What problems were germane to the decolonization process of Malay Peninsula.

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Ghissu Editorial · Accepted Answer

Malaya's decolonisation was troubled by the sultans' sovereignty, citizenship for a plural Malay, Chinese and Indian society, a communist insurgency and the shape of the nation. The Alliance's inter-communal bargain, embodied in the Reid Commission's constitution, delivered Merdeka in 1957.

**Introduction**

British Malaya was a patchwork of Straits Settlements and Malay States, home to a "plural society", in J.S. Furnivall's term, of Malays, Chinese and Indians. Decolonising it after the Japanese occupation meant first settling who the nation was.

**Constitutional and Communal Problems**

1. **Sovereignty of the sultans**: The Malayan Union of 1946 stripped the sultans of sovereignty, provoking a backlash that created UMNO and forced the Federation of Malaya in 1948.
2. **Citizenship and economy**: Malays were only about half the population, and with Chinese capital in tin and trade and Indian labour on rubber estates, citizenship for non-Malays became the core dispute.
3. **Inter-communal bargain**: The UMNO-MCA-MIC Alliance under Tunku Abdul Rahman won 51 of 52 seats in 1955 and accepted the Reid Commission's compact: citizenship for non-Malays, special position for Malays.

**Insurgency and the Territorial Question**

SKETCH: timeline | Malaya's Road to Merdeka
- 1946 :: Malayan Union, UMNO
- 1948 :: Federation, Emergency
- 1955 :: Alliance wins polls
- 1957 :: Merdeka
- 1963 :: Malaysia formed
- 1965 :: Singapore exits

1. **Communist insurgency**: Chin Peng's Malayan Communist Party, built on its wartime anti-Japanese guerrillas, fought the Emergency of 1948-60, which Britain met by resettling Chinese squatters in "New Villages" under the Briggs Plan.
2. **Shape of the nation**: Singapore's Chinese majority kept it out of the 1957 Federation; the wider Malaysia of 1963 faced Indonesia's Konfrontasi and a Philippine claim to Sabah, Brunei stayed out, and Singapore was expelled in 1965.

**Conclusion**

Malaya's decolonisation meant building a nation from a plural colonial society under armed challenge, achieved through gradual transfer and an inter-communal bargain. The riots of May 1969 showed that such a bargain postpones, rather than finishes, the work of integration.

What problems were germane to the decolonization process of Malay Peninsula.

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