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Home / Whanganui Chronicle

Journey's end nears for Rajah

Merania Karauria
By Merania Karauria
Editor, Manawatū Guardian·Whanganui Chronicle·
23 Aug, 2013 10:38 PM5 mins to read

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Co-founder Operation Peace though Unit, Gita Brooke, and the view of the Whanganui River loved by her late husband Anthony PHOTO/ BEVAN CONLEY

Co-founder Operation Peace though Unit, Gita Brooke, and the view of the Whanganui River loved by her late husband Anthony PHOTO/ BEVAN CONLEY

Gita Brooke has trepidation about taking her late husband Anthony's ashes to Sarawak next month.

However the widow of the last Rajah of the former British protectorate knows it is a trip she needs to make.

The couple have lived in Whanganui since 1987, but it is Anthony's birthright links to Sarawak on the island of Borneo - now a state of Malaysia - that determined where he will be buried.

Taking the ashes to Sarawak is a return to the island that meant so much to her husband and it is appropriate, Mrs Brooke says.

"Anthony asked if Sarawak would want them, and if they did, he wanted me to carry them there," she said of the conversation they had before he died in June 2011.

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Mr Brooke's ashes will be interred in Kuching on September 21, the International Day of Peace, which is appropriate given the lifelong work for peace that the couple travelled the world promoting.

Whanganui potter Ross Mitchell-Anyon is making the urn with his white trademark glaze, and there is paperwork that the Cleveland Funeral Home has to process for the special delivery.

Mrs Brooke is also collecting gifts from Whanganui, to "add to the riches of connectedness" going to Sarawak.

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Mr Brooke was fifth in succession and the last Rajah Muda - Crown Prince of Sarawak.

An obituary in The Telegraph gives a full account of Anthony's Brooke's extraordinary life, describing the family as "absolute rulers of Sarawak for three generations and popularly known as the White Rajahs with their own money, stamps, flag and constabulary, and the power of life and death over their various subjects."

His uncle Sir Charles Vyner Brooke, the third Rajah, controversially ceded Sarawak to Britain in 1946, which caused years of heartache for Mr Brooke and people in Sarawak, said Mrs Brooke.

Mr Brooke is quoted as saying it was not only illegal, but the people of Sarawak were not considered and he would "fight tooth and nail to make sure they were properly consulted so they could choose what government they wanted."

Discover more

Birgitte Brooke's long life a peace campaigner

06 Mar 04:00 PM

He found out the territory had been placed under British rule when he was returning to Sarawak from Britain in 1946 but got only as far as the Philippines, where he was stopped by police and told that he could not enter Sarawak.

The action was personal and hurtful as well as political. Mrs Brooke said the British Government never relinquished the "undesirable persons enactment," that they placed on her husband's name. He tried for years to get the action reversed, right up to a written request to Tony Blair and the House of Lords for his name to be cleared.

Lord Avery took up the cause last year, but the wording of the act could not be found, so it could not be relinquished.

There has been some compensation: Mr Brooke's grandson Jason has said his grandfather received a letter from the Queen sending her best wishes and affirming Mr Brooke was a "citizen of good standing". Unfortunately, Mr Brooke was too ill to comprehend the intention of the letter.

After the shock of Sarawak being ceded, Mr Brooke lived in Singapore and later in Britain, including time at the Findhorn community in Scotland. He was an activist for peace and in 1982 he married Gita, nee Keller, who is from Denmark.

Operation Peace Through Unity (OPTU) was founded in Sweden in 1975.

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In Whanganui they shared Rumah Brooke (Brooke House), also known as Te Rangi, on Durie Hill.

It has sweeping views of the Whanganui River which Mr Brooke could see from his bed. He would say to his wife: "As long as I can see the river." It is yet another connection in Mr Brooke's life; his final resting place overlooks the Sarawak River.

The Brookes arrived in Whanganui in 1987 after almost 10 years of travelling the world on tourist visas, and applied for residency. It was a huge undertaking, but the couple had the determination for peace to keep them going.

"You have to sort your values. Did we take pamphlets and books of our Operation Peace through Unity (OPTU)" or more practical material. The reading material won out over a warm sweater and boots.

Mrs Brooke says she is unashamedly optimistic of the "new culture, the new civilisation, the New World."

At a 2011 NGO briefing on the Culture of Peace in New York, Mrs Brooke's letter to Maria-Luisa Chavez was read out. Mrs Chavez is the chief of NGO Relations in the Outreach Division of the Department of Public Information at the United Nations.

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"In every little town, village, settlement or family throughout the entire world there will be whispers of hope, and voices that courageously - and in the face of status quo - are pronouncing the coming in of a new era ... in which harmony, justice and peaceful relations will take root in, and evolve from the heart of humanity."

Rumah Brooke was the first home Mr Brooke owned, and now the house they both loved has been bequeathed to the OPTU charitable trust.

The Brooke Scholarship has also been established in memory of Mr Brooke and is offered to a post-graduate level student from any discipline, branch of the arts, culture or walk of life, whose research falls within the primary aims of OPTU; to seek fuller knowledge and deeper understanding of the interconnectedness of life in all its many forms and its seemingly potential to evolve, and contribute to the betterment of all relationships within this knowledge.

The scholarship offers free accommodation at Rumah Brooke for a period of time (4-9 months), plus funding towards travel costs.

The last public ceremony for the last Rajah of Sarawak will take place in St Thomas Cathedral in Kuching, the capital of Sarawak, led by Reverend Datuk Bishop Bolly Lapok.

After the service the ashes will be interred near Fort Margherita in the place set aside for the Brooke graves.

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