May 13 The victims stories (Part 1)

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First Published: 9:15am, Dec 13, 2012 Last Updated: 6:58pm, Dec 13, 2012 Nation by Mohsin Abdullah FZ.COM/Sam Fong

Kg Baru-born and bred Mohsin Abdullah meets 2 old friends who recount what happened on May 13. BEING Kampung Baru born and bred, I was witness to the May 13 tragedy back in 69. Ive written about May 13 many times before usually on the day itself to mark the anniversary. So to write about the tragedy now is perhaps a little odd. But not bad timing I must say. The timing, to me is right. Considering May 13 has been in the news of late courtesy of Datin Paduka Shuhaimi Babas government sponsored Tanda Putera movie and Wanita Umno head Datuk Seri Shahrizat Abdul Jalils fear of a recurrence of the tragedy should Malays lose their political power. Both created controversy and polemic political of course. And expect the ghost of May 13 to be resurrected even more as the 13th general election draws nearer. Hence this article, now. I met up with two old friends a few days ago and asked them was May 13

the result of politics? And can resurrecting May 13 work in getting political victory? And will the tragedy happen again? Why ask them you might wonder? Well both were residents of Kuala Lumpurs Kampung Baru where trouble started on that fateful day in 1969. Both were direct victims of May 13. Both are Chinese Malaysians. That I feel makes them qualified to talk about the tragedy and answer the questions. To me their opinion matters. So last Saturday I followed them back to Kampung Baru to the very spot their houses were in 69. The old houses were no more of course. But what happened 43 years ago, they can never forget. Oh yes. There was a fourth question which I asked them. But more on that later. At the tail end. But before the answers to the questions, their stories first: Michael Changs story May 13, 1969 was a Tuesday. Michael Chang Kum Yuen was 13 years old, a Form Two student at KLs famous St Johns Institution located not too far from his house in Jalan Stoney in Kampung Baru . Form One and Two students then (like now) went to afternoon school. And class usually ended at 6.15 in the evening. Somehow on May 13 69, students at St Johns were allowed to go home early as early as 5.30pm in fact. The teachers had decided to dismiss them early as there was supposed to be a "demonstration" later that evening. Obviously they were referring to the plan by Umno to have a procession of their own to counter victory parades held days earlier by the opposition, namely DAP and Gerakan (the party was part of the opposition then). Both parties had scored significant success at the general election held on May 10. So Michael, happy that lessons were cut short that day, went home. At about 6.30pm there was a commotion near his wooden house. He and his siblings were warned by their mother to lock the doors and windows and remain inside. It was common those days for gangs in our kampong to fight. Chinese gangs fighting each other to settle scores. We would just locked everything up and stay indoors until the fights were over. So that evening we thought it was the usual gang fight, remembered Michael. But the usual gang fight it was not. I peeked through the wooden wall of my house and saw a Malay youth coming out of the house opposite with parangs. And he distributed the parangs to others who had gathered nearby.

