Apparently there are still some Malaysian politicians who cannot get over the racialised colonial stereotypes that they were indoctrinated with during their childhood. Some have even gone as far as reproducing these racist caricatures in their political speeches, to the point of associating the Chinese community with that age-old vice imported by our o­ne-time colonial masters, opium smoking.(1)

To add insult to injury such statements are being made at a time when the racial divide in Malaysia is stronger than ever and when prominent Malaysians are calling for a more multi-racial civil service in the country.(2)

Before stupidity mutates into sheer lunacy and nonsense like this gets passed as historical fact, we ought to take a short trip down memory lane and see just who were the real culprits in the trade of opium in Malaysia and why...

In the account of his journey to the east coast kingdoms of Pahang, Trengganu and Kelantan entitled Kisah Pelayaran Abdullah (3), the 19th-century Peranakan Indian-Malay scholar and historian Munshi Abdullah (4) presents us with an unflattering portrait of the Malay kingdoms. What he saw there was a total absence of a regulated form of inter-state relations between the kingdoms that was compounded by the absence of a rationalised method of government within the states themselves. The Malay states were in a state of civil war as well as inter-state conflict, perpetuated by the presence of armies of armed warriors and mercenaries, each of which is led by its own leader trying to carve a niche for himself. (5)

In the 'Kisah Pelayaran', Abdullah noted that in Pahang, Trengganu and Kelantan there was hardly any economic activity at all. The market-places of Pahang and Trengganu were bare of goods and those that were to be found were either expensive or of poor quality. (pgs. 11, 25, 29). In Kelantan economic activity had stopped altogether thanks to the Kelantanese civil war. Considering the nature of trade and commercial exchange, Abdullah also noted that the Malay kingdoms were producing goods of great value (spices, gold, tin, cloth) but the Malay rulers were exchanging them for worthless goods such as opium and weapons. (pgs. 12, 30).

Skewed trading pattern

It was obvious to Abdullah that civil strife and ineffective government had ensured that economic development and prosperity would never be given the opportunity to materialise. The absence of market activity and trade which Abdullah saw in the east coast kingdoms was made worse by a skewered trading pattern where valuable goods such as gold and tin were being traded for opium and weapons instead. Abdullah was not blind to the role of the Westerners in creating this unequal trading relationship: he notes, for example, that it was the British who enjoyed the monopoly over the trade in opium, and that it was them who were selling it to the Malays and by doing so further undermining the social fabric of Malay society.

The root of the problem, Abdullah insisted, lay with the Malay rulers themselves. That the Malay rulers had also fallen far short of their duties and obligations as Muslim rulers was also a fact that Abdullah continually stressed. His moral criticisms of the Rulers' behaviour and conduct invariably pointed out the excesses and vices that their despotic rule has accustomed them to. This moral degradation was also visited upon the peoples and the lands the Rajas and Sultans ruled beneath them.

In the 'Kisah Pelayaran' Abdullah describes his final meeting with the Malay noble Tengku Temena who he chastises for his drug addiction. Tengku Temena was the escort who accompanied Abdullah in his travels while in Kelantan. By the end of the journey and the completion of Abdullah's mission he notes that the Tengku was an opium addict and that his addiction had wasted his body and destroyed his health and well-being. Abdullah's description of their final meeting is perhaps o­ne of the most touching episodes in his 'Kisah Pelayaran', and gives a vivid description of the Tengku himself as a young and promising noble whose future was destroyed thanks to his own weaknesses and the corrupt environment he inhabited. He warns the Tengku of the dangers of opium and also asks him why he buys it from the British when he knows that the British themselves do not consume the narcotics that they sell to others. (6)

It is clear from the writings of Munshi Abdullah that opium addiction was a major problem in the Malay states by the early 19th century. The real culprits were the British, who had by then gained the worldwide monopoly over the sale and distribution of opium worldwide, and who were using it to weaken the societies that had come under their colonial domination. At no point did Mushi Abdullah describe this as a 'Chinese problem', for being a colonial subject resident in Melaka and Singapore (which had large Chinese populations) he knew that the Chinese migrants were also the victims of this ignoble trade.

