The Singapore Bicentennial: a Celebration or an Inquisition?

Bronze statue of Stamford Raffles outside Victoria Theatre

Singapore, January 2019.

People reading this might think I'm suffering from colonial hangover and yearn for the return of empire and its excesses especially against the native peoples. 

No, absolutely not. I just have issues with the verbal diarrhoea directed at Raffles at this time of so called bicentennial celebration of his founding of modern Singapore. I'm only speaking for the dead, those who have no voice to answer the barrage of accusations directed at them. Whichever side you're on, I ask for your indulgence to read without prejudice.

In this bicentennial year of the founding of Singapore by Thomas Stamford Raffles, forces envious of his immense contribution to the rise of this city state would be out to steal the thunder from him, perhaps even photoshop him out of the popular narrative. Through a process of spins, character assassination, misinformation and disinformation, the myth makers will focus on prior historical events to put Raffles in the shade. 

Under the guise of paying homage to Singapore's founder, they will undermine Raffles by playing up the splendour that was Singapore before he arrived.

Starting January a multi-prong blitzkrieg in print, on air and online propagating an alternative narrative rolled out from the very spot where Raffles stepped ashore 200 years ago. 

"Raffles did not discover Singapore!" it was pointed out at the glittering inaugural party. Who ever claimed that Raffles did? No school kid was ever taught that Raffles discovered Singapore, so why the need for correction?  

Then a display of rival statues representing famous characters before and after 1819 was mounted with much fanfare next to Raffles' own polymarble casting on the river promenade. The effect was cognitive dissonance. 

“What on earth are these gatecrashers doing at my party?” Raffles might well ask.

Gatecrashers from different eras at Raffles' Bicentennial bash.
Photo credit: © Tan Cheng Ling 2019. All rights reserved.

Perhaps to widen mass appeal and add the ‘wow!’ factor to the campaign, a multimedia Bicentennial Experience was launched at Fort Canning encapsulating this new narrative on a grand scale. 

The Singapore Bicentennial Experience showcases 700 years of history in an multisensory presentation.

Spinning a romanticised version of the times before Raffles.

The question is why now? 

Wouldn't juxtaposing Singapore's past be a party pooper on the celebration of Raffles' defining moment in founding a free port that changed the course of history for an island nation? 

However that glorious chapter in our history is more the stuff of spin artists than historical fact. Mostly pure speculation exists based on scant artefacts from archaeological digs such as pottery fragments, coins and jewellery. Nothing even a shadow of Angkor or Borobudur has ever been found to date.

Borobudur. Photo credit: Gunawan Kartapranata - own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4838861

Five Ways the Myth Makers will Steal the Thunder

#1 Singapore history goes back over 700 years not just 200

They will romanticise Singapore's past and paint a picture of a booming centre of trade long before Raffles set foot here. This is partly true but what is downplayed is that Singapore had already vanished into the mists of time when the western powers were jockeying for supremacy in the East Indies. 

The tipping point for that disappearing act came with the move to Malacca by King Parameswara of Singapura (Sanskrit name for Singapore meaning Lion City). Malacca then rose to eclipse Singapore, which faded into obscurity and was reclaimed by the jungle, reducing it to a mere sea town or Temasek as the locals called it. 

In fact when Raffles came ashore there was only a fishing village with no sign of a city in ruins but a 3m high boulder with some mysterious inscriptions and remnants of a low wall. Recent archaeological excavations have failed to find any trace of a lost city on the scale of Angkor or Borobudur, just the usual artefacts indicating the existence of human habitation and commerce.

The Singapore Stone, National Museum collection, the only remaining fragment of the boulder
that stood at the river mouth at the time of Raffles' landing.
Photo credit: National Heritage Board, Singapore.

