JULY 18 — We are halfway through the month of July and halfway towards the historic month of August, the country’s so-called Independence Month (Bulan Kemerdekaan).
But Malaysians celebrate not just the entire month of August. The celebrations go beyond the month, culminating — rightly so — on September 16.
A bit of history is perhaps timely.
Legal history, I mean.
Until the Japanese Occupation, there were three territories in Malaya, namely (a) the Settlements of Penang (including Province Wellesley) and Malacca, forming part of the Straits Settlements; (b) the Federated Malay States of Perak, Selangor, Negri Sembilan and Pahang; and (c) the Unfederated Malay States of Johore, Kedah, Kelantan, Terengganu and Perlis.
The Straits Settlements, as a Crown Colony, were under direct British administration with a Governor and an Executive and Legislative Council.
In the Federated Malay States, British authority rested upon Agreements concluded with the State Rulers at varying dates from 1874 onwards.
The Agreements preserved the sovereignty of the Ruler in his State, and bound him to accept the advice of a British officer (Resident) on all matters of general administration in his State except matters relating to Islam and Malay custom.
Despite establishing a federation, the Agreements did not define the respective functions of the federal and state governments.
It was only in 1909 that a Federal Council was established under an Agreement of that year.
But it was only in 1927, under an Agreement signed by the High Commissioner and the four Rulers of the Federated Malay States, when the Federal Council was reconstituted, that the legislative authority of the Council was outlined.
No further change in the constitutional arrangements was made until the reforms associated with the name of Sir Cecil Clementi were introduced as the result of a request from the four Rulers.
One of the reforms was the division of Federal and State functions which the earliest of the Agreements had failed to make, and the transfer of a number of departments to State control.
The Unfederated Malay States of Kedah, Kelantan, Terengganu and Perlis came under British protection in 1909, when Siam transferred to Britain her rights over those territories.
Under a series of Agreements, a British Adviser was appointed to each State, having no executive powers.
The fifth of the Unfederated Malay States, Johor had earlier confided the control of its foreign affairs to the care of Great Britain by a Treaty of 1885.
It was not until 1914 that an Agreement was concluded with the Sultan under which a British officer was appointed as General Adviser.
In these States, the executive authority rested with the local State Government, exercised by Malay officials of whom the Menteri Besar was the head.
The Sultan and the State Council, the meetings of which the Adviser attended, passed and enacted all legislation.
These States continued to develop their administration while under British Protection.
The single coordinating authority for policy and administration for the whole of Malaya was the Governor of the Straits Settlements in his dual capacity of Governor of the Straits Settlements and High Commissioner for the Malay States.
It was he who was in direct charge of the administration of the Straits Settlements.
It was he who exercised his authority in the Federated Malay States through the British Resident in each of the four States and through the Federal Secretary in Kuala Lumpur.
And it was he who was behind the British Adviser in each State of the Unfederated Malay States. (See Constitutional Proposals for Malayа: Report of the Working Committee Appointed by a Conference of His Excellency the Governor of The Malayan Union, Their Highnesses The Rulers of The Malay States and the Representatives of the United Malays National Organisation (Umno), 1946)
But it was the contrasting forms of administration in the Federated and Unfederated Malay States that gave fodder to the British’s hope that the two “might be assimilated to the point at which a wider Federation embracing them all would be acceptable as an important, and indeed necessary, step towards the ultimate achievement of self-government for the territories as a whole”.
Then came the Japanese Occupation of Malaya in 1942.
* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of Malay Mail.