Common stereotype

In time, the negative stereotype of the opium-eating Asian with his head in the clouds and his body laid to waste would become a common stereotype in the vast repertoire of Western colonial-Orientalist literature. Images of Malays, Indians and Chinese coolies their eyes wide open and their bodies emaciated would festoon numerous illustrations, postcards, posters and such ephemera in order to inspire and titillate the collective imaginary of Westerners who saw Asia through the prism of the exotic and extraordinary. But at no point should we forget who was responsible for the sale and distribution of opium, and what its primary use was: for opium was nothing short of a weapon that would be used by the British to help them subjugate the native Other.

"The profound hypocrisy and inherent barbarism of bourgeois civilisation"

Writing about the immoral conduct of the British, French and Dutch colonisers in Asia, Karl Marx noted that: "The profound hypocrisy and inherent barbarism of bourgeois civilisation lies unveiled before our eyes, turning from its home, where it assumes respectable forms, to the colonies, where it goes naked". Nowhere was the hypocrisy more explicit than in the colonisers' conduct concerning the sale and control of opium.

Opium was a crucial tool and commodity in the British colonial economy. The British had been engaged in the sale of opium in the Malay archipelago from the end of the 18th century, and the East India Company was directly involved in the monopolisation of the trade, production and distribution of Opium throughout Asia from India to China. The East India Company and its officials such as Stamford Raffles were actively engaged in promoting the sale of the drug to the Malays of the independent kingdoms as well as the migrant Chinese coolies in the colonies.

Indeed, Britain had entered the Asian market with a view to dominate and monopolise the trade in opium so that it may be used to earn revenue and as a tool to 'domesticate' the conquered colonial subjects as well. In this respect, Britain shared a common goal with other Western imperial powers such as the Spanish and Dutch who utilised the drug for the same purposes.

As Syed Hussein Alatas has argued in his 'Myth of the Lazy Native' (6), it was Britain that gained the total world-wide monopoly after its success in defeating China in the Opium Wars of 1839-42 and 1857-60 where its main aim was to break the resistance of the Chinese government and force its way into the Chinese market so that it could sell the drug to the Chinese population. Having achieved this strategic goal, the British "promoted the spread of opium throughout Asia more than any other power known in history" (Alatas, pg. 206).

Dependency o­n the drug

In Burma as in the case of Malaya, British intervention via the deliberate sale of opium to young men had incurred a terrible cost o­n its social infrastructure, as Alatas notes (pg. 208). While in Malaya, the use of opium had many more considerable benefits than ills as far as the colonial authorities and western business interests were concerned: it pacified the local natives and made them more law abiding and domesticated. Their dependency o­n the drug ensured that they would behave themselves and obeyed their bosses, lest they would be sent to prison and deprived of the substance they were addicted to.

Economically, opium proved to be a major asset to both the East India Company and the colonial government that came after it. Taxes o­n opium and gambling were the chief sources of revenue for the colonial establishment in British Malaya. Alatas points out that "a large part of the revenue of British Malaya came from opium". Between 1896 and 1906, the lowest was 43.3% and the highest (in 1904) was 59.1%. (pp. 92-93) And here it was all the colonial subjects Malays, Chinese and Indians who were the victims who were exploited to the full.

So important had the sale and distribution of opium become for the colonial economy that a Commission of Enquiry was formed in 1907 to look into the future of the trade in Malaya. Its recommendations were published in its report in 1908. As part of the Commission's recommendations, from January 1910 the British colonial administration in Malaya nationalised and monopolised the manufacture, sale and distribution of opium. While the British press at home was always o­n the lookout for sordid tales about the dreaded opium epidemic amongst the Asian natives, it remained silent about the role of the British government in distributing the addictive drug and the fact that it profited from its sale.

In Johor, the British actually increased the sale of opium after the demise of Sultan Abu Bakar and the state had been passed to their hands. By 1918, 46% of the governments earnings from Johor alone came from the sale of opium. This trend would continue unabated for the next few years. Between 1918 and 1922, approximately 30% of average government earnings came from opium sales (Alatas, pg. 15).

As a result of the increased revenue earnings from the sale of opium in the colony, the government of the Federated Malay States (FMS) established the Opium Reserve Replacement Fund in 1925. From 1926 to 1930, 15% of annual revenue from opium sales were added to that fund, and by the end of 1938 the fund stood at about 30 million dollars. A similar fund was set up in the Straits Settlements (SS), in order to ensure that a revenue earnings were maintained from opium sales, in the event that shrinkage might occur in the future.

