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Malaysia

Malaysia is located on the South China Sea in Southeast Asia. The country consists of two parts: West or Peninsular Malaysia and East Malaysia. West Malaysia is located on the Malay Peninsular between the Strait of Malacca and Gulf of Thailand, contiguous with the mainland of the Southeast Asian subcontinent. West Malaysia shares the peninsular with Thailand to the north and the city-state of Singapore at its southern tip. East Malaysia occupies the northern portion of Borneo Island, which it shares with Brunei and Indonesia. The two parts of Malaysia are separated by 400 miles of the South China Sea.

West Malaysia accounts for about 60 percent of the country's 127,320 square miles total land area.

Malaysia is a multiethnic nation consisting of a federation of 13 states with Kuala Lumpur as the capital and largest city. Indigenous or Malayan peoples constitute about 60 percent of the population. The rest is made up of ethnic Chinese (26 percent); ethnic Indians (7 percent) and small numbers of others. The national language of Malaysia is Bahasa Malaysia or Malay. English, Chinese and Tamil are also widely spoken.

The official religion of Malaysia is Islam, practiced by more than half the population. There is also Buddhism, Confucianism, Daoism, Hinduism and Christianity and traditional beliefs being practiced by smaller numbers of the population.

Due to its strategic position straddling the South China Sea lanes, Malaysia has been greatly impacted by successive waves of outside influences. As far back as 100 BC, Chinese and Indian traders were known to have been in the area. The Indians brought with them their religions of Hinduism and Buddhism which were adopted, along with other aspects of Indian life and culture, by local kings and chieftains on the Malay Peninsular.

From about 100 BC on, the Malay Peninsular was dotted with numerous kingdoms, none of them strong enough to check pirate activity and secure trade in the area. In 1400 AD when the kingdom of Malacca was founded the situation changed. Malacca was founded by Parameswara, a Sumatran prince, who took on Islam as a religion. The new kingdom prospered and provided a safe haven for visiting trading ships. Its influence and Muslim religion spread throughout the Malay Archipelago.

The Portuguese conquered Malacca in 1511. In 1641, the Portuguese were in turn ousted from Malacca by the Dutch. For over a hundred years, the Dutch held sway in the region and like the Portuguese before them, warred constantly with neighboring kingdoms. In 1785, the British secured Pinang Island from the Sultan of Kedah. During the Napoleonic Wars, in order to forestall a possible French take-over, Britain took over control of Malacca in 1795. Subsequently, in 1815, Malacca was returned to the Dutch and in 1819 the British founded Singapore. Five years later, through the Anglo-Dutch Treaty, Britain secured control over Malacca from the Dutch in return for Sumatra. Penang, Malacca and Singapore became known as the Straits Settlements under a British governor based in Singapore.

From the Straits Settlements the British were able to gradually extend indirect rule over the Malay kingdoms. Britain also gradually gained control of the north coast of Borneo between 1841 and 1891 when a second Anglo-Dutch treaty established the border between British and Dutch Borneo. The British imported great numbers of Indians and Chinese as laborers into the Malaya colony.

Beginning in 1941, as part of its World War II campaign, Japan seized control of Malaya, Sarawak and North Borneo, and held them until her defeat at the end of the war in 1945.

In preparation for Malayan independence, the British, in 1946, announced plans to form the Malayan Union as a unitary state with equal citizenship for Malays and the immigrant groups. The Malays resisted this plan and formed their own political party, the United Malays National Organization (UMNO) that same year to seek independence under Malay control. In 1948 the peninsular states formed the Federation of Malaya. In 1949, the Malayan Chinese Association (MCA) was formed. The MCA desired Malayan independence with equal citizenship, but it also wanted collaboration with the UMNO. In the early 1950s, three political parties, based on the three main communities in Malaysia -- the indigenous, United Malays National Organization; the Malayan Chinese Association; and the Malayan Indian Congress -- came together to form a new party, The UMNO-MCA-MIC Alliance, which overwhelmingly won the first general elections in 1955.

A communist insurgency that had started in 1948 posed a threat to national unity and seemed capable of disrupting the drive toward independence, but was effectively defeated by 1954 and ultimately in 1960.

Between 1955 and 1956, the Alliance, with the British, worked out a formula for national independence which provided for citizenship for all Malayans, but left the government firmly in Malay hands. On August 31, 1957 Malaya was granted independence. The first prime minister was Tunku Abdul Rahman, the leader of the UMNO.

In 1961 Prime Minister Rahman suggested a union of Malaya with Brunei, Sabah, Sarawak and Singapore, to form Malaysia. The British agreed to the plan in principle in October 1961. After exhaustive consultations and a referendum in the affected states, the British government began the process of making a constitution for Malaysia. Brunei pulled out of the union in July 1963. Neighboring countries, Indonesia and the Philippines had their own objections to the union, but could not stop it. Malaysia, made up of, Malaya, Sabah, Sarawak and Singapore, formally came into existence on September 16, 1963.