Monday, 18 February 2013

Key events in Singapore and Malaya


Singapore 
A chronology of key events:

Colonial trading post

Financial district buildings of Raffles Place: Colonial trading post to teeming metropolis
  • Singapore population: 4 million
  • 1297: Port of Temasek founded
  • 1819: Sir Stamford Raffles sets up trading post
  • 1965: Singapore becomes a republic
1819 - Sir Stamford Raffles of British East India Company establishes trading post on Singapore island.
1826 - Singapore, Malacca and Penang become British colony of the Straits Settlements.
1832 - Singapore becomes capital of Straits Settlements. The port attracts thousands of migrants from China, India and other parts of Asia.
1867 - Straits Settlements become crown colony of British Empire.
1869 - Suez Canal opens, trade booms.
1922 - Singapore becomes main British naval base in East Asia.
1941 - World War II. Japan bombs Singapore.
1942 - Singapore falls to Japan, which renames it Syonan (Light of the South).
1945 - Japan defeated. Singapore under British military administration.
Malaya
A chronology of key events:
14th century - Conversion of Malays to Islam begins.

Capital: Kuala Lumpur

  • Settlement established 1857 by Chinese tin miners
  • Kuala Lumpur translates as "muddy confluence"
  • Population: 1.4 million
1826 - British settlements of Malacca, Penang and Singapore combine to form the Colony of Straits Settlements, from where the British extend their influence by establishing protectorates over the Malay sultanates of the peninsula.
1895 - Four Malay states combine to form the Federated Malay States.
1942-45 - Japanese occupation.
1948 - British-ruled Malayan territories unified under Federation of Malaya.
1948-60 - State of emergency to counter local communist insurgency.
1957 - Federation of Malaya becomes independent from Britain with Tunku Abdul Rahman as prime minister.
1963 - British colonies of Sabah, Sarawak and Singapore join Federation of Malaya to form the Federation of Malaysia.
1965 - Singapore withdraws from Malaysia, which is reduced to 13 states; communist insurgency begins in Sarawak.
1969 - Malays stage anti-Chinese riots in the context of increasing frustration over the economic success of the ethnic Chinese.
1970 - Tun Abdul Razak becomes prime minister following Abdul Rahman's resignation; forms National Front (BN) coalition.
Positive discrimination for Malays
1971 - Government introduces minimum quotas for Malays in business, education and the civil service.
1977 - Kelantan chief minister expelled from Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS), triggering unrest, a national emergency and the expulsion of PAS from the BN coalition.
1978-89 - Vietnamese refugees benefit from unrestricted asylum.
1981 - Mahathir Mohamad becomes prime minister.
1989 - Local communist insurgents sign peace accord with government.
1990 - Sarawak communist insurgents sign peace accord with government.
1993 - Sultans lose legal immunity.

Adapted from : 


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