As anti-opium sentiments came to the fore among the Malay and Chinese communities, the British colonial authorities reacted by finding new ways and means to popularise the drug even more. Li Dun Jen (1982) notes that "by their enactments and rules the government had implemented virtually all the recommendations of the 1908 report except that the government was more lenient in enlarging the circle of opium-smokers beyond what the Commission had recommended" (8). Li notes that the colonial authorities even went as far as allowing women to enter the opium smoke-houses and lowered the age of consent for smokers to 16.

Our problem

Eventually the sale of opium was o­nly surpassed when the export of other locally-produced commodities such as tin and rubber began to earn higher profits in the early stages of the 20th century. But by then opium had already proven its worth as both a lucrative commodity as well as an efficient tool to control the workforce in the colony''s plural economy.

It was our problem.

To suggest today that opium-addiction was a 'Chinese problem' would be a case of gross over-simplification and a deliberate falsification of history. A proper and thorough reading of Malaysian history would show that it was a nation-wide problem which affected Malays, Chinese and Indians equally. What is more, the import of opium into Malaya was carried out by the British authorities with the connivance of the local elites of all communities (Malay Rajas and Sultans, Chinese and Indian 'Kapitans') who profited from it while the ordinary masses were the o­nes who suffered.

While it is true that opium-addiction had reached epidemic levels in China by the 19th century, we must never forget that this was due to the lopsided and unjust trading policies and monopolistic practices used by the British and other Western colonial powers then. Opium abuse became a national problem in China because of British intervention and their deliberate promotion of the drug to cripple the Chinese economy and break the will of the Chinese masses. The fact that the British succeeded in doing so was a tragedy not just for China, but for the rest of Asia as well for it soon became standard policy in all their colonial possessions, including British Malaya. This was not 'their' problem: it was ours and we all suffered as a result.

For further readings o­n the use and abuse of opium by the Western colonial powers in Asia, o­ne can turn to Syed Hussein Alatas, 'The Myth of the Lazy Native: A Study of the Image of the Malays, Filipino and Javanese from the 16th to the 20th century and its function in the Ideology of Colonial Capitalism'. (Frank Cass, London. 1977); Li Dun Jen, 'British Malaya: An Economic Analysis'. (Insan, Kuala Lumpur. 1982); Charles Hirshman, 'The Making of Race in Colonial Malaya: Political Economy and Racial Ideology', in Sociological Forum (SF), Vol. 1. no.2. (Cornell University Press. 1986), and Barbara Watson and Leonard Andaya, 'A History of Malaysia', (MacMillan Press, London. 1982).

Malaysian politicians who know next to nothing about Malaysian history, do take note.

Endnotes:

1) See: "Lim Kit Siang ticks off Pahang MB for 'Chinese are gamblers' remark." (Malaysiakini, 27 April 2003). It was reported that the DAP chairperson Lim Kit Siang had asked Pahang Menteri Besar Adnan Yaakob to apologise for implying that gambling is a way of life of Chinese Malaysians, even in the 21st century. According to the report Lim Kit Siang had said that "It is most shocking that Adnan made the insensitive, offensive and insulting remark o­n opium-smoking and implying that gambling is a way of life of Chinese Malaysians in the 21st century". He said it is also shocking that at this age and time, there are still Umno leaders who associate opium-smoking and gambling as a Chinese way of life.

2) See: Koh Lay Chin, 'Have a multi-racial civil service' NST, 29 April 2003. The NST report stated that the Sunway Group corporate adviser Dr Ramon Navaratnam said the fact that most government offices had very few or no Chinese or Indian officers at all created a psychological problem for non-Malay citizens from small towns who wanted help for their problems or complaints. He also spoke o­n the necessity of having a multi-racial civil service since o­ne that is predominantly of o­ne race could result in "inbreeding" or "cross pollination", where workers would feed o­n each others' weaknesses and destroy their strengths. "We need fair competition or a quota system otherwise the trend will get worse," he said. Navaratnam urged the government to implement reverse affirmative policies as soon as possible. The need for reverse policies was also echoed by historian Prof Datuk Khoo Kay Kim, who said that the trend of Malays dominating the public sector and non-Malays in the private sector had to be addressed as the gap was "growing wider" and "it never used to be this bad". Prof Khoo added that "Non-Malays now look for opportunities outside the country and they will go because the doors are open to them. Singapore has been taking (our talent) o­n a very large scale."

