PAPER TRAIL

Collector traces Singapore’s history through wartime propaganda leaflets

- Natalie Tan

"Cease firing. Stop all firing forthwith. Lay down your arms and raise the white flag."

This surrender note, circa February 1945 and signed off by General Archibald Wavell of the Allied Forces, was in fact not penned by him. It was a forgery by the Japanese army invading Malaya, meant to mislead the British forces into surrendering.

This rare copy of black propaganda a genre of propaganda that aims to deceive through false attribution used to be in the hands of a private collector.

But it will now be part of Singapore's national archives.

On Aug 15, Dr Benjamin Seet handed over his collection of more than 900 pieces of propaganda leaflets to the National Library Board (NLB), which will be conserving and digitising the collection.

"This collection is too important to remain in private hands," said Dr Seet, 59, group chairman of the medical board for research at the National Healthcare Group.

gorised in Dr Seet kept his collection, catearchival-quality albums, in an air-conditioned room.

But he said the library will be better able to digitise, archive and preserve it.

The leaflets in his collection date back over 80 years and span two volatile periods in Malaya's history: World War II, when the Japanese occupied Malaya between 1942 and 1945, and the Malayan Emergency.

Fought from 1948 to 1960, the Malayan Emergency was a guerilla war between British colonial forces and communist fighters seeking to overthrow British rule in Malaya.

National Library director Alicia Yeo told The Sunday Times: "This is an important collection which will enhance the study of these two major events in Singapore and Malayan history.