WHAT COLONIALISM HAS DONE TO US, MALAYSIAN

Being one of the countries that were colonized for many years, Malaysia has had the repercussion of it until today. Before the end of World War two and the emergence of nationalism (the right of colonized country to be independent), superpower nations liberated Africa and Asia; imposing their law, transporting in immigrants and suppress local demand for control of the economy. Thus, for hundreds of year’s doings, definitely adverse effects of colonialism are before our Malaysian eyes clearer than ever.

In the case of Malaysia, the crystal clear effect is the appearance of racial population that we have today. During the British rule, they brought in Indian and Chinese to serve in the plantation industry and the mining industry. Not just that, the bad part of is was when the British government decided to divide these races into specific economical activities to work into, with minimum opportunity to work in other sector which are exploited by the British themselves. This ‘divide and control’ system put racial integration at bay and that affect our nation until today.

Depletion of national resources was perhaps the most unfortunate effect of colonialism to any country. As we know it, the historical reason why westerners dominated the third world was because to get their dirty hands on the abundance of natural resources the third world possesses. Just look at Lembah Kinta in Perak where mining of tin could never be performed again because the metal had finished quite some time ago. With fewer natural resources, Malaysia’s development will suffer continuous friction that slows it down.

However, we cannot deny the fact that colonialism has accelerated our development and technology advancement. Railway stations, telegraph, television and rubber estates are there because of the colonizers. It most probably will take us another hundred years to achieve that technology. Before the start of British rule over Malaysia, most states used traditional and inconvenient method to extract natural resources, administration of states and management of the economy. Not thinking of their method is the sole best way, but with the help of them, our nation had already had a functional system by the time our independence was at hand.

As the conclusion, the impacts of colonialism are with us until today. What we have to do is to break our dependence on the colonialism system and reform our political, economical and social system in our own ways. Never blame the past and its effects; emergence of racial fracture, exhaustion of natural resources and dependence on colonialism system, but we learn the mistakes of the past and improve the state of our nation.