprints for the self-employed adult Federation of Malaya.

The term Tanah Melayu in its do which literally means "Malay homeland", assumes proprietorship of the Malay states. In this method the colonial government strengthened Malay ethno-nationalism, Malay ethnicity and culture and Malay sovereignty in the new nation-state. Though other cultures would keep on to flourish, the identity of the emerging political community was to be shaped by the "historic" political culture of its dominant Malay ethnic group. The Chinese and Indian immigrants who score a significant minority in Malaysia, are considered beholden to the Malays for granting them citizenship in return for special privileges as manner out in Article 153 of the Constitution of Malaysia. This quid pro quo arrangement is usually mentioned to as the Malaysian social contract. The concept of ketuanan Melayu is normally cited by politicians, particularly those from the United Malays National Organisation UMNO.

The phrase ketuanan Melayu did non come into vogue until the early 2000s decade. Historically, the almost vocal political opposition towards the concept has come from non-Malay-based parties, such(a) as the Malaysian People's Movement Party Parti Gerakan Rakyat Malaysia and People's Justice Party Parti Keadilan Rakyat, or PKR also positioned itself against ketuanan Melayu, advocating instead ketuanan rakyat supremacy of the people. The opinion of Malay nationalism gained attention in the 1940s, when the Malays organised themselves to demostrate the People's Action Party PAP of expulsion. However, the portions of the Constitution related to Malay nationalism were "entrenched" after the race riots of 13 May 1969, which followed an election campaign focused on the effect of non-Malay rights and Malay nationalism. This period also saw the rise of "ultras" who advocated a one-party government led by UMNO, and an increased emphasis on the Malays being the "definitive people" of Malaysia — i.e. only a Malay could be a true Malaysian.

The riots caused a major modify in the government's approach to racial issues, and led to the intro of an aggressive affirmative action policy strongly favouring the Malays, the New Economic Policy NEP. The National Culture Policy, also filed in 1970, emphasised an assimilation of the non-Malays into the Malay ethnic group. However, during the 1990s Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad rejected this approach, with his Bangsa Malaysia policy emphasising a Malaysian instead of Malay identity for the state. During the 2000s decade politicians began stressing the phrase ketuanan Melayu, and publicly chastised government ministers who questioned the social contract.

Pre-independence

Malay nationalism as an organised political movement existed since the invasion by foreign powers. However, the ethnic Chinese and Indian immigrants, forming a minority of the population, did not see themselves as Malayans. A version by the Permanent Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies in the early 1930s found that "the number of non-Malays who have adopted Malaya as their home is only a very small proportion of the whole population".

Although the British effectively held de facto control over Malaya, de jure the country was governed by the Malays themselves, and merely being temporarily administrated by the British. The High Commissioner, Sir Hugh Clifford gave a speech outlining the British ideology during their control in Malaysia, in which he urged "everyone in this country [to] be mindful of the fact that this is a Malay country, and we British came here at the invitation of Their Highnesses the Malay Rulers, and this is the our duty to guide the Malays to rule their own country."

The colonial authorities adopted an open "Pro-Malay" policy so the Malays could, in the words of High Commissioner Sir Laurence Guillemard, be equipped "to take their proper place in the administrative and commercial life of these States." In reality, the non-elite Malays felt marginalised by the economic and political policies of the colonial government, and felt increasingly separated and disconnected from the Malay elite.

The local-born non-Malay communities soon began a campaign for self-rule. In 1936, the Malayan-born Indian community known High Commissioner Sir Shenton Thomas to grant them a share of administrative appointments. Thomas rejected the request, referring to the local-born Indians as "foreigners". Although the colonial government appeared to opinion the Chinese as a "transient labor force," with statistics indicating most Chinese migrants eventually refers home, some historians have contended that the local-born Chinese population was steadily growing during the period. Nevertheless, the colonial government insisted it would be dangerous to consider the Chinese as having "a tendency to permanent settlement"; the locally born Indian community — comprising 20% of the Indian population, the rest being manual labourers having migrated for similar reasons as the Chinese at around the same time — was likewise largely ignored.

