The first Sarawak district council elections was held in the end of 1959++.
I was then about 10 and I had no idea what all the hullabaloo was about. Mum later told us that there was a great deal of shouting in town when the final results were announced in the evening. She was neither amused nor worried.
That evening, my father being very taciturn, had come home more than cheerful.
He had been elected by popular vote to the District Council. For him it was nothing to shout about. It only meant that he was elected and he would continue to be of service to his fellowmen.
To the family whether he was an elected member or not, he was always helping people to go to the government departments to handle some translation work, or negotiate with the DO or Resident to get things done. He was fluent in English, Chinese, Malay and Iban. My grandfather was pleased I suppose as he liked some social recognition for his children. He had been pleased by the marriages, graduations and other achievements of his children.
He would have hung the graduation photos of all his children on the Tiong Wall of Fame at home. But he did not for reasons best known to himself. But we knew he was pleased.
In those days, every office or shop was within walking distance, and walking was never a problem with my father, although he did drive a company (KAB) car. Many villagers approached my father for help especially in getting government welfare. He used to help many to fill forms. If these people went to the petition writers they would have to pay a little. So they saved some money by coming to see my father.
Another issue during the last year of that 50's decade, I remember the adults discussing the number of children a family should have. Sister No.4 was born in 1958. Would my parents have more children? We were not really a big family by Foochow standard. But uncles and aunties were concerned saying that mum should stop having children. The issue of getting more boys in the family was still very significant and I believed my grandfather was still hopeful to have more grandsons.
Since I was still young I did not listen to adult conversations.
Adults also talked about people making extra bucks by being greedy and how a few men grew rich because they were well connected. I looked at my father, an elected council member who did a lot of work without getting paid even. I remember how my father refused to accept a big gift of a white pomfret from a grateful relative who appreciated my father's help in doing some paper work. The poor man had to cycle away with the fish, still tied to a string..
My father was a very simple person so to speak, actually very spartan in outlook. He did not have a large office at home, with filing cabinets and lots of folders. He did have a safe to keep something. It was an open secret in the family he did not have much money, checque books or land titles, unlike many people in Sibu who had tens of land titles in their safes. He worked from a simple desk, with two drawers.
My father believed in being a clean politician and a good social worker. He could not be coerced into doing anything he did not like. That was probably the reason why he finally gave up party politics in the end.
It reminded him too much of the Imperial Qing Politics, the Chinese Revolution and the Communist Movement .
(++NB It was a multi-tiered system functioned to elect 24 members into Council Negri (now Sarawak State Legislative Assembly).[3
No comments:
Post a Comment