Tan Jing Quee - Death of a Singaporean Socialist

• Dalforce 25

  20 Aug 11, 12:58

  Friday, August 19, 2011

  Time to set up a Truth and Reconciliation Commission and abolish the ISA

  [ Read also More ex-detainees speak out : Political violence and the abuse of the ISA in Singapore ] 
  
  
  by Teo Soh Lung 
  
  Photo : Singapore's longest-held political prisoner Chia Thye Poh (centre), with detainees of 1987's "Marxist Conspiracy" arrests at a Chinese New Year gathering this year in Chia's home in Ang Mo Kio. Chia is currently working in the Netherlands. 
  
  
  From left : Activist Isrizal Mohd Isa, ex-detainees Vincent Cheng, Chia Thye Poh, Wong Souk Yee and Teo Soh Lung.

  Tan Jing Quee and Michael Fernandez were the first ISA detainees to speak about their detention in 2006. Both men were detained in 1963 and again in 1977. It took them more than 40 years to talk about their imprisonment. 
  
  In 2009, Jing Quee composed a poem “ISA Detainee”. There he recorded the prison conditions in the 1960s as well as that of 1977. 
  
  1977 saw the arrest of at least 28 people, mostly professionals. They were labelled “Euro Communists” by the PAP government. I was a young lawyer then and personally knew some of the people who were arrested. When they were released, none of them spoke about their experiences. 
  
  Earlier this month, Dr Ang Swee Chai who now lives in London, wrote about what she went through as a ISA prisoner in 1977. ISD officers had visited the hospital where she worked to arrest her. The hospital staff were so terrified of those plain clothes men that they interrupted her while she was performing an operation in order to inform her of their presence. I felt really sad for her as well as for my country when I read her note. Why do we have to respect the ISD so much that the hospital staff had to announce their presence even when she was performing an operation? I am glad Dr Ang was able to remain calm and successfully completed the operation. 
  
  It is clear from Dr Ang’s account that her experience had remained fresh in her mind for the past 34 years. She remembers graphic details of how she was arrested and treated in the cold room. She even remember her prison number. 
  
  From 1970 to 1979, 149 people were arrested under the ISA. Among them were prominent theatre practitioners Kuo Pao Kun and Goh Lay Kuan and writers like cultural medallion recipient, Yeng Pway Ngon. Yet none of them had until today, written about their experiences. 
  
  If ISA victims of the 1970s were silent until recently, those of the 1960s also suffer in silence. In 1963, Operation Cold Store saw the arrest of at least 145 people. Among them were prominent doctors, politicians, newspaper editors, journalists and trade unionists. How could the then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew and his cabinet ministers imprisoned fellow Singaporeans without trial for decades? Between 1960 and 1969, a total of at least 284 were detained. Among them were : 
  
  Lim Chin Siong (Secretary of Barisan) 6 years 
  
  Dr Poh Soo Kai (Vice Secretary of Barisan) 
  17 years 
  
  Said Zahari (Editor of Utusan Melayu, Chairman Partai Rakyat) 
  17 years 
  
  Dr Lim Hock Siew (Central Committee of Barisan)
  20 years 
  
  Ho Piao (Paid Secretary of SNSU) 18 years 
  
  Lee Tee Tong (Barisan Member of Parliament) 
  18 years 
  
  Loh Meow Gong (Barisan Member of Parliament) 
  7 years 
  
  Wee Toon Lip (Barisan candidate) 10 years 
  
  S T Bani (Barisan Member of Parliament) 
  3 years 
  
  Michael Fernandez (Paid Secretary, SCHFEU) 
  9 years 
  
  Chia Thye Poh (Barisan Member of Parliament) 
  26 years 
  
  Chia Thye Poh, a member of parliament was imprisoned for 26 years and subjected to restrictions for another 6 years. I met up with Chia sometime this year. I was told by his father who is now in his 90s that Chia his eldest born was a brilliant student. He was a bookworm and was always at the top of his class. He did not participate in student activities. It was only when he became a lecturer at the Nanyang University that he became interested in politics. He stood as a Barisan candidate in 1963 and won. When he was arrested in October 1966 his mother suffered a stroke and had not been in good health ever since. Today, she is bedridden. Both parents are being looked after by his younger sister. Chia who has a doctorate degree, works abroad and returns home irregularly. Life is tough. 
  
