Malaysia's Golden Jubilee

Albert J. Fernando is mesmerised by Malaysia, which celebrates its 50th independence anniversary today.

Anniversary: "Visit Malaysia-2007,"is the slogan found in public transport, shops, Malaysian Airlines planes, airports, public billboards and media so much that you are never far from this sign wherever you travel in Malaysia.

Ask any Malaysian about this much funded publicity campaign and he will tell you gladly that 2007 has great significance because this southeastern country is celebrating this year 50 years of independence from the British.

It was on August 31, 1957, that Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahaman declared Independence at Dataran

 Merdeka or Independence Square. (Tunku means "Royal" since he is the only Prime Minister to belong to a Royal family).

No wonder, therefore, that Malaysia is celebrating its Golden Jubilee of independence with countrywide festivals throughout 2007. The first major festival took place on a few weeks back at Putrajaya, the newly-built administrative capital situated about 25 km from Kuala Lumpur, the business and financial capital of the country.

The mega show was a colourful extravaganza showcasing the multicultural nature of Malaysia, with songs and dances of various communities such as Malays, Chinese and Indians. There were also Thai and Portuguese dances to remind some of the ancient influences in this country. The chief guest at this function was Prime Minister Dato Seri Abdullah bin Ahmad Badawi.

The parade, aptly termed "Colours of Malaysia, 2007," was watched by some 10,000 invitees including some 400 media and travel trade personnel from 47 countries, including Canada. (Unfortunately there were no journalists or travel trade representatives from Sri Lanka. Probably, the invitation must be gathering dust in some Sri Lanka official's file.)

As a participant from Canada, I was very much impressed not only by the pageant itself, but also by the efficient manner it had been organized. Not a minute was wasted in between performances since when one group of performers was leaving the stage, another group came on to present their item.

As well, on each of the 10,000 or seats there was a bag containing a fan, a bottle of water, sweet buns, a few other useful items, in addition to the program souvenir. The participants really appreciated the fan and the bottle of water as it was quite warm that evening. This shows how much of detailed planning had gone into organizing this major event to showcase Malaysia.

An English-speaking visitor will find something interesting in this Asian country: he can read signs and newspapers but generally will not be able to understand. This is because Bahasa Maleyu (Malay language) is written in the Roman alphabet.

However, going about in Malaysia, I found that some signs and terms can be understood although the spelling is somewhat different. For example, "taxi" is spelled as "texi." Another ubiquitous signboard is "restoran," for "restaurant." No difficulty at all finding a pharmacy as it is spelled as "farmacy."

Malaysia is comprised of the mainland Malaya and Sabah and Sarawak on the island of Borneo. 50.4% of the Malaysians are Muslims while 23.7% are Chinese. Indians comprise 7.1%. The indigenous population and others belong to the rest.

After independence from the British in 1957, Malaya joined with Singapore, Sabah and Sarawak to form the Federation of Malaysia in 1963. However, Singapore left the Federation and declared itself as an independent country two years later. Like Britain, Malaysia is a constitutional monarchy but there is a big difference: each of the royal rulers of the 9 states gets a chance to become the King of Malaysia for 5 years.

There must be a few countries in the world where such a rotation of the crown takes place. Malaysia today is one of the fastest developing countries in Asia with high rise glass towers dotting major cities. The 88-story Petronas Twin Towers is one of the tallest buildings in Asia.

It is a major producer of tin, rubber and palm oil but now heavy investment is given to manufacturing and information technology in addition to tourism. The country has some of the most attractive beaches, national parks and islands in Asia.

Dato Seri Tengku AdnanTengku Mansor, the Minister of Tourism, addressing a press conference prior to the "Colours of Malaysia" cultural show pointed out several reasons as to why his country is attracting millions of tourists every year: "Ours is a peaceful country where multi-ethnic groups live in harmony, we are blessed with natural beauty with mountains, beaches and islands, our transport and communications system is as good as any developed country, our hospitality industry is second to none and above all, our people are some of the friendliest people you can ever meet." He also added that tourist industry is the second biggest contributor to Malaysian economy.

Although the Minister was highlighting the success of tourism, he was humble enough to appeal to the travel trade and media representatives to promote tourism. "Please help us.

We need your assistance to spread the message that this is an ideal tourist destination so that we get more tourists in the future," the Minister requested.

How successful is the tourist industry in Malaysia? The statistics bear this out. In 2006, Malaysia recorded 17.5 million tourist arrivals. The target for 2007 is 20 million! For comparison, Sri Lanka is trying to get half a million. Sri Lanka has a long way to go even to get one million tourists per year. Of course, it is easy put the total blame on the ethnic conflict but that is only one part of the problem, as everyone knows.