Singapore's political prisoners

A letter to The Dominion

from the Dominion, May 27.

R. W. and J. H. Doran, Palmerston North, write to the Editor of The Dominion:

We would like to bring to public notice the plight of political prisoners in Singapore. Over the last 12 years the government of Singapore has imprisoned many of its political opponents. Rather than catalogue these events, we would prefer to give the example of the detainee with whom the Palmerston North branch of Amnesty International has been concerned.

"You Can Imprison My Body But Not My Spirit" Tan Wah Piow

Each branch of Amnesty deals with three prisoners in different countries. Our prisoner in Singapore is Said Zahari, who was a newspaper editor and president of the Malaysian National Union of Journalists. He was active politically in opposing the formation of the Federation of Malaysia. He was arrested in February 1963 and has been detained since then, though he has not been accused of any offence and has not been given a trial. Zahari is married with four children; his youngest daughter, now aged 11, was born three months after he was imprisoned.

Rather than succumbing to the despair of imprisonment, he has sustained himself by writing poetry. Though his work is banned in Singapore his poems have been smuggled out of prison and published in Malaysia. His poems have been privately circulated among Singapore intellectuals and instead of being forgotten in incarceration Zahari has become an important figure in local literature.

As New Zealand is currently pursuing a moral foreign policy. It is important that we are all aware of those countries among our allies who do not respect the fundamental rights of their citizens.

In Singapore Said Zahari and many others have been deprived of their liberty merely for their opposition to government policy, yet New Zealand is now the only Commonwealth country to aid the defence o' Singapore by maintaining a military garrison.