History - Contemporary

Question 1

Years prior to independence

Answer 1

1963 - Independence from the UK. Merger with Malaysia
1964 - Race riots

Question 2

Location of the 1964 race riots

Answer 2

Mostly Kallang and Geylang

Question 3

Reasons for merger of Singapore and Malaya for Singapore

Answer 3

Singapore lacked resources for survival so LKY wanted

Question 4

Reasons for merger of Singapore and Malaya for Malaya (2)

Answer 4

• Initially Malaya didn’t want because
  with Singapore, there would be more Chinese than Malays but adding Borneo secured more Malays in Malaya and
• could not let communism have a base to influence Malaysia from Singapore over which M wouldn’t have any control. Made especially clear with the recent election of a communist MP at Hong Lim

Question 5

Political tensions when Singapore was Malaysian

Answer 5

PAP was promoting equality of race while the main Malayan party was promoting affirmative actions in favour of Malays.
Agreement for merger was that each party would remain outside of the realm of the other one, which they didn’t

Question 6

Details of the events of the race riots

Answer 6

2 series of riots based on misinformation and tensions and triggered by a small incident

Question 7

First race riot

Answer 7

Triggered during a Muslim
procession by
- A Chinese throwing a bottle at Malays in the Padang
- later, Malays attacking a Chinese cyclist

Question 8

Casualties of the race riots

Answer 8

~20 killed, hundreds wounded

Question 9

Event linked to the Konfrontasi in Singapore

Answer 9

The MacDonald House bombing

Question 10

MacDonald House

Answer 10

Building housing HSBC and some foreign Consulates in Orchard

Question 11

Controversy around the MacDonald House bombing

Answer 11

In 2014, Indonesian named a military ship after the terrorists, tensions, then apologised but kept the name

Question 12

Was the MacDonald House bombing the only one

Answer 12

No, dozens in Singapore alone

Question 13

Singapore’s final independence

Answer 13

Expelled from Malaysia by the parliament unanimously but with Singaporean representatives absent

Question 14

Reaction of LKY to expulsion

Answer 14

He cried in public but had secretly planned this with Malaysia as he saw that Malaysia would struggle to maintain peace between races while Singapore would still have access to the Malaysian market

Question 15

How did Singapore organise its government after the expulsion

Answer 15

The local government, parliament, etc. became the sovereign gouvernement