The Star Online > Nation

Saturday August 19, 2006

War vets in battle of honour

By CHOI TUCK WO

LONDON: A group of British war veterans has embarked on what they see as their last battle to secure the right to wear the Pingat Jasa Malaysia (PJM) medal awarded to them for their sacrifices for the country. 

SPECIAL BADGE: Close-up of the lapel badge designed specially to promote the group’s cause

Calling themselves the Fight4thePJM Campaign, they have formed an association to lobby the British government to reverse its decision barring them from wearing the medal. 

With the motto Pingat Kami – Hak Kami (Our Medal – Our Right), the group has submitted petitions to Queen Elizabeth II, Prime Minister Tony Blair and the Scottish Parliament over the issue. 

Association press officer Gerald Law said about 35,000 British war veterans who helped protect Malaysia during the Emergency and Confrontation periods had been denied the right to wear their medals with honour. 

“We’ve been cheated out of a bit of pride and joy in our twilight years by dinosaur civil servants bent on perpetuating an outdated imperial honours system and the myths around it,” Law, 62, said in an interview. 

The controversy arose after the British Committee on the Grants of Honours, Decorations and Medals ruled that British citizens could accept the Malaysian medals but would not be allowed to wear them. 

The recommendation was made following the British government’s announcement in the House of Lords last year that it would refuse such awards for its citizens on the basis that they were contrary to the nation’s medals policy. 

Australia and New Zealand have, however, accepted the medals without any restriction for its citizens after they were approved by the Queen on the advice of the Commonwealth country concerned where she is head of state. 

ANOTHER BATTLE: Law posing with the lapel badge his group designed in London recently.

Last month, Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak conferred the awards on the first batch of 40 British ex-servicemen who served in Malaysia between 1957 and 1966. 

Law, who served in Singapore and Sarawak between 1964 and 1966, said they had so far received support from more than 100 British MPs and peers. 

He said they hoped to get the MPs to table a motion on the issue when Parliament reconvened in October after the summer break. 

Law added that their campaign website (www.fight4thePJM.org) had received more than 50,000 hits since it was set up a few months ago.