Annual report on the Malayan Union.

Date:
[1948]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Annual report on the Malayan Union. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    228/234 (page 190)
    Security Forces on operations and obtain the facts for themselves and through the inauguration of a series of regular Press Con¬ ferences. The latter were attended by the Chief Secretary, the Commissioner of Police, the General Officer Commanding Malaya District, the General Officer Commanding Singapore District, the Air Officer Commanding, a Naval representative with other leading officials and provided the Press with regular opportunities to obtain a broad view of the situation and to obtain the answers to questions concerning it. There is no Press Censorship in Malaya. In the period July-December, 1,175 official Press Releases concerning matters related to the Emergency were issued through the Press Section of the Department of Public Relations which maintained a teleprinter service with Singapore, Ipoh and Penang on a 14-hour day basis. The diversities of language in the plural society of Malaya allied to the fact that the majority of the population live in isolated villages and on estates and mines, in riverine kampongs and in \ rural areas, necessitated the planning and production of simple leaflets in vernacular languages which could be readily disseminated by aircraft, police patrols, mobile public-address units and other agencies. Thirty million leaflets written in simple terms in vernacular languages, co-ordinated to a basic plan, and varying from news and explanations of the many Emergency Regulations to psychological warfare and anti-Communist material were prepared and distributed up to the end of the year. Simple vernacular papers in Malay and Tamil were prepared and distributed in rural areas and to labour forces on estates to a total of 540,000 during the period. Many estates and mines co-operated by assisting in distribution of leaflets and news-sheets to their labour forces. Twelve Mobile Public Address/Cinema Units of the Department of Public Relations played a considerable part in informing the rural population. Between June and December, Field Officers of these Units addressed some one and a quarter million people in vernacular languages on matters of importance in connection with the Emergency. That the bandits appreciated the danger to their cause which the work directed by the Emergency Publicity Committee presented is evident from strong reactions to it in their propaganda output. Their own output of propaganda was on a considerable scale mainly through crudely mimeographed pamphlets the contents of which varied from the abstractions of Marxist-Leninist theory to crude threats of murder and demands for extortion money. The onset of the Emergency meant a large amount of extra work to the Public Works Department in the erection of defence works, detention camps, new police posts and accommodation, etc. The cost of these works was in the neighbourhood of §2,700,000.