THE MEMOIRS OF MUSTAPHA HUSSAIN - Malaysia Today

132 Memoirs of Mustapha Hussain
left and right, Muslim and non-Muslim, had fought with one aim – to
get rid of Dutch colonialists! Sutan used to say, “If you, my friends, begin
to see one or two political detention camps being set up by the British
that is indeed a sign that political agitation in Malaya is beginning to bear
fruit.” “I must warn you that political agitation towards Independence is
an undertaking fraught with danger, but let us hold fast to the Malay
saying, ‘together, we carry light things in our hands; and together, we
load the heavy burdens on our shoulders’. Can we?”
Interested members of the audience asked question after question,
for example, “According to you, the colonial masters are blood-sucking
exploiters who feed on the wealth of this nation. What steps can we take
to get rid of them?” His answer: “That is a very good question. It shows
that you have understood our national struggle. We, in Indonesia, have
tried for many years to get the Dutch out; the work is hard and involves
many sacrifices. We call it fardu kifayah (a community obligation), a
difficult task that must be shouldered by the people en masse, just like
the job of burying a dead person. That is also fardu kifayah.”
As a start, he urged us to set up either an association or a union,
formed and run by members elected on merit. As many of us were unexposed
to political organisations and were ignorant of associations and
unions, the old man had to explain the structure of a political body in
detail. We were not ashamed of our ignorance because no political books
were available in the market. We should have been proud that we were
the first group of Malays to get together to set up a political body in Malaya.
Apart from explaining the organisational structure, Sutan expanded
on administrative aspects, which he said were more difficult. There should
be a central body in Kuala Lumpur, before divisions and branches could
be set up in different parts of the nation. Divisions would be responsible
for the branches. A liaison body would take on the role of communications
with the central body. One of his interesting pointers was to avoid electing
a Secretary or Treasurer related to the President or Vice President, but it
was fine to elect a President and Vice President from the same family,
even if they were brothers.
Sutan often recounted his political activities to try to gain Indonesia’s
independence. For example, to counter the oppressive Dutch sugar cane
planters, he and his political activist friends caught a civet cat to whose
tail was tied dry lalang (a fast-burning long grass). When the grass was
set ablaze, the mortified civet cat ran wild through the plantation, setting
dry sugar cane leaves afire until thousands of acres were destroyed in
just one night. “Dutch capitalists were so affected that they returned the
land to their former owners at low prices.”