British painted communism, MCP as a Chinese insurgency, says expert

FMT:

 

British painted

communism, MCP as a

Chinese insurgency, says

expert

Rex Tan

-28 Mar 2025, 09:00 AM

Ng Sze Chieh says the MCP had sought to liberalise Malays from feudalism, Indians from harsh labour in the estates, and Chinese from Confucian patriarchy.

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New Era University College’s Ng Sze Chieh says while the MCP was predominantly Chinese, there was a “significant” number of Malay and Indian members.

PETALING JAYA: 

Communism and the causes championed by the now-defunct Malayan Communist Party were racialised as a “Chinese insurgency” by British anti-communist propaganda, an expert in Southeast Asian history said.

Ng Sze Chieh, an assistant professor at New Era University College, said that although the MCP was predominantly composed of Chinese members, there was also a significant representation of Malays and Indians.

He said the MCP included an Indian regiment, albeit for a short time, while the Malay regiment remained active until the end of its struggle in 1989.

“But people downplayed the Malay and Indian membership because British propaganda mills were very effective in painting the idea that Asia was under a Chinese communist threat,” he told FMT.

Ng, who co-authored “Narratives from Piyamit: Life Stories at the End of the Revolution”, with Murray Hunter, added that the MCP’s vision included liberating the Malays from feudalism, Indians from harsh labour in the estates, and Chinese from Confucian patriarchy.

However, these struggles were rarely discussed in mainstream discourses, he said.

“Our official historiography continued this British narrative and this is dangerous because we are presenting an unobjective version of history.”

Ng added that the propaganda materials from China, often in Mandarin, had also limited MCP’s outreach to Indians and Malays.

“The support and materials they got in the 1970s were from China. It was hard to translate because they barely had enough translators, so it was easier to propagandise to the Chinese community.”

Ng said one of those he had interviewed, Sheng Rong, a former guerrilla of Tamil ethnicity, joined the communist cause based on his conviction rather than racial or linguistic affinity to the MCP.

In the book, Sheng Rong said he met a group of communists propagandising in Betong when he was 17, but he “didn’t understand a word of it” as he could not understand Mandarin.

However, he was deeply impressed by the discipline and security displayed by the uniformed group and eventually followed them into the jungle.

Published by Gerakbudaya’s imprint, Strategic Information and Research Development Centre (SIRD), “Narratives from Piyamit” can be purchased online or in its physical store.