PANGKOR ENGAGEMENT

(1874), treaty between the British government and Malay chiefs in Perak, the first step in the establishment of British dominion over the Malay states. In January 1874, Governor Andrew Clarke of the Straits Settlements, prompted by the local trading community, organized a meeting between British, Malay, and Chinese leaders to settle a Perak succession dispute and to stop warfare between Chinese secret societies. Named after Pangkor Island, off the Perak coast, the engagement adjudicated these issues. The complicated Perak succession controversy was settled in favour of Raja Abdullah, the candidate supported by Lower Perak chiefs, who had been passed over in the 1871 succession. Ismail, the Upper Perak contender, absent from the meeting, was pensioned off with an annual allowance and was granted the honorific title of sultan muda. In return for British backing, Abdullah agreed to accept a British resident (adviser) with broad powers at his court. The Chinese-secret-society issue was settled in the separate Chinese Engagement. Similar agreements were later signed with other Malay states, achieving de facto British rule of the Malay Peninsula by 1914.