After years of waging war, the ex-communist guerrillas finally found a place to call home where they have quietly built new lives for themselves and their families.
ONE of the most powerful and ultimately destructive forces of the 20th century was the ideology of communism. Purportedly based on the ideals of equality and justice, virtually every communist regime became a dictatorial police state in which people suffered even more than they had done before.
Our nation’s “flirtation” with communism came towards the end of World War II, a time when the Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) had been at the forefront of resistance against the Japanese. Fired by revolutionary independence movements in Indonesia and Vietnam, Malaysia’s communists were a major presence in the immediate post-War scenario but were eventually outmanoeuvred by the returning British.
The CPM was banned, and a bloody conflict (known euphemistically as the Emergency) that claimed the lives of an estimated 13,000 Malayans from both sides (and the civilian population) raged from 1948 to 1960. Despite some renewed activity in the mid 1970s, however, the CPM was essentially a spent force by the time its guerrillas agreed to lay down their arms on Dec 2, 1989.
Now, 20 years after the historic Peace Accord signed in Hatyai, Thailand, many of the principal actors in Malaysia’s communist story have passed on. Those remaining are elderly and largely in declining health.
Abdullah CD third from left in a group photo with Chin Peng (centre) and members of the CPM’s 10th Regiment (from left) his wife Suriani, Rashid Maidin, Abu Samah Mohd Kassim, Ibrahim Chik and Abdullah Sudin. While much of the spotlight has been on the legal battle waged by former CPM secretary-general Chin Peng for the right to come home to Malaysia to die, hundreds of his former comrades are seeing out their twilight years in a handful of “Peace Villages” located in the south of Thailand.
With that in mind, we set out for Kampung Chulabhorn 12, an hour away from the town of Sukhirin in Thailand’s southernmost of province of Narathiwat. The village is home to Abdullah CD, former CPM chairman, and his veteran cadres from the 10th regiment that he once led. Our brief was to gather as many of their testimonies as we could.
The journey itself proved a tricky one – the Sungai Golok border was flooded, both before and after we crossed. At the border we were met by Abdullah’s assistant, Yaakob Ibrahim, 47, himself a former CPM cadre. A two-hour drive through approximately a dozen military checkpoints (the south of Thailand has fallen prey to separatist violence over the last decade) led us to an isolated but idyllic village deep in the heart of the jungle.
Joining the struggle (1945-1948)
Waiting to greet us was Abdullah, 86. He is in good physical shape and is very jovial, but, sadly, his memory is slipping and he frequently retells the same story in answer to different questions. Abdullah’s wife, Suriani Abdullah (formerly Eng Ming Ching), was one of the CPM’s most prominent leaders, but is now wheelchair-bound and barely able to speak.
Fortunately, other veterans were able to fill us in on the initial period of activity. Former company chief Awang Ismail (also known as Shukor), 81, took up the story:
Abdullah CD, today at 86. “I was born in Temerloh, Pahang, which was famous as a stronghold of Malay nationalism. At first, I was just a farmer but after the British came back after the war, I resented it. After all, we were the ones who had endured Japanese rule.”
Awang was introduced to the nationalist youth movement, Angkatan Pemuda Insaf (API), by the late Kamarulzaman Teh, a one-time CPM operative who served 15 years in prison and returned to party politics through Parti Sosialis Rakyat Malaysia in the 1970s and 1980s.
“I was fired up by the spirit of independence but it was tough. API was banned, many members were killed or thrown in prison, so, partly because we felt we had no other choice, we decided to go into the jungle to fight for our cause.”
Indeed, in the period after World War II, many left-leaning organisations rallied together to push for the establishment of an independent republic.
Abdullah was one of the leaders of the Parti Kebangsaan Melayu Malaya (PKMM) in the 1940s and he found himself working with the CPM.
The PKMM, a largely leftist Malay nationalist movement, and its affiliated youth and women’s wings (API and Awas – Angkatan Wanita Sedar – respectively) were breeding grounds of leaders who eventually became prominent figures in Umno (Tun Ghafar Baba, Tun Sardon Jubir and Tan Sri Dr Aishah Ghani), PAS (Dr Burhanuddin Helmi and Asri Muda), Parti Rakyat Malaysia (Ahmad Boestamam), the Labour Party of Malaya (Ishak Haji Muhammad) and, of course, the CPM (in the form of Abdullah, Shamsiah Fakeh, Rashid Maidin, etc). As Abdullah put it, “nationalism came first for me, and only then did Marxism follow.”
Yaakob Ibrahim, 47 It is the same story for Liau Chin Sun @ Mamat Abdullah, 79, a native of Triang, Pahang, who followed his older brother into the CPM.
“During the Japanese Occupation, my brother joined the Malayan Peoples Anti-Japanese Army (MPAJA). When the British came back, we joined in the struggle to liberate our country. When I finished school in the late 1940s, I was punished with a 40-day jail term for my involvement in the unofficial tentera tani (farmers’ militia). My parents bribed local officials and I fled to the jungle, joining ambush patrols on the armed forces and police, whom, we felt, had chosen to side with the British.”
