GEORGE TOWN: Off Jalan Bunga Telang in Fettes Park here, nestled between double-storey houses and town houses is an area covered with thick green undergrowth.
Hidden beneath the undergrowth is the grave of a powerful woman, Foo Teng Nyong (circa 1816 to 1874), the third wife of Kapitan Chung Keng Kwee (1827-1901), the man who founded Taiping.
Teng Nyong was also the aunt of Foo Choo Choon and helped her nephew secure the job that eventually made him the “Tin King of Malaya”.
Now, her ornate grave, said to be built by Cantonese masons and rich in granite artwork that withstood the ravages of the elements, looks to be headed for demolition in the name of progress and development.
Teng Nyong’s grave sits on a piece of land measuring roughly 0.25ha. The land was once owned by the family but now belongs to someone known only as “Mr Lim”.
In mid-February, Lim had published a small classified ad in a Chinese newspaper, calling on Teng Nyong’s descendants to arrange for the exhumation of her grave by Feb 22.
In the event of her decendants failing to do so, Lim wished to reserve his right to deal with the grave as he saw fit. It is not known how he came to be the landowner.
Historian Clement Liang, 59, says the grave should not be destroyed and even if the landowner really wants to develop the land, he should at least relocate the grave.
Liang, a council member of Penang Heritage Trust, an NGO on heritage conservation reminded landowners and property developers to consider the risk of losing links to history.
“We need development, but we cannot keep going modern and abandoning our history. That will make us lose our identity,” he stressed.
He called for conservators to be commissioned to move the tomb to a permanent location.
Liang said historical records revealed Teng Nyong to be Keng Kwee’s most beloved wife and evidently exerted much influence on the Kapitan’s climb to success.
Keng Kwee was not only a philanthropist and industrialist in Penang, he also helped end the decade-long Larut Wars, an armed conflict caused by the tin mining boom in the 1860s, before establishing the Taiping township.
After Teng Nyong’s passing, Keng Kwee commissioned artisans to construct the grave, said her great-grandson, Jeffery Seow of Petaling Jaya.
“My mother was Chung Guat Keng, daughter of Chung Thye Phin (1879-1935), who was Teng Nyong’s son,” he said, adding that he has started a petition for the conservation of the grave.
Thye Pin was born in Taiping and is remembered as the last Kapitan of Malaya.
While he followed in his father’s footsteps and became a tin and rubber industrialist, he also pioneered roselle cultivation in Perak, using its fibres to manufacture rope and twine.
Despite the anxiety and the advertisement by Mr Lim, a check with Penang assemblymen showed that no formal development applications have been submitted for the land.