The youth, said Chang was an outsider and had come a few months earlier to stay with a Malay family whom Michael knew. I used to play with my friends Aziz and Harun but never knew that guy. He had come and stayed with the family of my two friends. Those days, Malay houses were located on one side of the narrow Jalan Stoney with the 40 odd Chinese families saying in wooden houses on the opposite side. My mum sensed trouble and decided we should flee. So we grabbed whatever things we could get our hands on fast and jumped into our car a blue Ford Anglia, recalled Michael. He still remembers the cars registration number BH 9770. My elder brother Kuen Siew, who was 22 then, was at the wheel. Myself, my three sisters and mum Ching Boh crammed into the car. And the car sped off leaving Michaels father Chang Chong Chee and another sister Chang Lui to take care of the house. At the junction of Jalan Stoney, my brother decided to turn right towards Campbell Road (now Jalan Dang Wangi). Had he turned left we would have headed towards Princess Road (now Jalan Raja Muda) where trouble had erupted .We probably would have been killed, said Michael. Still as the car was heading towards Campbell Road, they were set upon by a mob. Needless to say a Malay mob. According to Michael: They were armed with parangs and all kinds of objects used as weapons. They hit our car with a hard metal objects which made a gaping hole at the side. The windscreen was smashed. We panicked and were really scared. My brother just stepped on the accelerator and sped off and we managed to escape. As the car passed the Odeon theatre (opposite the present Pertama Complex), Michael saw people in panic running aimlessly. "They were office workers, stranded, didnt know what happened and didnt know where to go," he said. They drove along Jalan Tuanku Abdul Rahman and headed towards Lornie Road (now Jalan Syed Putra) and reached their destination a relatives house in Taman Seputeh off Old Klang Road (the present Jalan Klang Lama). And there they stayed for weeks without knowing the fate of their father and sister who had remained in Kampung Baru. And without the faintest idea how to get in touch with them. By then Kuala Lumpur was under curfew. Things in Old Klang Road were "relatively peaceful". Then one day my sister telephoned my relatives house to say she and dad were safe and were staying in Chin Woo Stadium which had been turned into a relief centre, Michael said. Other relief centres were nearby Stadium Negara and Kelab Sultan Sulaiman in Kampung Baru and the Kampung Baru mosque itself, to name a few.

We were so happy. Apparently, our Malay neighbours asked my dad to flee two days after May 13 as they had heard that a mob was coming for them. So he fled. But our house was set on fire and burned to the ground. Not too long after that phone call, Michaels mother decided to take her children to Chin Woo Stadium to be with her husband and daughter. Off they went during curfew relaxation hours and the family was reunited. Chin Woo Stadium was like a refugee camp. There were hundreds of people. All Chinese who had fled the violence, said Michael. There they stayed for months until the situation returned to normal. But Michael and family never went back to Kampung Baru. After all they had lost their house and whatever little belongings they had. So the family settled down somewhere in Weld Road (now Jalan Raja Chulan) and began life all over again. They had to start from scratch. Michael Chang now lives in Petaling Jaya, is a finance manager and a keen observer of politics. Teh Jit Siangs story Like Michael, Teh Jit Siang was also at home when the bloodbath began. Jit Siang was also then a Form Two student at St Johns. Thus he too went home early that evening. Jit Siang was living in one of the shophouses along Kampung Barus Hale Road (now Jalan Raja Abdullah). His father Teck Wah and his mother Mei Ying ran the Yik Wah coffee shop. The family, all 20 of them, lived upstairs. It was a big place enough to accommodate all of us," said Jit Siang. Across the road were the Malay houses. At about 6 something that evening, there was a commotion. Nobody suspected anything but something told us to close the shop and go upstairs, he said. That they did. And from the window of his bed room, Jit Siang saw some Malay youths running into a house nearby which was under renovation. "I could see heaps of weapons like parang and metal strips in the house and the youths were taking them out, he said. A while later a mob had gathered in front of his shophouse. "They were outsiders. Our Malay neighbours came and told them not to do anything there. Somehow they listened and left. Not too long after that, I saw the mob along Campbell Road (now Jalan Dang Wangi) facing a group of Chinese youths. Both groups were armed with parangs. But I dont

know why they did not clash and dispersed. Had they clashed many would have been killed. But the Malay mob returned to the row of shophouses Jit Siang was staying at. They went on a rampage and I saw them overturning cars including my fathers Morris Minor. They then set fire to the car. At about 9pm, Jit Siang and his entire family decided to flee. They came down the stairs, went out of the shop and walked to the nearby Campbell police station (now the Dangi Wangi police district headquarters). There were many people at the police station taking shelter. In the early hours of May 14 we were taken by police trucks together with the other Chinese families to the Chin Woo Stadium. And Chin Woo Stadium was home for months until the situation permitted them to return to Kampung Baru. Yes we came back to Hale Road and operated the coffee shop. There was no fear. We stayed in Kampung Baru for more than 10 years before finally moving out, said Jit Siang. Teh Jit Siang is now a gold trader and lives in Jalan Raja Laut which is not far from Kampung Baru. The row of shophouses he had stayed in is gone. In its place is a modern office block. Opposite, the Malay houses still stand. Some have been renovated and others, rebuilt. Now for the fourth question to them I was talking about earlier. Given what they had gone through, the sad, bitter and frightening experience during the May 13 bloodbath, do they despise the Malays? Are they Malay haters? Read more: http://www.fz.com/content/may-13-%E2%80%93-victims%E2%80%99stories-part-1#ixzz2VF6AvdN6