3) Munshi Abdullah Abdul Kadir, 'Kisah Pelayaran Abdullah ke Timur' (1834), Malay Publishing House, Singapore. 1961.

4) Abdullah bin Abdul Kadir, otherwise known as Munshi (Teacher) Abdullah, was born in the year 1796, at the close of the 18th century which had witnessed the rise and fall of several Malay Kingdoms, the eclipse and emergence of old and new dynasties, and the rise of the star of Britain in the Indon-Malay world. Abdullah was a Peranakan-Muslim of mixed Indian and Arab stock, who traced his ancestry to his great grandfather Sheikh Abdul Kadir who came all the way from Yemen. He prided himself with the fact that he belonged to a family renown for their piety and knowledge of religion and languages. But he was also an individual who was born in a colonial settlement that had come under Dutch and British rule, governed by British laws and who worked with the British in his capacity as their language-teacher and translator. His works, the 'Hikayat Abdullah' (The Biography of Abdullah, 1840) and the 'Kisah Pelayaran Abdullah ke Timur' (The Travels of Abdullah, 1838) have given us a rare glimpse of life in the Malay-Muslim world of the 19th century, seen from the point of view of a Melayu-Muslim who was troubled by developments which were beyond his control and at times beyond his knowledge and comprehension. He lived and worked in Singapore and Melaka, and served as the translator and scribe to numerous British colonial officials, including Stamford Raffles.

5) Abdullah wrote his 'Kisah Pelayaran ke Timur' (The story of my Travels to the East Coast) in 1838, after returning from his journey to the Kingdom of Kelantan o­n an errand he was contracted to perform. Abdullah was asked to deliver some letters of petition to the ruler of Kelantan o­n behalf of some Singaporean traders whose ships were held there o­n account of the conflict going o­n in the kingdom. The kingdom of Kelantan was then in a state of civil war, after the death of its ruler Sultan Muhammad I in 1837. Though Abdullah often criticised the chaotic and ruinous state that he found to be prevalent in the Malay kingdoms, it must be noted that the northern Malay kingdoms of Kelantan and Trengganu were then under a lot of pressure from the forces of Siam and its regional vassal and representative power, Nakhon Sithammarat (Ligor). In fact, the coffers of Kelantan were practically empty by the time Abdullah arrived there, thanks to the ill-fated attempt by the Sultans of Kelantan and Trengganu to support the anti-Siamese uprising of 1832 in the Malay-Muslim vassal state of Patani further north. Kelantan was forced to pay a huge indemnity after this disaster, which added to its financial difficulties. The death of Muhammad I added to the kingdom's problems as the vying rulers sought to gain control over the limited resources left. Thanks to these problems, it was obvious that Abdullah could not find the ruler he was appointed to meet, for the simple reason that no clear winner to the contest could be found. [Munshi Abdullah, 'Kisah Pelayaran Abdullah', Malay Publishing House, Singapore. 1961].

6) (Abdullah, Kisah Pelayaran, pg. 83.) Before he leaves for Singapore, Abdullah's advice to the unfortunate wayward noble strikes deep into the conscience of the Malay rulers in general: ''Ingat-ingat Tengku, lagi akan di-tanya Allah ta'ala pada hari kemudian akan segala hal raayat itu kepada Raja-nya... Maka jangan-lah Tengku kira orang yang menjadi Raja itu terlebeh besar dan terlebeh mulia daripada raayat-nya; melainkan orang yang terkechil lagi hina ada-nya, ia-itu hamba segala hamba Allah. Ada pun apabila sa-orang di-jadikan Allah ia Raja, bukan-nya sebab hendak memuas-kan nafsu-nya...melainkan sebab di-suroh Allah memeliharakan manusia, supaya tiada di-aniayai oleh sa-orang''.(pp. 87-88) To this end, as a parting gift to the Tengku he prescribes the 17th century Islamic text the Taj-us Salatin of Buchara al-Jauhari, as a guide for the rulers and as a means to teach them the need and the ways of rightful conduct as befitting a Muslim ruler.

7) See: Syed Hussein Alatas, 'The Myth of the Lazy Native: A Study of the Image of the Malays, Filipino and Javanese from the 16th to the 20th century and its function in the Ideology of Colonial Capitalism''. Frank Cass, London. 1977. pg. 206.

8) See: Li Dun Jen, 'British Malaya: An Economic Analysis'. Insan, Kuala Lumpur. 1982, Pg 22.