Liau eventually joined the CPM’s 6th Regiment under Chin Nam. He was shot twice by security forces and was treated by a Japanese doctor, as the CPM actually absorbed some Japanese military personnel who wished to continue their fight against the British!
“I eventually joined the 10th regiment (which largely comprised Malays) when a cadre mistakenly dropped me off there! I served as a bodyguard to leaders during special meetings and I also became a field medic,” said Liau, who choked up when asked what happened to his older brother, who is believed to have been killed.
Still, despite the horrors of war, certain aspects of “normal” life went on. Liau, for example, met and married an older woman of a different race.
“I met Siti Mariam Idris in 1963 and asked her to marry me. There was no need to ask for permission. If you liked someone you approached her, if she wanted to accept you, then you were a couple.”
Siti Mariam, 83 Siti Mariam, 83, was a pioneer feminist who also hailed from Temerloh.
“I was 20 when I entered the jungle. I left two children behind but I was proud and happy to fight for my race, religion and my land. We were a poor family, I married at 12 and had my first child at 14. My mother encouraged me to fight for my beliefs and I left my children with her. When my mother was herself detained by the authorities, other relatives looked after my children.”
While life in the jungle may seem unimaginably tough to us modern city slickers (I found a trek to the 10th regiment’s abandoned jungle camp to be downright traumatic), young Siti Mariam had the time of her life.
“Of course the struggle was difficult, but our spirits were high, and I was not afraid, not of people nor animals. Abdullah CD was a great leader, like a father. He had to worry about food, safety, so many other things, yet he led us well.
“I enjoyed learning about other cultures and my political training. I learnt to read and write the Jawi script. I even found it fun to climb Cameron Highlands when we relocated there en route to Thailand!”
Siti Mariam recalled that the initial mood among the population was very supportive. “The village people helped us. Most of them supported our fight for independence.”
The losing battle (1948-1955)
By the end of the war, the CPM was at its strongest. However, as fate would have it, the communists failed to seize power because they were betrayed by their own members in the form of “triple agent” Lai Tek, who worked for both the British and the Japanese while serving as CPM secretary-general. Former chairman Musa Ahmad is also now viewed as a traitor to the communist cause.
Liau Chin Sun, 79 While most of its members made many sacrifices, the sheer bloodiness of the conflict meant that the CPM was gradually losing its appeal among the population, and when British Director of Operations in Malaya Sir Harold Briggs came up with an anti-CPM strategy in 1950, it resulted in many CPM supporters being herded into controlled areas known as New Villages.
This seriously affected CPM supply lines. Eventually, the party found itself being defeated militarily and being literally driven out of many areas in Peninsular Malaysia.
Under Abdullah, the 10th Regiment made the difficult decision to flee Pahang for southern Thailand.
Ironically, the CPM (or at least its Malay-majority 10th Regiment) found more support among the people of southern Thailand than the Communist Party of Thailand (CPT) did. The latter concentrated on their base in the north-east of Thailand, leaving the CPM to build in southern Thailand!
“The CPT was very strong once, but they had to give up their struggle eventually,” Liau recalled. “They were our brothers, our comrades. This place used to belong to them, but they weren’t as popular with the local people, because the CPM, especially the 10th Regiment, was closer to the local people. The CPT supplied us with manpower, equipment and even gave us children to look after.”
Ramasamy Letchumanan, 69, a native of Sungai Siput, Perak, was a child when he joined the party in 1952.
“I was just 12. I joined a pasukan India (Indian company) that was operating in the Tambun area in Perak. Back then, the estate Indians strongly supported the CPM. The company chief saw how small I was and took me as an adopted son. In the late 1950s, I moved with the party to Thailand.”
Ramasamy Letchumanan, 69 Post-Baling (1955-1968)
By 1955, Malaya had held its first federal elections and the communist threat had vastly receded. Still, the government under Tunku Abdul Rahman decided to hold high-profile peace talks with Chin Peng. The talks ended fruitlessly with neither side prepared to budge.
Awang Yaakob (better known as Hatta), 70, is another one of the Termerloh gang.
“After the failed Baling Talks (in Kedah) in 1955, we knew we couldn’t win militarily. We didn’t want to fight but we didn’t want to surrender– we had sacrificed a lot for our struggle – so we were at an impasse.”
In 1960, three years after Malaya was granted its independence, the Emergency was officially declared over.
A religious man, Awang said he never saw a conflict between his faith and Marxist doctrine.
“I was strongly motivated to join because of the anti-British factor. The CPM never went against religion. We could always practise our religion, according to our personal choice. No religious view was ever forced on us.”
Internal turmoil (1968-1974)
It is not widely known that the CPM itself underwent a number of splits. Inspired in part by events in China where the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) saw the condemnation and death of major figures such as President Liu Shiaqui, who was accused of being a counter-revolutionary, the CPM turned on itself.
Awang Ismail, 81 “At some point the CPM central committee ordered the killing of certain leaders, alleging that they were spies. Some regiments resisted this,” said Liau.