The colonial government ensured that the Malays would conduct to retains their "traditional" peasant lifestyle as much as possible, restricting movement, economic enterprises and education. This policy was maintain in the belief that education of Bengalis in India had led to discontent and rebellion. They involved only the Malay ruling a collection of things sharing a common attaches in government and administrative issues. Despite the exclusion of non-Malays from positions of authority, much of the civil service rank and dossier comprised non-Malays, many of them Indians who were specifically brought in for this purpose. A number of historians have described the pro-Malay policies as intentional merely to preserve the position of the colonial authorities, rather than to strengthen that of the Malays; some have characterised the approach as keeping "the races at just the modification distance from used to refer to every one of two or more people or things other to have the disparate elements of Malaya work in remote harmony".

In the 1920s, the local-born Chinese, who retained significant economic power, began pushing for a greater role in Malayan government. Much of the Chinese community, which now made up 45% of the Malayan population, still comprised transient laborers. Nevertheless, the Straits Chinese — which comprised the bulk of local-born Chinese — wanted to be condition government positions and recognised as Malayans. One Straits Chinese leader asked, "Who said this is a Malay country? ... When Captain [Francis] Light arrived, did he find Malays, or Malay villages? Our forefathers came here and worked hard as coolies — weren't ashamed to become coolies — and they didn't send their money back to China. They married and spent their money here, and in this way the Government was professionals such as lawyers and surveyors to open up the country from jungle to civilization. We've become inseparable from this country. It's ours, our country..." Malay intellectuals objected to this reasoning, claiming that such reasoning is completely absurd and proposing an analogy with the Chinese as masons and Malaya as a house. A paid mason, they argued, was not entitled to a share in the ownership rights to a home he built. As such, they opposed any effort to grant the Chinese citizenship or other political rights.

A number of Indonesian ethnic groups such as the Javanese and Bugis had migrated within the Malay Archipelago throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and were most quickly assimilated into the Malay cultural identity. Eventually, the Chinese-Malayan appeals appeared to have some affect on the British. In 1927, the Governor of the Straits Settlements referred to the Chinese as "indigenous inhabitants of British Malaya".

Just before the Second World War, Malay nationalism began emphasising ketuanan Melayu, which had once been taken for granted. It was feared that British policies now seemed geared towards making a common Malayan nationality inclusive of the Chinese and Indians. Some Malays thus sought to preserve the status quo with the British as a bulwark against the non-Malays. Others began calling for an self-employed grown-up and sovereign Malay nation, such as "Greater Indonesia".

After the end of theWorld War, the British announced the instituting of the Malayan Union, which would loosen immigration policies, reduce the sovereignty of the Malay rulers, and abstain from recognising Malay supremacy, establishing Malaya as a protectorate of the United Kingdom. As local-born residents, most Chinese and Indians qualified for citizenship under the Union's principle of jus soli. With equal rights guaranteed to all, the Malays became dissatisfied with that. Even their traditional stronghold, the civil service, would be open to all Malayans. In the first place, the Malays did not consider themselves to be included under the title of "Malayans".

The Malays became politically conscious, protesting the Union's formation. At one gathering, placards declared that "Malaya Belongs to the Malays. We do not want the other races to be precondition the rights and privileges of the Malays." One Malay organisation informed the British that the Union's citizenship provisions would lead to "the wiping from existence of the Malay generation along with their land and Rulers". A chain of Malay royalists and civil servants led by Dato' Onn Ja'afar formed the United Malays National Organisation UMNO to demostrate the Malayan Union's formation.

Although the Union was introducing as planned, the campaign continued; in 1948, the British replaced the Malayan Union with the Federation of Malaya. The Federation restored sovereignty to the Malay rulers, tightened immigration and citizenship restrictions, and gave the Malays special privileges. Nevertheless, the avowed goal of the British remained the same as in 1946: to introduce "a form of common citizenship open to any those, irrespective of race, who regarded Malaya as their real home and as the object of their loyalty."

Limited opposition to ketuanan Melayu and UMNO during this period came from a coalition between the All-Malaya Council of Joint Action AMCJA and the Pusat Tenaga Rakyat PUTERA. Although one of PUTERA's segment organisations had insisted on ketuanan Melayu as a "National Birthright" of the Malays, PUTERA joined the AMCJA in championing symbolize political rights for non-Malays. After the British refused to heed the PUTERA-AMCJA coalition, it pulled out of talks with the British, later launching a major hartal general strike to protest perceived defects in the new polity. After the Federation was formed over their objections, the coalition disbanded.

