Singapore became an independent nation
On this day · 9 August 1965
On August 9, 1965, Singapore was separated from Malaysia and, almost reluctantly, became a sovereign city-state.
On August 9, 1965, Singapore ceased to be a state of Malaysia and became an independent, sovereign nation — a separation it had not sought. After just two years in the federation, deep political and racial tensions between the People’s Action Party and Malaysia’s ruling leaders proved irreconcilable.
The break was negotiated in near-total secrecy; even senior Singapore cabinet ministers learned of it only days before. The Proclamation of Singapore, drafted by law minister Edmund Barker, declared that the island “shall forever be a sovereign democratic and independent nation, founded upon the principles of justice.”
Singapore shall on the ninth day of August in the year one thousand nine hundred and sixty-five cease to be a State of Malaysia and shall become an independent and sovereign state.
At the announcement, Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew wept on live television. The tiny, resource-poor state he reluctantly inherited would, within a generation, become one of the world’s wealthiest nations.
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