This resulted in the 8th Regiment splitting in 1970 and becoming the CPM (Revolutionary Faction) under E Chiang (also known as Huang Yijang) while the 12th Regiment became the CPM (Marxist-Leninist) under Chang Chung Minh. These two factions eventually merged in 1983 and laid down their arms in April 1987, before the “main” CPM did.
Ironically, while the CPM was experiencing a downturn, the rest of South-East Asia was falling like dominoes to communist insurgents. As such, Chin Peng was ordered by his backers in China’s Communist Party to renew efforts at an armed struggle, which led to the assassination of then Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Abdul Rahman Hashim on June 7, 1974. However, by this point, the CPM had long lost the battle for the hearts and minds of most Malaysian civilians.
Still, Abdullah’s assistant, Yaakob, was one who chose to join the party during this time.
“I originally came from a village in the Pasir Puteh district of Kelantan. The people there were very poor, and they are still poor. At first I was just curious about these people fighting in the jungle for a better life. The Malaysian Government’s anti-communist propaganda was very strong but I wasn’t that happy with what I learnt in school. Then when I joined them, I found that I could accept their ideas and their way of life.”
“I was trained to survive in the jungle, to use arms and certain martial arts tactics. Sometimes we fought for self-defence, sometimes we had to create trouble to maintain a presence in the area.”
There was no room for sentiment in those days, he added. “There were hantu (spies) who informed on us and led many cadres to their death. If we found out who they were, we killed them.”
Winding down (1974-1989)
Eventually the CPM struggle came to a long drawn-out halt, as the foreign policy of China changed and its regime became more friendly with the Malaysian Government.
“By the last few years, we were at an impasse with the Thai army and we stopped shooting at each other. Whereas once we had to disguise ourselves to move about in the local towns, we were practically out in the open before the ceasefire,” explained Yaakob.
“Eventually even though most of us were Malaysian, we had been residing in Thailand for so long that it was the Thai Government and army who were keen to see our situation resolved once and for all. To that end, they were prepared to furnish us with houses and land.”
Current village headman Droman Binza, 52, is a Thai who chose to join the CPM in the 1970s. Instead of fighting, however, he found himself involved in peace negotiations and eventually played a part in the Hatyai peace accord.
“I felt that this was my struggle too, to improve the lives of the common people. I had three brothers who joined before me. I have stayed with Abdullah CD most of my life. He is a very intelligent, fair and honest leader and I try to emulate him.”
The people who live in idylic Kampung Chulabhorn 12 used to fight a war when they were members of the Communist Party of Malaya. Building new lives (1989-2009)
Now in their twilight years, most of the guerrillas are philosophical about their once violent lives.
“I feel satisfied in playing a role in bringing more independence into women’s lives. My granddaugther told me that it is because of our fight that modern women can work in office jobs and rise to great heights,” said Siti Mariam.
Said Liau: “The Chinese say if you drink water, you must remember where its source is from. Today, the Malaysian Government says they achieved independence through peaceful means. I think that’s wrong. Our people held strikes, we rioted and we spilt blood.”
Awang (Ismail) was a little more sanguine: “I think of it like this ... during the difficult times we were on the frontlines, but now there is peace and prosperity, it is my turn to be at the back. When you enter a war, you expect to die, but I didn’t die. Instead I will die from old age.”
Ramasamy, who now spends his days tending to his rubber and fruits trees, is proud of the progress of modern Malaysia.
“We wanted to fight the British to set up a democratic republic, but even though we failed, Malaysia has done well. In the last 20 years I have travelled to many countries in South-East Asia and I believe Malaysia is the most developed. I am proud of that.”
He is aware that the present generation may not understand what prompted him to choose the path he did.
“Things evolve, ideas evolve. Karl Marx, Chairman Mao – they all lived a long time ago. Some of their ideas can work, some not. Communist regimes did evil things despite having an original good intention of creating a society where all are equal. But I don’t regret the struggle.”
Looking ahead (2009- )
In the two decades since the Peace Accord was signed, most guerrillas have chosen to stay in Thailand and accept the favourable terms there. Their beautiful village appears to be run like a harmonious community that provides them with livelihoods.
Indeed, the village appears to be prospering under Droman’s stewardship. It has its own primary school, Sekolah Rendah Chulabhorn 12, which has about 100 pupils and six teachers. On weekends, the children attend classes on Islam and the Malay language and culture. The village clinic is currently being expanded into a regional medical centre.
“My job is to solve the problems of daily life and co-ordinate with various government agencies. I also head the village committee of 15 people. But, actually, we have had no major problems in the last 20 years. Nobody comes to disturb us,” said Droman.
He is optimistic about the future.
“We are not just a village of old fighters. We have around 200 young children here. Once they are old enough, say 15, we tell them about the struggle that led to the establishment of this village.
“Many like to stay here, but there are some who go and study elsewhere. People seek jobs in the towns, but even those who go, help the village so I believe we will survive and prosper.”
The warriors of Kampung Chulabhorn may not have succeeded in creating a Marxist paradise in Malaysia, but they have built a life and even a future from the ashes of their broken dream.
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