A columnist at the Malaysian Malay daily Utusan Melayu had lashed out at MM Lee Kuan Yew for “splitting” Singapore from Malaysia during the tumultuous years of 1963 - 1965 when Singapore was part of the Malaysian federation. (read article here) 

Writing in a column published after Malaysia’s 52nd National Day, former Information Minister Zainuddin Maidin said former (Malaysian) prime minister Tunku Abdul Rahman had to throw Singapore out of Malaysia because it was a ‘thorn in our flesh’.

Wrote Mr Zainuddin: ‘If 50 years of independence have given a deeper understanding of the poison sowed by Kuan Yew 40 years ago, the recent events mentioned would not have occurred.’

‘The main reason Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman decided to kick Singapore out of Malaysia was the speech made by its then Prime Minister, Lee Kuan Yew, in the Malaysian Parliament in May 1965 questioning the Malay government in Malaysia,’ he wrote.

He added that similar controversies are resurfacing, alluding to concerns among Umno leaders that Malaysian minorities are questioning the position of Malays and Islam.

Singapore joined peninsula Malaya, Sabah and Sarawak on 16 September 1963 to form the Federation of Malaysia. A year later, the PAP led by then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew contested in the Malaysian general elections and won three seats in the peninsula, one of the which was occupied by Singapore’s third President Devan Nair.

Lee was against the “special rights” of the Malays in Malaysia and advocated for a “Malaysian Malaysia” to treat all races equally. He founded the Malaysian Solidarity Convention together with smaller parties in Sabah and Sarawak to advocate his political ideas which infuriated Malay ultranationalists within the dominant UMNO.

Racial riots broke out in parts of Malaysia and Singapore as a result of provocative articles published in the Malaysian press. The situation was spiralling out of control and the Tunku finally decided to ask Singapore to leave the federation.

When Lee announced the independence of Singapore on 9 August 1965 on television, he broken down and cry. “For all my entire life, I believe in the union between the two territories (of Malaysia and Singapore)”, he said.

After Singapore was ejected from Malaysia, the remnants of the PAP in the peninsula regrouped to form the Democratic Action Party (DAP) led by a young lawyer named Lim Kit Siang from Batu Pahat, Johor to continued Lee’s struggle for a “Malaysian Malaysia”.

Racial issues were raised again by the ruling UMNO in the aftermath of the March general elections last year when the resurgent opposition won an unprecedented 82 seats in the Dewan Rakyat, denying the ruling Barisan Nasional coaltion’s traditional two-thirds minority.

DAP formed the state government of Malaysia’s richest state, Penang and Lim Guan Eng, the son of Lim Kit Siang, became its Chief Minister. This is the first time in Malaysian history that DAP has seized power at the state level

In a desperate bid to regain support among the Malays, UMNO and its mouthpeices - Utusan Melayu, Mingguan Melayu and New Straits Times have been stoking racial sentiments and protraying themselves as defenders of Malay rights.

During the recent Permatang-Pasir by-election in Penang, UMNO attacked the Islamist Party PAS of colluding with the Chinese DAP to undermine the interests of the Malay community. The strong racial rhetoric did not go down well with the electorate and the PAS candidate won eventually by a majority of more than 4,000 votes.

The Malays in Malaysia, especially the older generation, do not have a favorable impression of Singapore’s MM Lee who has become a perennial bogeyman for Malaysian politicians to wack in order to garner support from the grassroots.

Zainuddin’s latest outburst against Lee should be viewed in the wider context of UMNO’s own impending political crisis rather than a diplomatic spat between the two countries.

As rising support for the multi-racial Pakatan Rakyat has shown, racial identity and ethnic rights are becoming less of a concern among young Malaysians who clamor instead for an efficient, competent and transparent government.

It is likely that Lee’s message of a “Malaysian Malaysia” will resonate more and more with Malaysia’s young in the future and it is an irony that his “successor” to fulfil his unfinished legacy is turning out to be a Malay ultra-nationalist who used to espouse values anathema to Lee’s - Malaysia’s ex-Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, founder of the Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR), a multi-racial political party in the mould of Lee’s PAP.