A brief introduction to Malaysia
A lush, tropical peninsular located just north of Singapore and south of Thailand, Malaysia has observed many transitions of colonial rule over the past four centuries, starting with the Dutch and Portuguese followed by the Japanese rule during the second world war, and finally by the British, who in August 31st 1957 after much lobbying and negotiations between our first Prime Minister, Tunku Abdul Rahman, gave us our independence. What followed was a period of economic restructuring, industrial development and social configuration[1], which brought Malaysia to its current state. In the wake of decolonization, Malaysia shifted its focus to industrialization; indeed, it capitalized on its natural endowments of crude oil and established its own oil and gas industry Petronas in August 1974 and subsequently its own automobile industry, Proton, in 1983. These “infant industries” will be extensively analysed in the latter part of this series.
There are three major ethnicities (the word “race” is deliberately averted for reasons to be explained later) in the country. The first is the Malay ethnicity. They originated from neighbouring Indonesia (also known as “Sumatra” during that time) and make up 50.7% percent of the population.
The second largest ethnic group in Malaysia are the Chinese, who accommodate 23.7% of the population. They occasioned from the Chinese traders who settled in Malaysia to exchange their wares (usually pottery and trinkets) during the mid-1800s.
The remainder of the population consists of Aborigines (11%) and people of Indian descent (7.1%)