Ok so the Battle for Merger book has somewhat unnecessarily been relaunched. But at the National Archives there are tapes of radio debates on the 1962 National Referendum Bill. The first debate featured Ong Eng Guan, Lee Siew Choh, David Marshall, Goh Keng Swee and Lee Kuan Yew. It was a robust affair, and David Marshall notably painted a critical picture of the referendum (where one could choose the type of merger, but not whether they wanted merger or not): How are they to vote? The Minister of Law says the people must answer ‘yes’ to one question. You want to beat your mother? You want to beat your wife? You want to beat your daughter? Say ‘yes’. And those of you who are not PAP, how are you to answer? You leave it blank, it means that you go for the PAP. We want to beat our mother, according to the Assembly with 26 votes. This is PAP democracy. Even Hitler, Stalin and Mao, in the list of candidates, they put out for elections, allow you to say ‘no’. They out-Hitler Hitler in their fascism, and out-Mao Mao in their communism. These dictators. This is not about siding with Marshall or the PAP, or any of the political parties, but acknowledging the great controversy that merger was, rather than taking one mans words. URL for the 1st radio debate: nas.gov.sg/archivesonline/audiovisual_records/record-details/51576c01-1164-11e3-83d5-0050568939ad
Posted on: Tue, 30 Dec 2014 15:01:10 +0000
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