Tomorrow, Monday the 31 of August 2009 Malaysia will celebrate its 52nd Independence Day or Merdeka Day. Come September 16, Malaysians will celebrate Malaysia Day.
Malaysia was born on 16 September 1963 formed jointly by the four parties, namely Malaya, Singapore, Sarawak and Sabah. Two years later, Singapore left the federation.
Malaysia was born 16 days behind schedule because originally, the formaton of Malaysia was slated to be on August 31 to coincide with the independence Day of the Federation of Malaya. The delay was owing to Indonesia and the Philippines at a meeting with the Federation of Malaya on the formation of Malaysia in Manila from July 28 to August 31 1963, making a strong demand for an assessment by the UN in the form of plebiscite or referendum to be carried out for the people of Sarawak and North Borneo ( Sabah ) to reaffirm their wishes to be part of the new nation Malaysia although the Cobbold Commission had already submitted their findings that the majority of the people of both states were in favour of the idea in joining the federation.
That demand threw a spanner into the plans to declare August 31 as the birthday of Malaysia, resulting in a flurry of heated exchange between all the parties involved in the Manila Summit Conference. Indonesia was the more vocal of our two neighbours in opposing the formation of Malaysia, fearing that it was a British plan to attract some regions in Indonesia into the new federation, ultimately leading to the disintegration of the Republic.
That fear was, of course, unfounded but despite the assurance of Tunku Abdul Rahman that Malaysia had no such design, Indonesia still objects and the tension was only defused after U Thant, the UN Secretary, worked out a compromise assessment on the wishes of the people be carried out in the two states.
The UN assessment team mission was fraught with problems. Indonesia refused to send any observer to verify its finding in an attempt to obstruct the formation of Malaysia. On September 7, the UN Malaysia Mission ended its 10 day tour of Sarawak and proceeded to Sabah. On September 14, U Thant released the mission report which found that the majority of the people of Sabah and Sarawak strongly supported the formation of Malaysia.
With the last hurdle cleared, Malaysia was finally formed two days later on September 16 1963. The question is should Malaysia Day which falls on September 16 be celebrated on a national scale as well? Or be declared a public holiday to commemorate the formation of Malaysia which is more significant to the 1MALAYSIA concept. While the East Malaysian respected the decision to celebrate Merdeka Day with their Semenanjung brothers and sisters for the last 46 years, September 16 is also an important date without Sabah and Sarawak there is no MALAYSIA.
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