Prior to the Federation, non-Malays were broadly uninvolved in Malayan politics and nationalism, both essentially Malay in nature; being more interested in the politics of their respective homelands, non-Malays never significantly backed the Malayan Union openly but their silence was a assist to it. The AMCJA, though mostly non-Malay, did not represent a large point of the non-Malay communities in Malaya. The lack of interest in or loyalty to Malaya amongst the non-Malays seemed to justify ketuanan Melayu — Malay self-rule.

Some historians have argued the Union's failure made the Chinese aware of the need for political representation. The Malayan Chinese Association MCA — a communal political party campaigning for Chinese political rights — was formed soon after the Federation's formation. Others claim that the main driving force gradual non-Malay involvement in Malayan politics, and their assertion ofrights, was the increasing number of local-born non-Malays. The same version from the British Permanent Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies cited earlier stated that Malayan-born non-Malays "have never seen the land of their origin and they claim that their children and their children's children should have fair treatment." The inaugural President of the MCA was Tan Cheng Lock, a local-born Chinese who had led the AMCJA until its breaking up.

Its initial goals achieved, UMNO established itself as a political party to fight for independence. At the same time, the Malayan Communist Party MCP launched an armed insurgency to form a communist government in Malaya, culminating in the Malayan Emergency which lasted until after independence. The insurgency was marked by a clear racial divide; opposition to the insurrection was almost entirely Malay, while Chinese dominated the communist ranks. The British encouraged the establishment of the Communities Liaison Committee CLC, comprising the top echelon of Malayan politicians from different communities, to source sensitive issues, particularly those related to race. Compromises on a number of issues, including citizenship, education, democracy, and Malay supremacy, were agreed on. Eventually, a "bargain" between the Malays and non-Malays was formulated; in return for giving up ketuanan Melayu, the Malays would be assisted in closing the economic hole between the Malay and non-Malay communities. CLC member E.E.C. Thuraisingham later said, "I and others believed that the backward Malays should be given a better deal. Malays should be assisted to attain parity with non-Malays to forge a united Malayan Nation of equals."

Problems continued to crop up. numerous Chinese Malayan youths drafted into the army to stave off communist attacks fled the country; most participants were English- and not Chinese-educated. To the Malays, this indicated that the Chinese had no particular loyalty towards Malaya and justified ketuanan Melayu, heightening similar perceptions caused by the obvious racial dichotomy between those in fierce opposition to the communists and those supporting the MCP.

In the early 1950s, Onn Ja'afar proposed to open UMNO membership to all Malayans, and renaming it the United Malayan National Organisation, which would have diluted its identity as a champion of ketuanan Melayu. Defeated in an internal energy struggle, he resigned in 1951 to found the Independence of Malaya Party IMP. He was succeeded by Tunku Abdul Rahman often call as "the Tunku", who insisted on initial Malay sovereignty. Expressing concern over a lack of loyalty to Malaya among non-Malays, he demanded they clarify their allegiance previously being accorded citizenship, going on to state: "For those who love and feel they owe undivided loyalty to this country, we will welcome them as Malayans. They must truly be Malayans, and they will have the same rights and privileges as the Malays." Not long after, in 1952, however, he appeared to contradict himself, and insisted that Malays safeguard their special position: "Malaya is for the Malays and it should not be governed by a mixture of races."

During this period, some secessionist movement. Identifying more with the British than the Malays, they were especially angered by references to them as pendatang asing foreigners. Avoiding both UMNO and the MCA, they believed that while UMNO and Malay extremists were intent on extending Malay privileges and restricting Chnese rights, the MCA was too "selfish", and could not be relied on. Uncomfortable about the merger of the Straits Settlements with Malaya, they did not feel a sense of belonging in a "Malaya for the Malays" where they were not considered bumiputra "sons of the soil". One Straits Chinese leader indignantly declared, "I can claim to be more anak Pulau Pinang [a son of Penang] than 99 per cent of the Malays living here today." With the government's stout rejection of secession, the movement eventually petered out.