Monumental temples of Angkor Wat, Cambodia.
Photo credit: Sam Garza - originally posted to Flickr as Angkor Wat, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7709377

#2 Farquhar should be credited with Singapore's early success

Books, magazine articles and newspaper spreads and op-eds have already been published to lend greater credence to Major William Farquhar, Raffles' sidekick and appointed First Resident. 

Raffles was an idealist, Farquhar the realist. What Raffles ordered for the town's welfare, Farquhar was to dismantle in the name of development. Many of the vices that Raffles sought to suppress were relaxed under Farquhar's watch in order to raise revenue to fund the administration's growing expenses. 

Major William Farquhar was appointed First Resident by Raffles.
Image credit: Artist unknown. Public Domain.  https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Portrait_of_William_Farquhar_(c._1830).jpg

#3 Raffles was a fake idealist

Raffles was a product of the Enlightenment and his idealism showed in his opposition not just to common vices such as cock fighting, gambling and prostitution which he banned, but also opium smoking and the slave trade. It is ironic that his employer, the East India Company, was a key player in international opium trafficking.

Opium smoking from "Nanyang, a graphic novel"
Image credit: © Tan Choon Hong 2019. All right reserved.  

But those bent on casting doubts on his stand against slavery have called out how during his tour of duty as Lieutenant-Governor of Java, he failed to curtail the use of slaves at his official residence. However it must be noted that freeing slaves was outside his purview as a caretaker of a foreign country handed to the British by the Dutch under a treaty to prevent it falling into Napoleon's hands.   

#4 Raffles was a looter

With the defeat of the Dutch by the French, the East Indies including Java became French territory. Raffles was tasked with mounting an expedition to take Java for the English crown. It was a walkover, and Raffles was reported to have ransacked the palace of the Sultanate of Yogyakarta and carted away the manuscripts of the court archives. 

Was it for personal profit or for the greater good of scholarship and preservation for posterity? 

A corner of the present day palace complex of the Sultanate of Yogyakarta.
Photo credit: Gryffindor - own work, Kraton of Yogyakarta, Indonesia. CC BY-SA 3.0
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki

While not condoning the theft of national treasures, one has to admit that the practice of pillaging cultural artefacts as spoils of war has yielded some unintended benefits for mankind in general. A not inconsequential volume of antiquities became the responsibility of the host nation and the expense for their restoration, upkeep and exhibition can be a heavy burden. If not for these custodians they might have ended up in the underground antiquities market to be squirrelled away in private collections, never to be seen again by researchers and the general public.

Coincidentally while researching this topic, a report appeared in the Jakarta Post dated May 9, 2019 that the Brits have returned some manuscripts taken from the palace, though only as digital copies.  

#5  Raffles had short stints in Singapore so Farquhar should be credited
with the heavy lifting

In today's terms Raffles would be considered a super achiever who set clear KPIs for his team and knew how to delegate. He planted the seeds of success and oversaw the master plan for the town, allocating land and other resources among competing interests, and issued a clear blueprint for the future of the settlement. Then instructed Farquhar to get on with it.

It is a fact of life that the man with the vision gets the accolades ahead of those who take it to fruition. 

Raffles' vision of a duty-free port set in the midst of the Dutch stranglehold on the archipelago trade
was to catapult the nascent settlement into the global metropolis it is today.
Image credit: National Heritage Board, Singapore

On the Bicentennial of his founding of Singapore,
Raffles would have been proud to know that his brainchild had succeeded beyond his wildest dreams.
Photo credit: © Tan Keng Yang 2019. All rights reserved.

Whatever his failings, real or concocted, one cannot underestimate the role that Raffles played as the founder of Singapore. It’s no flight of fancy to say that if not for his dogged pursuit of a foothold in the archipelago to crack the spice trade monopolised by the Dutch, this island Singapore would today be no better than Johor or Batam.  

Disclaimer: These are rants of a layman with some interest in history and not those of an academic. Anyone offended by the remarks can simply dismiss them as noise from the lunatic fringe or leave some comments below.