We were all losers on that day in '69

First Published: 1:35pm, Dec 14, 2012
Last Updated: 4:09pm, Dec 14, 2012 by Mohsin Abdullah FZ.COM/Sam Fong

In the 2nd part of their story, Chang, his sister and Teh share their views on May 13 incident. MICHAEL CHANG and Teh Jit Siang were "direct" victims of the May 13 tragedy, having endured the frightening nightmare together with their families. They also lost property to mobs which had gone berserk that evening 43 years ago. To me, both have the "locus standi" to talk about May 13. Their take on the subject does matter. Both strongly believe what happened was "pre-planned", citing how weapons were made easily available to the mobs. And Chang most definitely agrees May 13 was about politics. Substantially about Umnos internal politics at that time, geared to toppling prime minister Tunku Abdul Rahman by impatient and overly ambitious Umno leaders, using Chinese economic strength and (the Alliances) defeat at the May 10 general election as convenient justifications. The scale of violence which ensued was a case of plans gone wrong, he said. As for the resurrecting the ghost of May 13 for political mileage, Chang had this to say: Senior politicians from Umno have not failed to regularly raise the spectre of May 13 6

disturbances during Umno AGMs. I think theirs is a struggle for their personal survival from being prosecuted (for what he see as their wrongdoings), than it is a struggle for Malay rights, which were never eroded nor even threatened to be eroded. And to Chang, the potential" for May 13 Ver 2.0 to happen is getting "more and more distant as time passes. He went on to say: In my view, it will happen again only if the corrupted leaders become so desperate (that they are willing) to sacrifice the safety of the country to escape punishment for all the mega scandals and corruption they have benefitted from. Harsh words. Angry even. But the anger is not aimed at the Malays. Both Chang and Lim say they do not despise or hate Malays despite the bitter experiences they went through during May 13. This I can personally vouch for. Our Malay friends came and protected us when the trouble started. It was not Malays in general that caused trouble. Only a section, said Teh . Changs sister Ng Moi pointed out that it was our Malay neighbours who came and warned my father of an imminent attack by the mob. Her father and another sister then fled to take refuge at Chin Woo Stadium which was used as a relief centre. That warning saved their lives. To Chang, when May 13 happened he was just on the threshold of gaining emotional and mental maturity". So I was too young to fully comprehend the reasons for May 13 at the same time not too young to see and remember visually the signs of hardship, destruction of property and losses to livelihood. I saw also peoples insecurity, the fears of aftershocks to the main quake of May 13. Thankfully there were no real aftershocks. He said pre and post-69, he had the opportunity to attend a great school St Johns Institution subsequently to work in various places where we had Malay colleagues at all levels and ranks and I personally have not seen any individual Malay colleague who had given me reason to hate". Now all he has is hope. That more Malays will see non-Malays not as threats but as brothers and also vice versa. Not too long ago Umno politician and MP for Jerlun Datuk Mukriz Mahathir was reported to have said in Parliament that May 13 was a blessing in disguise in an obvious reference to the birth of the New Economic Policy after the disturbances. Many had expressed sadness to say the very least that a bloodbath could be likened to a blessing.

Equally sad that Malays have been constantly told they were the winners of the May 13 fight. The reality is we Malays and Chinese were all losers that day in 69. Read more: http://www.fz.com/content/we-were-all-losers-day-69#ixzz2VF7UpQQW