special After the ethnic violence following the worst defeat for the Alliance at the 1969 general elections, Tunku Abdul Rahman retired from office and the prime ministership passed to Tun Abdul Razak in 1970.

It was the passing of an era which saw the control of the ruling party Umno shift from the old-style English-educated Malay aristocracy to the emergent and ambitious new Malay capitalist class.

Razak is credited with initiating much of the racial restructuring of the Malaysian economy under the New Economic Policy. He died in 1976 and his successor was Hussein Onn, son of Umno's founder Onn Jaafar. The new prime minister's first test was to confront Harun Idris, the powerful chief minister of Selangor, who represented an increasingly militant communal wing in Umno.

Harun's activities became so blatant that in 1975, the prime minister decided to press charges of corruption against him. He was sentenced to six years' imprisonment on charges of corruption and forgery in 1978 but still managed to win a seat in the Umno supreme council that same year. He was released from prison in 1981.


Tunku: Yes, 1959 was good, 1964 was also good but 1969 was the worst year because the communists started trouble and my own people, like (Abdul) Razak, started trouble - trouble started by Harun, Mahathir (Mohamad), Ghazali (Shafie). They wanted to take over power. Things were going so well, they kept on calling me forgetful and what not. So I said, "All right, go on and take over. As for myself, I work for the country and for the people. If you can do better, take it." So that is why I left ...

I was then appointed secretary general of the Organisation of Islamic Countries. The headquarters were at my office in Kuala Lumpur. So I just had to carry on with my new job. I was not feeling upset, I did not feel bad. I told them, "If you want to do the job, do so by all means." The King of Saudi picked me to organise the OIC, so I did. I always feel happy when I have to organise something, so I was happy to go and organise the OIC.

K Das: Tunku, since the terrible May 69 days, this country has progressed rapidly economically and more and more Malays have gone into business and are doing very well, but there are people who say that perhaps they are going too fast. How do you feel about this?

Tunku: I think they might be right in the sense that it is going a bit too fast for people who have had no previous experience in business and economics and as a result, there is a certain section, and a very small section at that, who can take advantage of all these projects that are aimed at benefitting the Malays. The rest are still behind and cannot take advantage of it. In a sense, we can say that it is all going too fast.

Whatever happens, I feel that in the whole economic progress, you've got to take the whole country with you, you've got to pay more attention to those who have less and those who are a little inexperienced in this type of work. You have got to try and help them along. But you cannot, so to speak, benefit one section of the people at the expense of another. That is the thing we must not do.

I think on the whole, the Chinese and others are quite happy to help the Malays along and so we must not hurt their feelings or show discrimination in any sense in this matter, but try and bring them all along together and get them to try and help Malaysia. It is difficult I know, but that is the sort of policy I tried to carry out in those years of my term as prime minister.

K Das: You have always expressed nothing but your admiration and feeling of friendship toward Tun Razak. I think that this feeling is general in this country but there is also a feeling that perhaps Tun Razak was very much in command but his policies are not being implemented as he would have liked them. Would you like to talk about this subject?

Tunku: I can try to say my bit on this matter because I don't think he was quite as lucky as I was. When I had him as my No 2, he was a very conscientious worker and I had all my colleagues in the cabinet whom I had entrusted to do the job. To the best of my knowledge, they did their job very well. They were, you might call pioneers and they were devoted and dedicated to their jobs.

Tun Razak might not have been as lucky as I was because he did not have another Tun Razak to help him in the way that I had. All these ministers are new except for one or two who were with him in the early days but on the whole, they are new. And then perhaps Tun Razak's way of doing things was different from mine because he was, as you said, a very hard worker - he wanted to do everything himself. In this way, he might have discouraged his colleagues who might have felt, "Well, if he wants to do it, let him do it, why should we bother?"

That is different from my way of doing things which is, "If you don't do it properly, then I will come after you." I never interfere in any of my colleagues' work. In fact some of the things I tried to do for my personal friends, my colleagues turned them down but I didn't say anything, I just accepted their decision as final. After all, it is their work. I could not interfere. That is how I feel about it.

Going after Harun

Tunku: It is clear that Harun Idris was corrupt. He was charged you know. Before that, they were trying to settle the matter.

K Das: How were they trying to settle the matter? How did Razak propose to settle the matter?

Tunku: You know Harun was one of those - Harun, Mahathir, Ghazali Shafie - who were all working with Razak to oust me, to take over my place. So these are his gang but actually he wanted to help him by sending him out of this country and be our diplomat outside. But Harun didn't want to go...

K Das: How did Salleh get into...

Tunku: He was the solicitor general...

K Das: At that time, solicitor general?

Tunku: Not solicitor, but attorney-general. I was in the AG's Chambers in the early days, as DPP.

K Das: At that time when Salleh Abas was solicitor general?

