Abdul Rahman is one of 47 children to the sultan of Setar, who made Malaysia and independent region. Rahman started his political career when he was elected in 1951 to be head of the United Malay National Organization. Rahman was a very peaceful man and believed in compromise instead of war. Rahman made an alliance with China and India to present a combined front against colonialism. In 1955, his alliance swept the national elections and Britain decided to leave the region. Rahman became the first prime minister of Malaya in 1957. When Rahman became leader, he wanted to continue the communist-base rebellion. Britain and Australia gave aid in order to conquer the communist-base rebellion in 1960. After that, he wanted to combine Malaya, Singapore, North Borneo, and Sarawak into a new nation called Malaysia. Malaysia was formed on September 16, 1963. Rahman also moved on to becoming the prime minister of Malaysia. After two years, Rahman removed Singapore from Malaysia because of ethnic tensions. Although Indonesia loathed the new federation, Sukarno and Rahman had a political confrontation, which ended peacefully.
In May of 1969, Malaysia faced a disaster between religious and ethnic groups. The Malays and Chinese went into street violence, which killed people and caused much damage. Rahman announced a state of emergency and banned the constitution. After everything settled down and there was peace, Rahman was accused by the Malays of favoring the Chinese and he decided thirteen years of national leadership by resigning in September of 1970. After he resigned, he was known as a respected elder states man. Rahman also wrote a weekly column for the newspapers. He continued to write papers until he died on December 6, 1990.
