Ngee Heng Kongsi of Johor (; Teochew Pêh-uē-jī: Ngĭ Heng Kong-si; 1844–1916) was a Teochew secret society that founded the earliest Chinese settlement in Johor. However, it did not have a clandestine image and has instead been accorded a respectable place in the history of the Johor Chinese. The term kongsi generally refers to any firm or partnership, and has also been used to refer to any group or society in a very broad sense. Ngee Heng is the Teochew name for the Ghi Hin or Ghee Hin, its name in Hokkien. The name identifies it as the Teochew offshoot of the Tiandihui secret society.
Overview
Starting as a group of political dissidents under Tan Kee Soon, the Ngee Heng Kongsi gradually transformed itself into an organisation of towkays and revenue farmers under its second leader Major China Tan Hiok Nee. Sultan Abu Bakar recognised the Ngee Heng Kongsi as a legitimate organisation and made it responsible for law and order among the Chinese in Johor, with the result that it dominated Chinese society as well as the pepper and gambier cultivation in the state. The Maharaja had seen how, in various parts of Malaya, Chinese led by one secret society had clashed in bloody feuds with other Chinese led by rival secret societies. In 1854, bad blood between the Ghi Hin and Ghi Hok had provoked ferocious fighting between the Hokkiens and the Teochews in Singapore. The riots lasted 10 days and some 400 Chinese were killed and many injured, with the conflict spreading to Johor. The Maharaja was anxious to prevent this kind of destructive conflict and introduced a number of controls. The Ngee Heng was required to open its membership to all Chinese. All kangchus, Kapitan Chinas and cultivators were required to be members and the Ngee Heng was held responsible for the behaviour of its members individually and collectively. In this way, the Maharaja brought all Chinese under his patronage and the Ngee Heng Kongsi exercised much influence over the Chinese and their affairs.
The influence of the Ngee Heng
The influence of the Ngee Heng which stretched from Riau to Singapore and Johor, was based on the large numbers of Chinese engaged in the cultivation of pepper and gambier who formed the pepper and gambier society. The Ngee Heng Kongsi of Singapore, from which the Ngee Heng Kongsi of Johor was derived, was an economic entity which first co-existed with colonial authority but was subsequently marginalised, criminalised and eventually suppressed as it got involved in armed robberies and crimes of violence.
Leader of Ngee Heng Kongsi Johor
1. Tan Kee Soon
2. Tan Hiok Nee
3. Lim Ah Siang
4. Lin Jin He
History
The history of the Ngee Heng Kongsi in Johor is an integral part of the history of the Chinese in Johor which in turn is an integral part of the economic history of Johor. It is well known that when Temenggong Daeng Ibrahim wished to develop Johor, he had few resources at his disposal. Johor then consisted of vast tracts of dense jungle and rivers were the only means of access into the interior. When he opened Johor to the Chinese, the Ngee Heng gained a dominant position among the Chinese there. The Ngee Heng did not follow the Chinese to Johor but led them there. The drift towards Johor was a natural consequence of its proximity to Singapore but in the 1840s, a clearer move northwards can be seen as a result of various factors, chief of which was the growing shortage of land and when the Singapore authorities introduced a system of land registration, the cultivators objected to paying the quit rent. The upshot was that in 1846, Tan Tek Hye, calling himself "Keeper of the Quinquangular Seal", published a letter in the Singapore Free Press informing the public that the Ngee Heng had commanded 4,000 members of its brotherhood to relocate in Johor in protest. This forms the first record of a substantial migration of Chinese to Johor.