| Proclamation
of Singapore
Do you know …
The Proclamation of Singapore that announced
Singapore's separation from Malaysia on 9 August
1965 was drafted by Mr E W Barker, then Minister
for Law. He was also responsible for drafting
two other related documents, namely: an Amendment
relating to the separation of Singapore from
Malaysia as an independent and sovereign state,
and an Act to amend the Constitution of Malaysia
and the Malaysia Act to give Singapore independence.1
PM Lee Kuan Yew entrusted Mr E W Barker with
the job of drafting the documents in mid-July
1965 after he received news that the Federal
Cabinet had agreed with Tunku Abdul Rahman
that Singapore should separate from Malaysia.
After several rounds of negotiations between
the Singapore government represented by Mr
Lee and Dr Goh Keng Swee, Minister of Finance,
and the Malaysian government represented by
Tunku, Tun Abdul Razak, Deputy Prime Minister,
Dato Ismail bin Dato Abdul Rahman, Home Affairs
Minister and Tun Tan Siew Sin, Finance Minister,
the abovementioned documents were eventually
finalised on 7 August.2
"Every time I look at these Agreements,
I'm happy, I have a sense of pride, having
contributed to a major change - the separation
of Singapore from Malaysia. I was able to draft
these documents then in a short time because
I had just left the Bar, in fact, nine months
before that. I had been in practice for 14
years and had a lot of experience. Hence, I
was able to do it."
Extract of oral history interview with Mr E
W Barker, 1982.
Information extracted from the oral history
interview of Mr E W Barker, Accession No: 000193
Source: SM's Office
Proclamation of Singapore that Mr E W Barker
drafted was signed by Mr Lee on 9 August 1965.
1 Lee
Kuan Yew, The Singapore Story: Memoirs
of Lee Kuan Yew (Singapore: Times Editions Pte Ltd
and Singapore Press Holdings, 1998), pp. 631-632.
2 Leslie
Fong, "The Week Before Separation", in
Singapore 25 Years:
A
Straits Times Special, National Day, 9 Aug 1990, ed. Leslie Fong (Singapore:
Straits Times Press, 1990), pp. 5-10 and Lee, The Singapore Story, pp. 628-647.
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