Photo: 1st Division N Humorous Speech Contest, Oct 5, 1997
Where did "N" come from?
The idea of a Division in Toastmasters International is to assist Areas to help their Clubs. In the good old days, some Districts had only Areas and did not have Divisions. The Division Governors also represent the District Governor in carrying out District goals.
Usually in other Districts, Divisions are chosen starting from A, B, then C.
When District 51 was formed, Divisions were named after different zones they represent. By coincidence it formed the acronymn "INSECT"
Division I - all clubs in Indonesia
Divsion N - all clubs in northern zone of Peninsular Malaysia in Penang, Kedah, Perak as well as States which still did not clubs then - Perlis, Kelantan, Terengganu
Division S - all clubs in Singapore
Division E - all clubs in East Malaysia - Sabah and Sarawak
Division C - all clubs in central zone of Peninsular Malaysia in Selangor, Kuala Lumpur, Negri Sembilan, Melaka, Johor as well as States which did not have clubs then - Pahang.
Division T - all clubs in Thailand
A map showing the boundaries of the above was approved as minutes of the Disrtict Exco meeting. I still have it somewhere.
Ricky Ch'ng, who had encountered Toastmasters while doing his tertiary education in New Zealand, was an enthusiastic, very friendly and like-able Toastmaster.
Ricky became the first Division N Governor in 1993. Ricky can be seen everywhere and attended all the Conventions. He even won the third place in the International Tape Speech Contest to receive the award at the Toastmasters International Convention in San Diego in 1995.
For your information, International Tape Speech Contest was for undistricted clubs. Although District 51 was given provisional District status, we were not allowed to take part in the Inter-District and World Championship of Public Speaking until in 1997.
For me, as the second Division N Governor, I barely missed achieving the Distinguished Division Award. We acheived 17 CTM, just two CTM short of the goal of 19 CTM. Reason was two Toastmasters who had achieved their CTM and promised me and told me that they had submitted their CTM applications but did not do so. In those days, there was no online submission and you had to fax or send by post. Still it was a great educational achievement in 1994 for Division N as the year before, there were only 2 CTMs for Division N. So going from 2 CTM to 17 CTM is a big leap forward.
KS Lim (Past President of National Semiconductor) was the third Division N Governor and during his term with OC Ricky Ch'ng organized a very successful District 51 Annual Convention in Hotel Equatorial in May, 1995. During 1995, I also became the second Toastmaster in Penang after Gerald Green to achieve the Distinguished Toastmaster Award.
Photo: Looking ahead by the five Past Presidents of National Semiconductor Toastmasters (655-51P). Three of us became the first three Division N Governors.
Then in 2006, Division N was reformed (split) into two Divisions. Division N covers Clubs in Penang Island and Kedah. Division S covers Clubs in Penang Island, Penang Mainland and Perak.
The last "original" Division N Governor is Clement Pang. The first "reformed" Division N Governor is Abdul Kadir and the first Division S Governor is Sue Chan.
Honor List of Division N Governors
2009 Koay Kah Hin (Bayan Baru, Penang)
2008 Eddy Chew (Achievers, Penang)
2007 Palaniappa Subramaniam (Siltera, Kedah)
2006 Abdul Kadir (Kulim, Kedah)
2005 Clement Pang (Intel Penang, Penang)
2004 Koay Leng Sze (Kulim,Kedah)
2003 Sivanganam Rajaretnam (Kulim, Kedah)
2002 Roger Green (Speech Dynamics, Penang)
2001 Sukhdev Singh (Taiping, Perak)
2000 Ahmed Bazari (Butterworth, Penang)
1999 Margaret Chan (Bayan Baru, Penang)
1998 Agnes Oon (Butterworth, Penang)
1997 Jayie Tan (Butterworth, Penang)
1996 TT Khoo (YMCA, Penang)
1995 KS Lim (National Semiconductor, Penang)
1994 SL Liew (National Semiconductor, Penang)
1993 Ricky Ch'ng (National Semiconductor, Penang)
Distinguished Division Award
2009 President's Distinguished Division
2008 - not distinguished -
2007 President's Distinguished Division
2006 President's Distinguished Division
2005 President't Distinguished Division
2004 President's Distinguished Division
2003 President's Distinguished Division
2002 ?
2001 President's Distinguished Division
2000 - not distinguished -
1999 - not distinguished -
1998 - not distinguished -
1997 President's Distinguished Division
1996 ?
1995 - not distinguished -
1994 - not distinguished -
1993 - not distinguished -
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