Early District Conventions Pose Difficulties

The first district convention planned under the new Malaysia branch arrangement was at Petaling Jaya in December 1972. One matter that caused some concern was that all public gatherings except those at recognized places of worship required a permit. Such a permit was promised for the proposed convention, since it was religious. However, the required permit was denied only one day before the convention was to start.

The branch office, though, had a contingency plan: Use two private homes and the two Kingdom Halls at Petaling Jaya and Kuala Lumpur. The audience was divided into nine groups: The Chinese-speaking group had their sessions each morning, four of the eight English-speaking groups had theirs in the afternoons, and the other four groups used the evenings.

One of these, at Petaling Jaya, was entirely in Chinese, and the other, at Klang, was in English. The combined attendance on Sunday afternoon for the public talk at the two conventions was 966.