  The PAP have wrecked many lives and deprived many parents of their children. There must be thousands whose lives were damaged by the ISA. Said Zahari wrote an account of his prison days in Dark Clouds at Dawn published in 2001. Low Miao Gong wrote briefly about her experience in “The Two Faces of Men in White” (published in The May 13 Generation). No others who were detained in the 1960s have to date written about their experience. 
  
  When Nelson Mandela was released after 27 years on Robben Island, he went on to become the President of South Africa. A Truth and Reconciliation Commission was set up to investigate the atrocities committed by the past government. Can we in Singapore ever expect such a Commission to be set up to investigate all ISA cases? Will I be able to see the repeal of the ISA during my lifetime? 
  
  On Saturday, 20 August 2011 at 2 p.m. at the Chinese Chamber of Commerce, friends of Tan Jing Quee will pay tribute to him for his contributions in re-writing the history of Singapore. Let us hope that their voices will bring change to our nation one day. 
  

  

  http://singaporerebel.blogspot.com/2011/08/time-to-set-up-truth-and-reconciliation.html

   

• jmstar~

  20 Aug 11, 13:08

  Dalforce, be prepared this topic you posted may be deleted.  I am saying may be.   Topics exposing pap , lKY lhl always kena deleted.   

• lce

  20 Aug 11, 13:53

  is this wat the 2 tons arguing about?

  wow, it must be heavy stuff

• jmstar~

  20 Aug 11, 13:55

  Old man LKY admitted he jailed his opponents without trial.   He so brave to admit, my "hero"!   He sick now is it, no news from him?   I all ready to "mourn" for him.

• Dalforce 25

  9 Oct 11, 13:04

  May 13 generation shares its stories
  By Leong Weng Kam, Senior Writer, Straits Times, 19 June 2011

  Former Singapore political detainee Tan Jing Quee, who was battling cancer, was promoting his latest book up to the last days of his life.

  He had been across the Causeway last month, in Kuala Lumpur and Penang, to launch The May 13 Generation, an essay collection on the Chinese middle school student movement in Singapore in the 1950s, which he co-edited.

  Mr Tan, 72, returned home ill on May 25, and was admitted to Singapore General Hospital a week later. He died just five days ago.

  The retired lawyer and former Barisan Sosialis politician, detained under the Internal Security Act for alleged pro-communist activities soon after his failed bid at the 1963 General Election, was cremated at Mandai Crematorium yesterday.

  Released in 1966, he went to London to study law and returned in 1970 to practise till he retired about 10 years ago.

  His two co-editors – Professor Emeritus Tan Kok Chiang, 74, a former Chinese middle school student leader; and Dr Hong Lysa, 58, a historian – were also at the book launches in Malaysia.

  Recalling their trip, Prof Tan who now lives in Ontario, Canada, said: ‘I could see Jing Quee feeling the pressure of long distance travel. But his spirits were very high, meeting friends and comrades whom he had not seen for a while.’

  Mr Tan’s wife, Rosemary, 65, said her husband of 40 years had wanted to go on the journey very much, to meet his many old friends in Malaysia, including former politician Lim Kean Chye, as well as to launch the book which took him two years to do.

  In an interview he gave to The Straits Times and Lianhe Zaobao following the book’s earlier launch in Singapore, also last month, he said the idea for the collection came when he was translating the Chinese novel Ju Lang (Mighty Wave), by leftist writer Lim Kim Chuan, into English two years ago.

  Helping him with the translation was Dr Hong and another former political detainee and Barisan MP, Madam Loh Miao Gong, 76, who was arrested after the 1963 polls for alleged pro-communist activities.

  Ju Lang, set in Singapore in the 1950s, was first published in Chinese in 2004 to mark the 50th anniversary of the mass anti-colonial movement started after Chinese middle school students had clashed with riot policemen.

  

  On May 13, 1954, students clashed with riot policemen while on their way to hand a petition for exemption from conscription to the Governor. -- ST FILE PHOTOS

  The students were on their way to hand their petition for exemption from conscription to the then Singapore Governor at the former Government House, now the Istana, on May 13, 1954.

  The novel’s English translation was launched as a companion volume to The May 13 Generation, which also has a Chinese edition.

  ‘Halfway through our translation, we felt a novel may not appeal to younger readers and it may not be able to highlight the significance of the historical event. So we started to invite scholars and those involved in the May 13 incident to write essays and their recollections,’ Mr Tan recalled during the interview last month before his death.

