‘I’m Penny Wong and I was born here’: Australia’s new soft power in Asia

Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia: When a young Penny Wong would fly to Malaysia and her father Francis picked her up at the airport, they would invariably end up eating fishball congee at a cafe called Kuo Man.

It was one of the few places in Kota Kinabalu, the unspoiled coastal city in the state of Sabah where she was born, that she found the dish just as delicious as her late grandmother used to make it.

Penny Wong with her brother James, eating fishball congee on Thursday in Kota Kinabalu.Credit: Jeremiah Chan

“This is the first time I’ve been here without my father actually,” said Australia’s foreign minister on Thursday as she returned to her favourite eatery during the final leg of a three-day tour of Malaysia. “It’s a bit sad.”

Wong’s father lives in Melbourne now but she retains long-standing ties to Sabah, where she spent her first eight years and where her younger brother James, his family and other relatives still live.

Welcoming her as one of their own in her first trip back as Australia’s top diplomat, Sabahans gathered for selfies with her at an arrival reception on Wednesday night and crowded around her in the city’s Chinatown district on Thursday as she was greeted with a traditional dragon dance.

In between, she visited the grave of her grandmother, who survived the Second World War when much of her family perished, and her alma mater Kinabalu International School, where she was student number 19 in the year’s first intake and where the main building was designed by her father, an architect.

Wong visits Kinabalu International School, which she attended as a girl.Credit: Jeremiah Chan

“I’m Penny Wong. I was born here and I went to KIS,” she told students, sharing with them how decades before the COVID-19 pandemic, she had lined up at the school’s former campus for a cholera vaccine which was administered to children with the same needle.

It was a memorable homecoming for the 53-year-old senator but also a deliberate soft power manoeuvre on behalf of the Labor government, harnessing her deep roots in the region.

Looking out over the waterfront fish markets of Kota Kinabalu to the strategically crucial South China Sea, it is difficult to ignore Beijing’s increasing assertiveness in this corner of the world.

Less than four weeks ago, China Foreign Minister Wang Yi was also in town, warmly welcomed on his way back from his Indo-Pacific tour by Jeffrey Kitingan, Sabah’s deputy chief minister.

Australia’s foreign minister is welcomed by dragon dancers in Kota Kinabalu’s Chinatown area.Credit: Jeremiah Chan

But Wong, who also met with Kitingan, hopes her background as a mixed-race migrant from Malaysia can draw Australia closer to its south-east Asian neighbour.

“You’re seeing parts of my life here but this story can be told by so many Australians,” she said. “The story of migration … the memories of where you came from and what that means about who you are … that’s a really important part of the Australian story.

“I think it matters that Australia speaks to south-east Asia in a way that recognises that we are part of this region and that our futures our shared. We are all seeking to navigate these challenging times and we do it best when we do it together.”

Wong’s emotional connection may also deliver more wide-reaching advantages, as subtle as they may be.

Yee I-Lann, an internationally renowned Sabahan artist who grew up across the street from Wong in Kota Kinabalu and, like her, attended university in Adelaide, believes her family history gives her a natural edge, particularly in Asia.

“She understands the smells that go beyond the academic,” she said. “So I think she’s going to do very well as a foreign minister in the region and beyond, precisely because she comes from a mixed heritage. That enriches you. It informs you, it gives you a greater knowledge, a wider understanding of more peoples, more empathy, and opens you to others.”

Wong’s immediate priority after Labor’s election was the Pacific, where she made three trips in short succession and where Beijing was bidding to extend its influence after signing a controversial security pact with the Solomon Islands.

Her focus since, though, has been squarely on south-east Asia and next week she will return for the third time in a month, firstly to Singapore, where she will deliver a speech outlining Australia’s foreign policy blueprint for the region and then to Bali for the G20 foreign ministers meeting.

Wong’s Malaysian heritage is unlikely to be a factor when she finds herself in the same room as Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov on the Indonesian island next Thursday.

In the coffee shops of Sabah, however, it means the world.

“The fact that she chooses to come back to Sabah is very significant,” said Masidi Manjun, Sabah’s minister of finance, after meeting Wong .

“Sabah will always have a special place in her heart. We are very, very happy she is now one of the most important people in Australian politics and I think it will only be good for Malaysia and Sabah in particular.”

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