SIR,—Mr. Walker clearly never read my article that he deplores
or he would not write that I never men- tioned Malays or ask if I met a good District Officer in a Kampong.
Really, a former deputy director of education should know that the word 'Malaysian' means people of Malay stock, from Indonesia to the Philippines. In fact the membership of our union was 100 per cent, among the staff of the only Malay language daily paper, Utusan Melayu. My vice-president was Malay and there were two other Malays on our executive of ten. At every annual meeting of the Malay Writers' League I was a guest of honour. I have been the guest of Malay headmen (Penghulus) from Kuala Trengannu to South Johore, also of British District Officers. The latter invariably de- plored (a) European bad manners, (h) the paper work from directorates that gave them no time to meet the people. I acknowledged the type as 'a leaven of Courageous Europeans.'
Having answered Mr. Walker's two questions, may I ask him two questions. How often in his directorate did he visit a Chinese middle school? What facilities for education in Chinese did his directorate give com- munities of Chinese squatters?
Mr. Walker says Europeans in Singapore would have learnt Chinese 'were it desirable.' How can it not be desirable to know the language of 80 per cent. of the population? When I was in Singapore the police boasted one European officer who spoke (but could not write!) Chinese.
I did not claim to blaze a trail. My 'discovery' was not that British officials Sometimes win the con- fidence of Malay Kampong dwellers, but that politically conscious South-East Asia will elect Englishmen as its spokesmen and even as its leaders. —Yours faithfully, 14 Great Ormond Street, WCI
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