As siblings separated, can Singapore and Malaysia truly be friends?

Lessons from the Separation are engraved everywhere in Singapore's engagement with Malaysia – but in a different way than expected.

- Lin Suling Opinion Editor

In Salman Rushdie's epic novel Midnight's Children, the unfolding lives of two boys born on Aug 15, 1947 - one from a wealthy Muslim family, the other to a Hindu family from the Bombay slums - tell the distressing story of partition.

The harrowing novel recalls the creation of modern day India and Pakistan from the traumatic 1947 division of British India, which resulted in mass displacement, communal violence and societal upheaval. It also paints a tale of brutal conflict between the two diametrically opposite main characters.

There are parallels in that story of symbiotic birth and national strife from that milieu of decolonisation when the British beat a hasty retreat and left some loose strings untied.

In the Middle East, the formation of Israel in 1948 and its dyad, the Palestinian state-in-waiting, is a struggle that still plays out today in war, terror and blood.

And here in Southeast Asia, we had the independence of Malaysia from British rule in 1963 and Singapore's abrupt separation two years later.

That last incarnation can feel distant from today - given the warm ties between Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and Prime Minister Lawrence Wong at the recent Leaders' Retreat. Cooperation is expanding in energy, healthcare and the combating of illicit drugs, construction of the Rapid Transit System is ongoing, and plans for two more Singapore consulates in East Malaysia are moving ahead. These developments suggest that a painful chapter of our shared history from the mid-1960s has almost receded into the horizon.

But has it really?

A HARROWING HISTORY

We are reminded of how troubling ties were and how grim the outlook was for Singapore with this week's release of a new book, The Albatross File: Inside Separation. It contains a secret dossier put together by Dr Goh Keng Swee, a key member of the revered first generation of Singapore leaders who played a pivotal role in separation.