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5 Political Vanguard: PAP Leaders of the Chinese-Speaking Community Profiling the PAP Leaders Th巳 postwar history of Singapor巳 is paint巳d predominantly in hues of communism, communalism and chauvinism. Th巳 authoritativ巳 accounts written byD巳nnis Bloodworth and John Drysdale show essentially the same landscape. This is the quintessentia1 portrait of a straightforward fight between the ‘English educated', a group of upright and honourable gentlemen who were schooled mostly in British institutions, and the ‘Chinese-educated' group of communist sabot巳ur日， with dubious intent and who hailed mainly from schools fund巳d indep巳ndently by various Chines巳 communities. 1 This dominant historical narrative bifurcates the realities ofthe 1950s and 1960日 into two diametrically opposed worlds, represented by the looming figures of Lee Kuan Yew with his core group of non-communist English-educated partners and Lim Chin Siong with his Chinese-educated communist comrades. It assumes the immutability ofthe ‘Chinese-educated', forgetting that th巳 constitution ofthis identity was a fluid and highly political, if not troubled, process. It also mi日construes other groups of historical actors who straddled in between and whose agency cannot be adequately accounted for. One such group is represented by the likes of Ong Pang Boon, Lee Khoon Choy and Jek Yeun Thong. Ong, K. C. Lee (as Lee Khoon Choy was popularly known) and Jek were t趾C巳 members clos巳ly identifi巳d as political vanguard of th巳 Chines巳-educated community. Ong, bom in Kuala Lumpur, attended a lower Chinese primary school before moving on to a Confucian Middle SchooJ.2 K. C. Lee was bom in Penang, had his education first in Yeok Keow Chinese School, and later moved on to the prestigious Chung Ling High SchooJ.3 The Singapore-bom Jek Yeun Thong attended lower secondary level at Chinese High Schoo1.4 Howev巳r， it is disputable whether th巳 term ‘ Chin巳se-巳ducated' captures their identity appropriately. Both Ong and K. C. L巳e had also received som巳 formof 80 Singapor巴's Chinιsε Dilεmma English education. After the Japanese occupation which interrupted hi日 studi肘， Ong switched language stream to Methodist Boys' School in Kuala Lumpur. He joined the University of Malaya in Singapore in 1950, graduating with an honours degree in geography.5 K. C. L間's exposure to the world ofthe Englisheducated was equally intense. He went overseas to study journalism at the London Regent Street Polytechnic. He then worked in two English-language newspapers (Singapore Standard and ST) in the 1950s.6 The three of them chose to fight on the side of the English-educated Lee Kuan Yew. They were promoted to become cabinet ministers and ministers of state, retiring only in the 1980s with the transfer of power to the secondgeneration PAP leaders. Despite their bilingual background and their affiliation with L間's group, they were essentialised by Bloodworth and Drysdale as Chinese-educated and somewhat tainted ideologically. In Bloodworth's blatantly culturalist narrative, Chinese chauvinism and communism translate into each other. His account teems with descriptions of Chinese cultural and behavioural patterns written to provide a genealogy of the Chinese-educated communists in postw征 Singapore. Communism in Singapore, according to Bloodworth, sprang from such sources. He uses phrases such as ‘chopstick communism' andthe ‘artificial topsoil ofcommunism 由at overlay the hard clay ofchauvinism beneath'.7 Like clandestine accomplices, the Chinese-educated were inevitably tainted by some form of incipient communist or pro-communist tendencies. So Ong Pang Boon was: not at first glance well cast in the role of an anti-communist King Canute, for some doubted whether he would even wi日h to roll back the red tide. He was bitterly anti-colonial and an unbending Chinese chauvinist and although he might seem steady enough, he ‘talked like a communist' . . .8 To drive home the point of a communist conspiracy, Bloodworth flogs the staid image of the inscrutable Chinaman. To him, the elusive Chinese secret societies are the embodiment of ‘Chineseness', explaining the ease with which Chinese-educated communists were able to set up conspiratorial networks. ‘Secrecy was second nature . . . most Chinese therefore lived on two planes simultaneously, the legal and illegal . . .'9 For Bloodworth, Jek Yeun Thong was the typical ‘crypto-communist\10 Educated at Chinese High, then a leading force in student radicalism, Jek was a ‘prolific [Anti-British League] scribbler', going through Marxist cell experience and eventually taking charge of his own underground communist network.l1 Referring to Lee Kuan Yew's discovery that Chan Sun Wing, a trusted Chinese-educated aide, was...

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