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MERGER AND SEPARATION
21
TWO
I. BIRTH OF A LION
II. THE MIRAGE OF MERGER
The name Singapore derives from the Sanskrit word for ‘lion city’. The way Singapore became
a nation state has no precedent. The tiny island republic came about because it was mutually
agreed between the Federal Government of Malaysia and the elected leadership of Singapore
that the only solution to the incompatibility of political objectives was outright separation—
people, territory, political leadership, economic assets, military assets and civic institutions—23
months after merger. It was all the more bewildering because Singapore’s very origins were
predicated on its strategic location in one of the most important sea-lanes of the world and its
centrality to its hinterland, the Malay Peninsula and the Indonesian archipelago. There was no
question that the Malaysian Government had a constitutional claim as well as a vital national
interest to retain Singapore, whose leadership had sought the unification with the widespread
endorsement of its populace. Malaysia might have even reinforced its claim with the historical
fact that the island had belonged to the Johor Sultanate before Stamford Raffles founded the
trading post that was to become the colony and state of Singapore. In realpolitik terms, the
island would have been more than worth the international and foreign policy opprobrium that
retaining it by force would have generated, especially since its populace as a whole had not been
advocating separation. The Malaysian Government could also have addressed the problem of
a confrontational Singapore leadership by more circumspect means if it had been so minded.
Moreover, the Singapore leadership would have preferred to stay within Malaysia if the Federal
Government had offered a slightly less drastic alternative.
Malaysia had been the outcome of a number of political developments from 1957, shortly
after Malaya, its core entity, became independent. For various reasons including costs, Britain
wanted to relinquish its other colonial territories in South East Asia, which then comprised
Singapore, the Borneo territories of Sabah (British Borneo) and Sarawak and separately,
the Sultanate of Brunei. Singapore would had been part of Malaya when the latter became
independent on 31
st
August, 1957, but for the fact that in April 1946, the British colonial
rulers had included only Penang and Malacca from among the three Straits Settlements in
the Malayan Union because they were mindful of the fact that extending Malayan citizenship
to an additional million plus Chinese would have left the Malay demographic majority in
the federation in a precarious position, in addition to being economically underweight in its
traditional homeland. As Singapore was also the main British defence node outside the UK,
and Britain had major defence commitments in the region, the Singapore issue was deferred
to play itself out. But over the next few years, ever increasing domestic pressure in the UK
to rationalise its defence expenditures had to be addressed. At the same time, colonialism
had become an acute embarrassment and agitation in Singapore for independence could not
MERGER AND SEPARATION