ALTHOUGH THE Union
Jack flew over Sandakan in 1878, and a Charter was
granted to the British North Borneo Company in 1882,
it was not until 1888, that Britain recognized the
State of North Borneo as an independent country
entitled to British protection and guidance.
In
those ten years the company had done enough to prove
that it was able to rule the country wisely. This was
a difficult task. North Borneo has never before had a
proper Government. All that many people knew about
'Government' was that officials sometimes come to
take their hard-eared possessions away from them. Why
then should they accept as their Government a handful
of white men who had made an agreement with the two
Sultans? These white men had no army, no police, no
ships and not much wealth. Even their own British
Government did not recognize their authority. 'Why
should we obey them?' some of the chiefs thought.
Almost
immediately, in January 1878, the people began to see
very good reasons for obeying the new Government. Mr.
W. S. Pryer, the first British 'Resident' at
Sandakan, issued order that customs duties must now
be paid at Sandakan. The Bajau chiefs were unwilling
to accept this order so Mr. Pryer invited them to a
conference. He then reminded them how miserable their
life had been because of raiding pirates and
head-hunters; Sandakan itself had only seventeen
houses; people lived there in fear of being murdered
at any moment. The new Government said Mr Pryer ,
would teach them how to defend themselves. The Bajau
chiefs listened but were not convinced. Even while
the conference was taking place, however, a
head-hunters; raid started. Mr. Pryer immediately
organized the Bajaus and led them to fight against
the head-hunters. He assembled many men from other
vil-lages together under his command. Within a few
days the head-hunters had fled in terror! Mr. Pryer
then spoke to the people and explained that while
they were divided, head-hunters and pirates could
kill them easily. When they were united under the
leadership of his Government, their enemies fled.
Seeing the strength of this argument, the people of
that part of the coast accepted Mr. Pryer as their
ruler and the conpany as their Government. After that
time law and order spread so quickly that by five
years later over 3,000 Chinese people had emigrated
from China in order to live in Sandakan.
The
people were all surprised and pleased when Mr. Pryer
set up a Court of Justice. Inthis court all men were
equal; the crimes of a powerful man were punished
just as surely as those of a weak man. Nothing like
this had been known before in North Borneo. For the
first time the people of Sandakan found safety and
justice.
What
had happened in Sandakan was happening in other parts
of the country too. Native chieftains who were
friendly with the Sultan of Sulu escorted the
company's officials to many districts. They explained
everywhere who the white men were and what they
wanted to do. They told them that what the company
wanted to do was not to take away the possessions of
the natives; it was to be a company concerned with
government, not trade. The company wanted to make
North Borneo peaceful, so that traders would not be
afraid to come and start business activities here.
After the centuries of bloodshed, there were too few
people left alive to develop North Borneo properly.
Therefore the company intended to encourage other
Asian people, especially the Chinese, to come to
Borneo and start farms and businesses. The taxes and
duties paid by the new trading companies would give
the Chartered Company enough money to continue its
administration and to build roads, hospitals, schools
and other such things. The company officials would go
on to explain that in order to keep the peace, they
would have to train selected local people as
policemen. This was something new to the people of
North Borneo, They had often seen rulers who came
only to plunder their villages. They had never seen
rulers who came to offer them work and safety. It
seemed good, and they were willing to try it. When
they saw Courts of Justice working, the natives were
even more astonished. It did not surprise them when a
poor man was tried in court; they were used to that.
But soon they saw that their own leading men were
not about the law ; even more surprising, European
planters who came here to develop tobacco estates
were often tried for offences too. For the first time
the law was the same for everyone.
Of
course travel was still very difficult, and the
interior was unknown to white men. Few people other
than the Muruts had ever seen the Pensiangan River;
Mount Kinabalu had not been explored; even Tambunan
was nor known to coastal people. Therefore journeys
of exploraration began. Pryer explored far up the
Kinabatangan River; another official called Frank
Hatton investigated minerals from the Labuk River to
Marudu Bay. The greatest explorer of all was an
Austrian called Witti. He made great journeys across
country in the west and interior as wellas on the
east coast. His last journey took him to Keningau and
Tambunan, where the people respected him greatly and
asked him to be a judge in their quarrels. Then he
retraced his step and visited Dalit before going on
to Pensiangan. This was a daring journey through
savage country, and proved to be too great a venture
at that time. Murut head-hunters attacked him near
Pensiangan, and although he fought desperately
against their blow-pipes and spears he was killed and
beheaded in 1882.
The
work of these explorers was very important; before
their time nobody had known where there was land
suitable for development. After the explorations
tobacco estates, farms and (some time later) rubber
estates were established. At the same time violence
was dying out, as people learnt to trust the new
Courts of Justice. The population of the country
increased as bloodshed finishes and immigration
began. In short, the Chartered Company made a good
start.
That
was the reason why the British Government gave it
support and recognized it in 1888 as the Government
of the State of North Borneo under British
protection.
QUESTIONS
