why and how may 13 happened

The series of events surrounding the ‘May 13’ riot has been documented by Dr Kua Kia Soong in his latest book May 13: Declassified Documents on the Malaysian Riots of 1969 which will be launched on Sunday in conjunction with the 38th anniversary of the tragedy.

read the article in full from malaysiakini or beritamalaysia.

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Official figures said the May 13 riots claimed 196 lives, 180 were wounded by firearms and 259 by other weapons, 9,143 persons were arrested out of whom 5,561 were charged in court, 6,000 persons rendered homeless, at least 211 vehicles and 753 buildings were destroyed or damaged.

[…]

 "The (official) history of May 13 is full of nonsense, it doesn’t reveal anything. It pins the blame on the opposition party which was not true, they were not the responsible party," Kua told malaysiakini in a recent interview.

"My book shows the responsible party were those ascendent state capitalist class (in Umno), elements within that gave rise and implemented this plan.There was a plan based on the people who assembled at the (Selangor) menteri besar’s house.

[,,,]

Kua maintained the May 13 incident was a coup d’etat against the Tunku by the then emergent Malay state capitalists – backed by the police and army – to seize control of the reign of power from the old aristocrats to implement the new Malay agenda.

A plot to oust Tunku

He opined the riots were works of "Malay thugs" orchestrated by politicians behind the coup.

read the article in full from malaysiakini or beritamalaysia.

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notice above it said it was started by UMNO? and the mentioned of ‘malay thugs’? see, as far back as in 1969, there were already malay thugs so ain’t no surprise when we see them in machap and ijok recently.

and from ktemoc:

the true reason leading to the riots was the ruling perikatan party, or to be nire specific, its dominant component, UMNO, losing so many seats that it was on the verge of surrendering selangor to DAP.

remember this remark by one UMNOputera youth at the last UMNO annual general assembly:

Malay rights cannot be challenged, otherwise the Malays will run amok and May 13 will happen all over again in Kuala Lumpur,"

neat. may 13, 1969, many of us had all along known silently it was UMNO who started it but of course we see the govt. and all those UMNOputeras swimming in the river of nile (in denial lah!) as they prefer to blame the opposition, as always. now, this wiseguy in 2006 confirmed that yes, the last riot was started by malays (UMNO), so another riot coming up will be started by malays again. nice going. according to dr kua, it is the ‘ghost of may 13‘.

lots of info/write-up on dr kua’s book at elizabeth wong’s blog, including how she wrote that the book almost did not go to print.

the launching of the book will be held on may 13 (this sunday) at the selangor chinese assembly hall, so if you are free, do drop in. the details as in suaram homepage:

SUARAM cordially invites you to

Book Launch "May 13 – Declassified Documents on the Malaysian Riots of 1969" by Dr. Kua Kia Soong

"the first credible account of the May 13, 1969 racial riots in Malaysia based on documents recently declassified at the Public Records Office in London"

and

Public Forum "Revisit May 13 Tragedy: Race Relations and National Unity After Independence"

Speakers: Dr. Syed Husin Ali, Dr. S. Nagarajan, Dr. Kua Kia Soong

Date: 13 May 2007 (Sunday)

Time: 10.00am-1.00pm

Venue: Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall, Kuala Lumpur

Admission to the book launch and the public forum is free. The public forum will be conducted in Bahasa Malaysia and English. For more information, please contact SUARAM, Ms. Enalini Elumalai at +603 7784 3525 or email: suaram@suaram.net