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The Organization of the British Military Administration in Malaya, 1946–48

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 August 2009

Martin Rudner
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Extract

The British Military Administration in Malaya: A Political Analysis

On 15 August 1945 a British Military Administration (BMA) was established by Proclamation in Malaya, newly-liberated from wartime Japanese occupation. In its post-operational phase this BMA comprised the effective government, of Malaya and Singapore pending restoration of civilian regime. From today's perspective this military interregnum demarcated an historic break from Malaya's passive colonial past, as the critical 1945–46 period constituted a political watershed for the movement towards Malayan independence. It is not our purpose here to survey BMA policy and politics, for these have been well documented elsewhere, but rather to study functionally the governmental structures of Malaya's post-war British Military Administration.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Southeast Asian History , Volume 9 , Issue 1 , March 1968 , pp. 95 - 106
Copyright
Copyright © The National University of Singapore 1968

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References

1. Proclamation No. 1, BMA Gazette, Vol. 1, No. 1.

2. Proclamation No. 15, BMA Gazette, Vol. 1, No. 1.

3. Ibid.

4. Donnison, F. S. V., British Military Administration in the Far East, London: HMSO 1956, p. 319Google Scholar; see also Gamba, Charles's The Origins of Trade Unionism in Malaya, Eastern Universities Press, Singapore 1962, p. 20.Google Scholar

5. Cf. The Colonial Empire 1939–1947 (Cmd. 7167), London: HMSO 1947, Para. 308.Google Scholar

6. Cf. Gamba, , The Origins of Trade Unionism in Malaya, p. 32Google Scholar, footnote 67, and Hanrahan, G.Z., The Communist Struggle in Malaya, New York: Institute for Pacific Relations 1954, pp. 54–55.Google Scholar

7. On demonetization of Japanese scrip and its socio-economic effects see Donnison, , British Military Administration in the Far East, p. 223Google Scholar; Hanrahan, , The Communist Struggle in Malaya, p. 55Google Scholar; and Gamba, , The Origins of Trade Unionism in Malaya, p. 49Google Scholar. Hanrahan and Gamba argue that a major factor inducing the British to demonetize the Japanese scrip was that the Malayan Communist Party, inter alia had accumulated considerable quantities of “banana currency” in order to finance their post-war political programme. Little has indeed been written on Japanese wartime currency; for a contemporary commentary see Onn, Chin Kee, Malaya Upside Down, Singapore 1946, pp. 212–213Google Scholar and also King, F. H. H., Money in British East Asia, London: HMSO 1957, p. 23Google Scholar. On the monetary problems of liberation in Europe and North Africa see Tamagna, F.M., “The Fixing of Foreign Exchange Rates” in The Journal of Political Economy LIII, No. 1 esp. pp. 62–66.Google Scholar

8. For a critique of the Rubber Buying Unit's distribution of supplies to smallholders see Bauer, P.T., Report on a Visit to the Rubber Growing Smallholdings of Malaya, London: HMSO 1948Google Scholar (Colonial Research Paper No. 1), pp. 52–56.

9. On the factors influencing BMA wages policy see Donnison, , British Military Administration in the Far East, pp. 312–313, 328Google Scholar and the (McFadzean) Report of Prices and Wages, British Military Administration, 30 November 1945.

10. As the largest single employer in Malaya and Singapore the BMA had a common interest with employers in keeping wages low and labour weak and disunited. On the development of post-liberation trade union policy see Gamba, , The Origins of Trade Unionism in Malaya, pp. 7–20Google Scholar; Hanrahan, , The Communist Struggle in Malaya, pp. 54–55Google Scholar; and Josey, Alex, Trade Unionism in Malaya, Donald Moore, Singapore 1954.Google Scholar

11. Vide. Purcell, Victor, Malaya: Communist of Free?, Victor Gollancz, London 1954, p. 42.Google Scholar