DECLINE AND FALL
JJOWEVER much British prestige had declined in Burma and Malaya during the Japanese occupation, the situation on our return was not a revolutionary one, sueh as^the Dutch were faced with in the Netherlands East Indies. The measures of firmness with restraint that "we undertook on behalf of the Netherlands Government pending its return in authority are in contrast with the speed with which we are shedding our" responsibilities in Egypt, Malaya and Burma, a process which Mr. Churchill (who declared -he had not been appointed the King's First Minister to preside at the liquidation of the British Em- , pire) and those who think like him, regard with unfeigned aiarm. The unrest that developed in Malaya was not the result initially of internal agit^tion so much as Whitehall's singularly blundering prescription for a Malayan Union, which not only offended the native rulers by relegating both them and their historic territories to the background, but also disturbed nationalist sentiment by proposing to grant citizenship 011 such slight qualification that the native population would have been placed in a minority among Chinese and Indians. The avowed object of the British Government was to develop a community of interest among all races domiciled in the country but princes and people alike resented both the substitution of Resident Commissioners for the traditional chiefs, who would in future have no voice in general administration, and the merging of their States in a union which they neither sought nor understood. The timely arrival of Mr. Malcolm Alacdonald as first Gov-ernor-General of the Union gave the Government a chance of redeeming the situation and a representative constitutional committee has drafted a scheme for federation instead 'of the original plan. The preservation of regional authority for rulers of each of the nine States will ndt hamper a strong central administration and citizenship rights are proposed to be extended only to Chinese and Indians who/elect to give allegiance to Malaya as their "real home." As far as can be gathered from the discussions on the Burmese situation to date, it seems that the Home Government is bent on liquidating its commitments there as eompletely as it is prepared to do in India. -Some few days ago, we regarded the danger of the spreading of ^.ny future civil conflict beyond the confines of India as unlikely, party 011 the assumption that Britain and the United States would see to it that they kept a • controlling hand on the Burmese borderlands but if this bastion is evacuated, the quelling of fanatieal fires in Burma, iiidoChina (now in f erment) , Malaya and the East Indies would become a much more difficult and dangerous task.- Australia and New Zealand are vitally concerned with such a prospect, and we regard the eagerness With which the United States has accepted the invitation to take part in the Burmese discussion with a rueful kind of satisfaction. Apparently, neither the Commonwealth nor the New Zealand Govemments have discussed this matter in t*he light of their own future, or there would have been an echo of Mr. Churehill's protest at the apparent lack of safeguards for the remaining members of the Empire.
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Rotorua Morning Post, Issue 5285, 23 December 1946, Page 4
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526DECLINE AND FALL Rotorua Morning Post, Issue 5285, 23 December 1946, Page 4
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