  He had been actively researching, writing and editing books on Singapore’s leftist history for the past 10 years.

  His last effort was The May 13 Generation, comprising 15 essays which include those on the arts in the 1950s. The preface, introduction and first four chapters were written by Mr Tan, Dr Hong and researcher Khe Su Lin.

  In their essays, they gave the social and political background, examined the historical framework and explained the context of the period in which the Chinese middle school student movement was inspired and later grew.

  The students formed a united, open and legal movement, the Singapore Chinese Middle School Students’ Union (SCMSSU), a year after the May 13 incident but it was banned barely a year later by the colonial government for engaging in pro-communist activities.

  Former prime minister Lee Kuan Yew, a young Cambridge-trained lawyer then, was SCMSSU’s legal counsel.

  It was through the students that Mr Lee got to know young Chinese-educated leftist trade unionists like Fong Swee Suan and rural dwellers’ association leaders such as Chan Chiaw Thor. Together with other like-minded people, including several of Mr Lee’s English-educated friends, they secured a mass base for a political party and formed the People’s Action Party (PAP) in November 1954.

  It was student support that helped the PAP win the municipal and legislative elections in the 1950s, leading to its landslide election victory in 1959 when it became the ruling party.

  Many scholars have said that PAP and the Singapore story would have turned out quite differently if not for the May 13 incident.

  Former leftists and alternative history writers often said the role and significance of the student movement were insufficiently told in the dominant, official narrative.

  ‘This volume, The May 13 Generation, marks the breaking of that silence,’ said Prof Tan, who was SCMSSU’s English secretary when he was a Chung Cheng High student in the 1950s.

  Prof Tan, a graduate of the former Nanyang University in 1960 who later left for his postgraduate studies overseas, is among those who have broken their silence. He wrote about his involvement in the student movement for the first time after nearly 60 years in the chapter, My Story, in the book.

  Also sharing her story for the first time is Madam Loh, who was among the arrested students when the colonial government cracked down on them on Oct 10, 1956. Her chapter is entitled The Two Faces Of Men In White.

  Other contributors include retired lawyer Lim Chin Joo and former Barisan MP Lim Huan Boon.

  ‘The telling of the story of the Chinese middle school students of the 1950s now begins,’ said Prof Tan.

  The May 13 Generation and the English translation of Mighty Wave are available at Select Books for $34.25 and $28.46 each respectively. – ST

  

  http://jacob69.wordpress.com/2011/06/16/former-political-detainee-tan-jing-quee-dies-of-cancer/

   

   

  The May 13 Generation: The Chinese Middle Schools Movement and Singapore Politics in the 1950s

  
  Tan Jing Quee, Tan Kok Chiang, and Hong Lysa (eds.)
  Petaling Jaya, Malaysia: Strategic Information and Research Development Centre, 2011
  ISBN: 9789675832161
  
  The May 13 generation was the first belonging to the immigrant communities from China to grapple with the issues of being Malayan/Singaporean, breaking irrevocably with the received wisdoms of their elders, and in a political climate where their explorations were deemed to be subversive.
  
  This book comprises the recollections penned by the participants of the era of the 1950s, where their generation was in the forefront of the anti-colonial movement, and the work of academic researchers who have examined the historical framework and context of the period, as well as how it has been made to fit into the country's mainstream history.

  The researchers have also examined the students' cultural expressions, whether it is in art, drama, dance or literature and found them to be socially engaged, and grappling with the question of who they were as a people. The cultural explorations of that period have been forgotten or repudiated.  It is revealing just how this amnesia and silence has become so set.
  
  It is also impossible to imagine the demands that the age had put on this generation of youths.

  http://datedue.blogspot.com/2011/05/may-13-generation-chinese-middle.html

  http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Book+Launch+of+The+May+13+Generation&aq=f

• iveco

  9 Oct 11, 13:30

  This book sounds like a must-read. THe struggles of the past generation must be remembered forever.

• Dalforce 25

  9 Oct 11, 13:38

  I watched below talk by Singapore historian Hong Lysa and it seems that Lee Kuan Yew is nothing but the dog of the british in 1950s. He is a total fraud.

   

  Book Launch of The May 13 Generation & The Mighty Wave - speech by Dr. Hong Lysa

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WyoKctg_0AU&feature=related