Patricia Hului

During Konfrontasi or the Indonesia-Malaysia Confrontation, Indonesia lent their support to Sarawak Chinese.

But why?

When the formation of Malaysia was proposed, President Sukarno-led Indonesia was not the only who opposed the idea.

The Sarawak Communist movement was also against the idea of Malaysia.

Instead, the Sarawak Communists supported the idea of unification of all Borneo territories to form an independent leftist North Kalimantan state.

They gained support from Sukarno who let the Sarawak Communist Organisation use Indonesian Kalimantan as a base to build up a guerrilla force.

Why did Sarawak Chinese youths turn to communism at that time?

The then Sarawak Deputy Chief Minister, James Wong might have the right explanation on why communism seemed to be attractive to Sarawak Chinese youths.

As what was reported by Sabah Times on Dec 28, 1963, Wong stated,

“As we all know some of the younger generation of Chinese in Sarawak have been much affected by the teachings of Communism. There are all sorts of reason for this.

Many young Chinese are proud of the achievements of Communist China and feel that what is good in China should be copied here. Others have had their sense of idealism twisted and misused by the Communist leaders in the country who teach that Communism is the only road to justice in this world.

Others are discontented because they cannot get good jobs or feel they are not making enough money or that they do not own enough land and that Communism will provide the answer to all their problems.

The older people do not subscribe to these ideas, but many of the older Chinese in Sarawak are people who, in China, never received a proper education.

They are overawed by the fact that so many of their children can claim to possess an education and they defer to the views of their youngsters. They are unable or unwilling to exercise the restraints and disciplines which parents should be able to exercise.”

The testimony of a young Sarawak Chinese

According to a Sarawak Tribune report which was published on Dec 8, 1965, a young Sarawak Chinese revealed his experience being recruited into CCO.

“About April or May 1962, subject to the propaganda and influence of a cadre of the clandestine communist organisation, I joined the Farmer’s Association under the Sarawak clandestine communist organisation. In August of the same year I was again recommended by my leader to join the Sarawak Advanced Youths Association, a secret communist organisation.
Later in November, I was sent by my leader to do racial work in Tebedu. Meanwhile a racial work cell for Tebedu area was formed with me as one of the cell members.

Our method of work was to make use of the SUPP (Sarawak United People’s Party) by asking the masses to join the party openly and then to absorb the better elements amongst the SUPP members into the Farmer’s Association.

In April 1963, our leader informed us that the organisation was prepared for armed struggle and wanted to send persons to receive military training in Indonesia. The Organisation wanted us to make a road from 23rd mile to Kampong Sidek in Indonesia via Tebedu.

The route was divided into four sections, and in May that year this new jungle track was completed secretly. On June 1st, the first batch of Sarawak youths of both sexes, about 40 in number, escaped to Indonesia by this jungle track.”

It was reported that harsh and contemptuous treatment by the Indonesians, as well as deprivations of jungle life had caused some of these Chinese to lose their ardour.

By the end of 1963, some of these Sarawak Chinese youths began to ‘trickle back into Sarawak’.

Those Communist exiles in Indonesia who have stayed behind, eventually would form the core of the North Kalimantan Communist Party’s two guerrilla formations.

The first one would be Sarawak People’s Guerrilla Force (SPGF) or Pasukan Gerilya Rakyat Sarawak (PGRS). Meanwhile, the second one was North Kalimantan People’s Army (Paraku).

With the assistance of the Indonesian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, PGRS was formed Mar 30, 1964 at Mount Asuansang in West Kalimantan.

How many of the Sarawak Chinese youths were in Kalimantan?

According to Justus M. Van Der Kroef in The Sarawak-Indonesian Border insurgency, “Already by mid-1964 more than one thousand Sarawak Chinese, mostly youths had crossed into Indonesia to receive guerrilla training, subsequently returning with Indonesian terrorist units, while others affiliated with the TNKU (Tentera Nasional Kalimantan Utara).”

It is believed that Sarawak Chinese youths were still slipping over the border into Indonesia to train for guerrilla war against their home state as late as March 1966.

As for the sympathisers, Herald-Journal’s report on Sept 2, 1971 might had some explanation on why some Sarawakians were not totally against communism.

First of all, the communists actually helped the people in the fields and give them medical care.

Additionally, the report stated, “Some farmers and villagers almost never see a government official; often the Communists win simply by default. In rural areas, Chinese shopkeepers have found it safer to keep quiet and roll with the punches. They don’t resist if a guerrilla demands bicycles so the frames can be made into shotguns.”

There were other impacts of communists insurgency in Sarawak mainly due to the curfew implemented in the state.

