An Anguish Cession: Issues during the Shaping of the Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur, 1974

Kuala Lumpur today has a special place as the capital of the Federation of Malaysia. The significant position of Kuala Lumpur began in the mid-nineteenth century when it was chosen as the capital of Selangor in 1880. Distinctively, Kuala Lumpur played a double role as the capital of Selangor and the administrative centre of the Federated Malay States (1896), the Federation of Malaya (1948), independent Federation of Malaya (1957), and capital of Malaysia (1963). After Independence, the Central Government saw the importance of it owning a capital city that it could directly run without the need to share it with any other political entity. Considering the irreplaceable nature of Kuala Lumpur, the Central Government worked to separate it from Selangor. However, this effort only saw success when the Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur was formed on 1 February 1974. The delay in this effort shows the Central Government’s inability to completely take over Kuala Lumpur, due to the need to focus on other domestic and foreign challenges in the 1960s. By the time of cession, a number of issues emerged, some of which were not fully settled even though the official transfer was concluded in 1974. Therefore, the road to transfer of Kuala Lumpur to the Central Government was fraught with difficulty in its realisation.