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SCMP Reporter

DAVID MARSHALL was the first chief minister in a self-governing Singapore, but he was never to lead it to full independence.

  Marshall, who was 87, died yesterday after a year-long battle with lung cancer.

  He died knowing his fights in the mid-1950s with his British colonial rulers played a key part in the process which led to full independence with Lee Kuan Yew and the People's Action Party, which still governs.

  The skills which brought him his early political success also made him a devastating criminal lawyer. But in the end, they were not enough for the task of leading Singapore out from under colonial rule, and at the same battling the factions which threatened to split it.

   Marshall was in genuine awe of the economic success which Mr Lee and the People's Action Party achieved, but refused to be silent about the harsher side of the Government, and the country's shift to materialism and acquiescence.

   In one of his last public appearances he boxed the ears of the local press. 'They are running dogs of the PAP and poor prostitutes,' was how he was quoted by the Straits Times, which was his prime target.

   It was a rare cry for Singapore's electorate to be more judgmental of their Government, but one he reckoned he had earned the right to make.

   Like most Singaporeans, his family were immigrants; Jews from Iraq who arrived in 1908.

   As he grew up, he didn't like what he saw of the British rulers and their superior attitude. Nevertheless, when the Japanese threatened he joined the Singapore Volunteer Corps, and was captured in February 1942 when Singapore fell. He spent the rest of the war suffering in 26 different prisoner of war camps, often acting as chief spokesman for his fellow prisoners.

   He learned his powers of advocacy before World War II when he studied law in London, although he returned to Singapore to practise. When the Japanese were defeated, Marshall, like many others, no longer believed in white supremacy.

   His move into politics was more successful than he dreamed. In 1955 when the first free elections in Singapore's history were held, his Labour Front emerged as the largest group, and Marshall was called upon by the British governor to form a government. He became chief minister.

   He wanted more than the British were prepared to give. Their idea was independence with strings; his was all or nothing. London refused to budge, and Marshall resigned in 1956.

   Mr Lee went on to become Singapore's leader, and finally its guide to independence. Marshall's political force was spent, and he returned to the law.

    His political life was far from being without accomplishments, according to historians and contemporary commentators. 'It is very hard to see without Marshall in the middle how the transition could have been made from a group of colonial lick-spittles who preceded him to an aggressive anti-colonial movement. I think he sensed his purpose as a bridge,' said Dennis Bloodworth, former chief Far East correspondent of the Observer.

   Marshall's battles with Mr Lee did not end with his withdrawal from politics. He spoke out strongly against the abolition of trial by jury, and was a fierce opponent of capital punishment.



Fighter played vital role in independence