The President, Dr Benjamin Henry Sheares in his address to parliament delivered on 8 Feb 1977 said:
“My government has again been returned to office. The PAP won in all constituencies. This government has the highest number of votes, and the highest percentage of votes (72.4%) cast in the six general elections held since representative government in 1955...
…
The mandate on which my government was elected is clearcut. The issues were fought for months, indeed years, before the elections. Many of the opposition political parties, both those who took part in the elections and those who did not, repeated the demands of the Communist Party of Malaya (Malaya including Singapore) (CPM), regularly voiced over their clandestine radio. These demands include the unconditional release of all communist and pro-communist detainees, abolition of the Internal Security Act, and abolition of National Service.
The people have rejected these and supported the government, But it would be naive to believe that the Communist Party of Malaya, in their armed struggle for a communist Malaya, will not try to abuse the opportunities of the democratic processes, and the mass media, to help camouflage their armed struggle to grab power. They will continue to rebuild amongst small misguided student groups, like the Malayan New Democratic Youth League (MNDYL). Student groups in the Polytechnic and in other tertiary institutions have been and will be their recruiting areas. Small groups of activists will continue to manipulate our student organisations abroad in Britain and Australia, in active collaboration with British or Australian Marxists and Trotskyites, as the case may be. They now style themselves as the "new left". But their techniques of oft repeated lies, and their exploitation of innocent soft-hearted or soft-headed "liberals", are long-established techniques and tactics of the communists, learned by the CPM from other communist parties in Europe and Asia, repeated with minor variations on new audiences in different places. And there is always the younger, politically innocent, if not naive, generation.
The vote is also a renewed mandate not to be beguiled away from a most necessary law, which the British themselves drafted and promulgated when faced with communist insurgency in 1948, namely, detention of communist and pro-communist elements without going through the processes of a public trial accorded to ordinary criminals. My government, in accord with humane sentiment, will release them if they will denounce the CPM's use of force to seize power, and themselves forswear the use of force to unseat a constitutionally elected government…”
http://sprs.parl.gov.sg/search/report.jsp?currentPubID=00069334-ZZ
Looking back, it is interesting to know that less than two days after the delivery of that speech, G Raman was arrested and imprisoned without trial under the ISA. Five days later, his friends and acquaintances and many others were also arrested and imprisoned. They were accused of being euro-communists, whatever that means.
Who were the communists and were they as dangerous, powerful and influential as Lee Kuan Yew made them out to be?
Today we know that Lee Kuan Yew met the Plen (supposedly a representative of the CPM) who promised CPM support for the PAP candidate, Jek Yuen Thong (a former member of the Anti-British League) in the Hong Lim by election in 1961. That promise did not translate into victory for Jek. Ong Eng Guan won 72% of the votes. The Hong Lim by election therefore clearly proved that the CPM was no longer a threat (if it ever was a threat) to the security of Singapore in 1961.
We also know that for political survival, the PAP arrested political opponents and potential political opponents. Even before Operation Coldstore, Lord Selkirk UK Commissioner to Singapore in his letter dated 28 Apr 1962 to Reginald Maudling, Colonial Office wrote:
“The Singapore Special Branch have virtually failed to identify directly any communists during the last three years. Evidence on which to base repressive action is therefore almost entirely lacking… I must, however, warn you that Lee Kuan Yew is quite clearly attracted by the prospect of wiping out his main political opposition before the next Singapore elections. I think therefore that you will find him advocating a policy of provocation on Lim Chin Siong and his associates with a view to forcing them into unconstitutional action justifying their arrests. I hope that you may be able to impress upon Lee the risks to merger of such a course and our doubts whether we could give our support.”
Finally, we know that the British and the Tunku colluded and helped Lee Kuan Yew arrest all his political opponents in Operation Coldstore on 2 Feb 1963 despite the fact that Lim Chin Siong and his colleagues did not take any unconstitutional action. The British then left the victims to rot in jail for decades. As a consequence, the PAP reign supreme to this day. Such is the dirty game of politics.
Teo Soh Lung
* Ms Teo Soh Lung graduated from the Univ of Singapore with a Bachelor of Laws (LLB Hons) in 1973 and served her pupillage under the late David Marshall. In 1981, she set up her own law firm in Aljunied and in 1985, she co-founded the Law Society Criminal Legal Aid Scheme which offers free legal assistance for criminal cases to the poor and needy members of the public.
Ms Teo also chaired a sub-committee under the Law Society which reviewed the Legal Profession Amendment Bill. One of the amendments to the bill had sought to take away the duty of the Law Society to comment on legislation. She called an EGM of the Society which overwhelmingly passed a motion calling on the government to withdraw the bill. Shortly after, she was subpoenaed to appear before a Parliamentary Select Committee and was vigorously questioned by then PM Lee Kuan Yew. She steadfastly defended her stand and the Law Society. She was subsequently elected as a member of the Council of the Law Society.
Some months later, in May 1987, she was arrested and detained without trial under the ISA together with the others for purported involvement in a conspiracy to overthrow the Govt by force and replace it with a Marxist state. She was released after 4 months but was imprisoned again in 1988 for refuting the government’s allegations against her. She was finally released in June 1990.
Soh Lung published her memoir ‘Beyond the Blue Gate: Recollections of a Political Prisoner’ in 2010 and was one of the editors of ‘Our Thoughts Are Free: Poems and Prose on Imprisonment and Exile in 2009′.