One of a Kind (2nd Edition)

SETTING UP SAFTI

FOUR

of Singapore’s military assets. It was a sad blow to the farmers: ‘Pasir Laba’ translates directly

from Malay to ‘soil rich’ i.e. rich soil and the re-entrants of Pasir Laba contributed significantly

to Singapore’s local production of fruits—soursop, mangosteen, chiku, rambutan, durian,

jackfruit, starfruit, pommello, lemon and the occasional vine of passion fruit (all of which

were deeply appreciated by the first few intakes of SAFTI trainees)—vegetables, and (less

salubriously) pork and chicken from the pigsties and chicken runs. The Ministry of National

Development bundled off about 95 farmer families from a broad swathe of land on either side

of Pasir Laba Road all the way to the bunkers and boatsheds at the Straits of Johor. Dozers

and construction equipment followed in indecent haste. The farmers were almost all squatters,

but it was the only livelihood they could aspire to. The late Chelliah Tiruchelvarayan, London-

trained Chartered Surveyor and a member of a special cell set up for MID in 1966 under Chief

Architect, Claude Eber in the Public Works Department, said that there was deep resentment

among the farmers, who would vandalise the vehicles of the officials when they were busy at

work. In due course, the uprooted farmers were given alternate farming plots around Lim Chu

Kang and other areas in compensation.

However, Pasir Laba was not entirely without prior claims as a military training area, nor even

as one for live-firing training. Areas close to the coast at the end of Pasir Laba Road had been

used for training of regular troops and Volunteers under the British at least as far back as 1947,

and probably even before WWII. There was, for example, the Pasir Laba Firing Ground Rules

(1947) issued as General Notice No. S109 dated 31

March, 1947. And there is a record of 33

acres of land at Pasir Laba and the contiguous military training area of 298 acres reverting to

the Commissioner of Lands with effect from 15

August, 1963 in old MID files.

There was also military history at Jurong and Pasir Laba, though there is no evidence that it

played a part in the selection of the site for the camp, unless the Chief Israel Defence Force

(IDF) Advisor had surpassed himself and read up on the Japanese campaign before arriving in

Singapore. The Japanese thrust into Singapore from Johor in the first week of February 1942

had been through here and not Changi in the east as expected. There had been bitter fighting

along the shores, swamps and farmlands as they cut their way through the hapless Australian/

British defences down Jurong Road to Bukit Timah and further south through Pasir Panjang

to claim victory on 15

February. The pre-war bunkers built by the British at the end of Pasir

Laba Road and occupied by the 44

Indian Brigade, but bypassed by the Japanese, were to

be ignominiously reduced to rubble from the time they were used to demonstrate techniques

of fighting in built-up areas for the first intake and for other live-firing exercises with rocket

launchers, mortars and grenades.

If there had been any ghosts of WWII skulking around Pasir

Laba, they were quiescent: unlike many other military camps in Singapore, no enduring ghost

stories have taken root in SAFTI to date, even with major cemeteries dotted all around the area

providing a tempting backdrop.