In less than two years, 255 tough criminals passed through Dutton’s care on Pulau Senang. Of these, no more than 23 had got into trouble again. This low rate of recidivism caused Devan Nair, by then a leading trade unionist believing in democratic socialism, to claim that the ‘social therapy of Pulau Senang makes the island one of the most successful penal experiments anywhere in the world’. Alas, Nair spoke too soon. The settlement was just about three years old when Dutton was murdered and the settlement destroyed.
Yet Nair had grounds for his optimism. For when gangsters in the streets were arrested, taken to jail, and not brought to trial, they knew that their only hope of getting back into normal society was through Pulau Senang. After about a year in jail, they could volunteer for manual work on the island. Most of them expected to be there for six months. Upon arrival, the ‘Laughing Tiger’ saw to it that they were taught the rudiments of a trade: anything from pig-keeping, poultry farming, carpentering, haircutting, bricklaying, book-binding, sign-writing and boot-making to furniture-making and plumbing. Every month, Dutton reviewed their work. If he was satisfied they were making progress, Dutton would recommend their release to the Work Brigade. If he was dissatisfied, he would recommend they be taken back to jail. Dutton was powerful and the men knew this. He was respected and feared.
Organised on semi-military lines, the Work Brigade had been set up by the government to cater for the unemployed, and for men and women seeking rehabilitation. Usually, men from Pulau Senang were put into the Work Brigade for six months and then released into society, but they could be released earlier if they could satisfy the authorities that they had a job to which they could go.
“Creative work in healthy surroundings. That is what reforms men,” asserted Daniel Dutton, pointing to a group of men working on the farmland. Everyone was paid $0.30 a day and given a ration of five cigarettes. They had to save half the money they earned. On their own, they made a collection and asked Dutton to buy them a cinema projector. He did and then arranged for a weekly English-language action film show in the community hall. Not all of them could follow the English dialogue, but to Dutton’s amusement, they all seemed to understand the usual message in these carefully selected films: that, in the end, the bad man always got his come-uppence. Dutton told me that most of the 63 murderers he had on the island when I called in, enjoyed the ‘cops and robbers’ films.
Daniel Dutton was the only European on the island. His deputy then was of Ceylonese origin and his two assistants of Chinese origin. Dutton believed in the minimum of supervision: he believed in encouraging prisoners to work hard, in their own way, at their own pace. Dutton had faith in the experiment. At the same time, he normally slept in his uniform, jungle boots handy by the bed. In spite of his ulcers, he was contented. He got a great deal of satisfaction from his job. He had informers on the island. When they told him the gang leaders were plotting to kill him, he laughed at the informers. Right till the end, he could not believe that the people he was trying so hard to rehabilitate would want to destroy him. In any case, he thought he could cope with the situation. Too late he realised the extraordinary power of secret society leaders.
Gangsters And Secret Societies
There have always been gangsters and secret societies in Singapore: they came with the immigrants from China, where the first secret societies were said to have been formed at 3,000 bce. In 1644, the Manchus overthrew the Ming Dynasty, and behind the fortified walls of the Shaolin Monastery, 108 monks plotted to restore China to the Ming emperors. They failed, having been betrayed by a traitor. Five survivors formed the Triad Society to carry on their work. Over the years, the high principles were blurred and the society degenerated into a protection racket. Eventually, the Triad Society broke up into different gangs, each with its own area of control and sphere of protection. In China, these secret societies had a considerable influence on the ordinary people, almost equalling the importance of the family unit. Secret societies were abolished in China in 1949 when the communists took over, but they continued to exist in Malaya and Singapore where gangsters still claim that their societies are directly descended from the original triad. One big gang in Singapore is called the 108 gang, in remembrance of the 108 monks of Shaolin.
In Raffles’ days, and for a long time after, secret societies in Singapore helped new arrivals from China. In effect, they were benevolent societies which provided for needy members and ensured that they had a decent burial (of singular importance to persons of Chinese origin). In consequence, one historian felt that secret societies might with fair accuracy, be described as ‘Pirates and Robbers Co-operative Associations’.
Secret societies have always been bitterly hostile to one another, and their rivalries, usually over territory, periodically culminated in bloody street fights. Rival mobs would often suspend operations to allow Europeans to pass through their midst unscathed. Members were forbidden to give any assistance to the police. The penalty was merciless flogging, mutilation and painful death. In 1854, 40 °Chinese were killed in 10 days of street fighting among secret society gangsters in Singapore.
In 1881, 11 secret societies were registered in Singapore with a collective membership of 62,376 people. Six years later, in 1887, the British decided they had enough. They decided to suppress them.
The simple argument of the British was that the Government must be the paramount power in the island. So long as secret societies existed, this was not so in the eyes of many Chinese. The effect of the suppression order was to drive secret societies still further underground. Brothels were deregistered in 1895, but secret society gangsters kept up the protection racket, and rival groups-the 108 gang, the Low Kwan gang, the Tai Hok gang, the Hung Khwan Society, and all the others-struggled for monopoly of extortion, as they still do today, from prostitutes, hawkers and small shopkeepers.
During the Japanese occupation of Singapore in World War II, all secret society activities were suspended. The Japanese did not jail gang suspects: they chopped off their heads and exhibited them on poles. Immediately after the Japanese surrender when the more tolerant British returned, triad societies sprang up throughout Malaya and Singapore with such rapidity that their membership soon reached scores of thousands. Sometimes over a thousand people would turn up to watch a single initiation ceremony. The result was that in certain areas in Malaya, and in some districts of Singapore, the civil government was almost powerless to check the growing numbers of murders and extortions, robberies and piracy.
When the People’s Action Party (PAP) in Singapore achieved self-rule in 1959, the newly elected government, headed by Lee Kuan Yew, zealously and determinedly decided to wipe out gangsterism. They had no alternative if they were to become an effective, corruption-free government. Gangsterism was beginning to dominate everyday life. In 1959, there were 21 gangland murders. There were 416 known gangster fights, mostly over territory. The PAP knew they must tackle this problem without delay. At the same time they decided to humanize prison conditions. They did. Today, Singapore claims to have an enlightened and efficient prison system. All prisons are open to inspection by the International Red Cross. But the PAP failed to eliminate the secret societies, though they have managed to restrict their activities almost completely.
On 24 October 1959, the Minister for Home Affairs broadcasted an explanation why the Government, a few days earlier, had offered an amnesty to gangsters. “Why did we offer them a chance to reform and become law-abiding members of society? Because we believe that not all secret society gangsters are bad men. Many, through foolishness, got entangled in the web of crime and did not know how to free themselves.” It was to such people, the Minister said, that the offer was made. All they had to do was to go to the Advocate-General and make a full statement about their past association with secret societies and declare their intention to break away. If the amnesty was ignored they would suffer, for the Government was determined to crush gangsterism. “We will relentlessly pursue every gangster and gang until they are utterly destroyed.” Backed by the people, the Government would move against the gangsters in force ‘to crush those who think that they can defy the organised might and anger of society’. The gangsters were given two weeks to make up their minds.