The 1910 Johor General Strike: Sultan Abu Bakar's Labour Crisis

In 1910, the British Forward Movement in Malaya upended traditional labour relations. When the Johor government introduced a new land tax and a registration scheme for Chinese labourers, the response was swift: a general strike that shut down gambier and pepper plantations across the state. Sultan Abu Bakar, the 'Father of Modern Johor' who had crafted the Undang-undang Tubuh Negeri Johor, faced his greatest internal challenge as Chinese kongsis—the same secret societies that had fuelled the Larut Wars—organised a coordinated walkout. This episode traces the strike's roots in the Gambier and Pepper Society's grievances, the role of Kapitan Cina like Tan Hiok Nee, and how Sultan Abu Bakar's diplomacy, rather than colonial force, defused the crisis. It reveals a moment when rapidly modernising Johor nearly broke under the weight of its own economic transformation, and how a sultan's refusal to call in British troops preserved Johor's fragile independence.

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