The huge influx of Chinese migration was directly caused by the poverty in rural China and massive employment opportunities in the British colonial or protectorate territories, with an estimated 5 million Chinese having entered by the 19th century.

Why is Chinese spoken in Malaysia?

The ancestors of most Chinese Malaysians came from various southern provinces in China, such as Guangdong and Fujian provinces. Therefore, the language varieties they brought to Malaysia were Cantonese, Hokkien, Hakka, Teochew, Hainanese, and other southern dialects (Tan Reference Tan, Lee and Tan2000).