Tunku: Oh, who was the AG then?

K Das: Salleh Yusuf.

Tunku: Oh, yes! He was a member of the cabinet. As solicitor general, he had to deal with the matter.

K Das: And he refused to compromise?

Tunku: The man had committed a crime. Whoever he was, what did I care? When a crime has been committed, he must be charged. If he was not charged, I was prepared to retire, to resign.

K Das: Harun was a very naughty fellow. Even as a boy he was very naughty, always fighting with the neighbour's children. Then he became MB (Mentri Besar), but why was he sacked by Mahathir?

Tunku: Adoi! Because he was dishonest.

K Das: But I thought Mahathir did not mind dishonesty?

Tunku: But there must be something. That is his brother-in-law. Because the Sultan did not want him, he went to plead and cry until the Sultan allowed him to be the MB for a term.

K Das: But Razali was also the man who betrayed Harun?

Tunku: Harun betrayed Abu Bakar. They are all crooked. So I sacked Abu Bakar Baginda. He was the legal advisor in Batu Road. He sneaked on the MB and then Ghazali sneaked on him. They are all dirty. Allah! All so dirty. Harun worked against me when I sent him to England for legal education. He admitted this that night when he came here for a public talk.

Later, he worked with me through the Football Association and then he turned against me yet again, working with Razak, Mahathir and others. Very dirty, but funny how he changed. When I came back from Saudi Arabia, there was trouble in his camp. The police had surrounded his house and there were all the youth inside. I had to go in and get him out. I told him, "You are now risking the lives of all these young people, you come to my house."

I took him in my car to my house, No 5 Jalan Tunku, and told him to give himself up. So he agreed and gave himself up to the police. Otherwise, all those youngsters were going to fight it out.

K Das: I know. We were all standing outside his house that night when the police surrounded his house.

Tunku: That morning I went over. I arrived in KL and Raja, that Tanjung Karang Raja, Raja Longchik, he came to the station and asked me to help. He took me directly to Harun's house. I climbed upstairs and took him back with me to my house because I said we could not talk business there, there were too many young people. They might make trouble. So I told the leaders of the youth - Abdullah was one of them - "If you want to follow me, you can but have a talk with Harun at my house." I told him to give up otherwise he would have to bear the responsibility for whatever happened, so he gave up then.

Now he's 100 per cent for me. Do you know he came all the way from KL to attend my buka puasa function? When I came back from Jeddah, he and the Pemuda (Youth) also came to Batu Feringghi to see me. I was staying there. I don't know what the trouble was then. I think they must have sensed it. He was a very strange fellow, changed, you couldn't hold him down. How he got himself pardoned, I don't know. (chuckle) I moved the petition to get his sentences served concurrently. I did not mention any pardon, if they had added it on they must have done it after I had collected all the signatures. Mahathir came to see me in my office then.

K Das: On behalf of Harun?

Tunku: No, he was Acting PM then. Hussein Onn was in England or somewhere. So I told him and he did it.

Pardoning Harun

K Das: Why did Mahathir come to see you?

Tunku: Over this case, I asked him. I did not want to go and see him in his office.

K Das: What did he say?

Tunku: He came and he said, "All right, I'll do it." So he did it. But Hussein Onn would not have done it. He did not like Harun, he is so dishonest.

K Das: I don't understand how they could give him a pardon. A pardon is very difficult to understand. The concurrent sentence I agree.

Tunku: But the pardon was not in my appeal. I was the one who made the appeal, nobody else.

<K Das: But his lawyer for the appeal was Marina Yusof

Tunku: I never saw the lawyer. I called Mahathir. He came and he agreed to alter the sentence.

K Das: I went to see Harun inside the jail. I went with Marina and his son. They are both lawyers. He said, "Whether I am guilty or not is not the question but this consecutive sentence is wrong."

Tunku: That was wrong.

K Das: Actually when I was talking to Marina and to him, I felt that although he was in jail and she was the lawyer, I thought he knew more about the law than she did and he certainly knew more than his son. He can remember very well all the cases. Mazlan, his son was not a very good lawyer.

Tunku: His son, oh! Is he qualified?

K Das: Yes, he's qualified.

Tunku: Oh, I didn't know.

K Das: He is a lawyer. When I was with him in Pudu jail to see his father, his father corrected him. He said, "You are quoting the wrong cases, wrong statute, wrong articles." Mazlan is not a very clever lawyer, Harun is a clever lawyer.

Tunku: That is why they sent him to England to qualify as a lawyer. He was a magistrate under me.

Tomorrow: The Tunku tapes: Troubles in The Star - Part 4

The above is an excerpt from The Tunku Tape - a newly launched book based on the interviews of Malaysia's first prime minister Tunku Abdul Rahman by veteran journalist K Das. The book is edited by social activist Dr Kua Kia Soong and is published by Strategic Info Research Development.