Herald-Journal reported, “Babies died of malnutrition and of diseases that could be cured because their families couldn’t go out after help. Government teams offered some relief but not all people could be reached by the limited staff.”

In the meantime, the British Intelligence estimated that there might be some 24,000 Chinese Communist sympathisers at a point in Sarawak.

The end of communist insurgency in Sarawak

While the confrontation officially ended on Aug 11, 1966, the communist insurgency in Sarawak continued until 1990.

The number of communist operatives distinctly decreased in the 1973-1974 when Sarawak then Chief Minister Abdul Rahman Ya’kub managed to convince several of the insurgents to lay down their arms.

One of their leaders Bong Kee Chok surrendered along with 481 of his supporters.

The final peace agreement communist insurgency was ratified in Kuching on Oct 17, 1990.

That was when the last of the communist operatives officially surrendered, marking the end of communist insurgency in Sarawak.

The name of Kanowit town comes from the earliest ethnic group who settled in the area, the Kanowits. Today, they are often referred to as Melanau Kanowit.

Their first contact with the British took place in 1846 when the steamer, the Phlegethon, commanded by James Brooke and Captain Rodney Mundy sailed up the Rajang River.

Brooke would have been 43 years of age at the time, and would have been Rajah of Sarawak for four years since the Sultan of Brunei had granted him the title.

On June 29, they arrived in the area that we know now as Kanowit town.

Imagine the Kanowits’ reaction watching an unfamiliar vessel came to shore with people of different skin, eye and hair colour on board… it would have been bound to create some havoc at that time.

So did their first meeting turn out a peaceful one or was there some blowpipe action going on?

The answer lies in Mundy’s journal as he describes their first encounter with the Kanowits as follows:

Shortly after noon our pilots pointed out the neck of land round which, in a small bay, was situated the village of Kanowit, and above the trees we caught sight of numerous flags, and the matted roofs of houses.

The admiral (Rajah James Brooke) now ordered the steamer to be kept as close as possible to the over-hanging palms; and with our paddle-box just grazing their feathery branches, we shot rapidly round the point, and the surprise was complete; so complete, indeed, that groups of matrons and maidens who, surrounded by numerous children, were disporting their sable forms in the silvery stream, and enjoying, under the shade of the lofty palms, its refreshing waters, had scarcely time to screen themselves from the gaze of the bold intruders on their sylvan retreat.

It would be difficult to describe the horror and consternation of these wild Dayak ladies as the anchor of the Phlegethon dropped from her bows into the centre of the little bay selected for their bathing ground.

The first impression seemed to have stupified both old and young, as they remained motionless with terror and astonishment. When conscious, however, of the terrible apparition before them, they set up a loud and simultaneous shriek, and fleeing rapidly from the water, dragged children of all ages and sizes after them, and rushed up their lofty ladders for refuge; then we heard the tom-tom beat to arms, and in every direction the warriors were observed putting on their wooden and woollen armour, and seeking their spears and sumpitans.

In ten minute all seemed ready for the fight, though evidently more anxious to find the extraordinary stranger inclined for peace. Meanwhile, the steamer swinging gradually to the young flood, and so drawing her stern within a few yards of the landing-place, brought into view the whole of the under part of the floor of this immense building erected at the very brink of the stream; for the piles on which it was supported were forty feet in height, and although at this short distance, had these savages chosen to attack us, a few of the spears and poisoned arrows might have reached our decks, it was evident that their own nest thus raised in the air, though containing 300 desperate men, was entirely at our mercy.

The chief, who was a very old man, with about thirty followers, then came on board. He was profusely tattooed all over the body, and like the rest of his savage crew, was a hideous object. The lobes of his ears hung nearly to his shoulders, and in them immense rings were fixed. Round his waist he wore a girdle of rough bark which fell below his knees, and on his ankles large rings of various metals. With the exception of the waistcloth, he was perfectly naked. We knew that this old rascal and the whole tribe were pirates downright and hereditary.

Having dismissed our visitors, we all landed and some of us mounting ladders of these extraordinary houses, presented ourselves as objects of curiosity to the women and children. I could stand upright in the room, and looking down at the scene below, might have fancied myself seated on the top-mast cross-trees. Having traversed every part of the long gallery thus level with the summits of the trees, and distributed the few gifts we had to bestow on the women and children, we turned our backs on the pendant human skulls, and retracing our steps to terra firma, immediately proceeded to the Phlegethon.

Unfortunately, the forty foot high longhouse which Brooke and Mundy visited is long gone. Additionally, we can hardly see a Kanowit man with full-bodied tattoos and long ear lobes these days.

If only the Kanowits knew how Mundy thought and described of them then, would their first encounter have been a peaceful one?