TRIBUTE ABDUL - Perdana Library

TRIBUTE TO TUNKU ABDUL RAHMAN
rights. The Chinese principle - "where ever born, A Chinese is a
Chinese subject". - made it hard for them who paid the largest
part of the taxes to have the feeling of really "belonging" to a
country where they had no political power officially. The "Others",
as small minority groups, were suspicious and watchful but anxious
not to antagonise. There was no single satisfactory answer to the
questions.
The Malays have always been tolerant. They acted with much
generosity and compromise. The higher civil service was opened
to non-Malays. The language was made easier for foreigners by
using the letters of the Roman alphabet instead of the Jawi script.
Citizenship was granted by registration and the issue of certificates
on extremely generous terms. There were common electoral rolls
and no communal representation.
Many and various means were employed to decrease separatism
and to promote racial harmony. Communal clubs, whether sporting
or social, threw open their doors to all. National celebrations,
national sports, village halls and women's institutes, courses of
instruction in civics, in agriculture, animal husbandry etc., etc.,
adult education, technical colleges and a University were available
to all without discrimination. A Dewan Bahasa and Pustaka was
set up to refashion the language so that it could carry the vast burden
of twentieth century science and knowledge, accelerate the use of
Malay as a medium of intercourse and become the national language.
Gradually Malaya is being divided not into communities but
into the natural form of citizens and non-citizens. Already noncitizens
have a differently coloured identity card and government
posts are limited to federal citizens. In due course, most of the
government forms that request particulars of name?, address?,
age?, occupation?, sex?, race?, married or single?, will omit their
inquisitiveness about race? and in its stead will ask Citizen or non-
Citizen? Thus will we resemble the United Kingdom and the
United States where a man retains his native and stimulating
qualities and culture but weaves them into the general pattern
of "British" or "American".