Oei Tiong Ham, the “Sugar King of Java”, was born in Semarang on 19 November 1866, so next month marks 160 years since his birth. He built what Singapore’s National Library Board (NLB) calls the largest ethnic Chinese business group in pre-war Asia. Around 1920 he moved to Singapore, where, historians say, British law let him choose his heirs more freely than Dutch law in Java. Seventeen children he left out challenged the will, and in 1961 Indonesia seized the group’s businesses there.
His story is an early case of choosing a country for its inheritance rules, and of the limits of that choice. Moving the owner changed the law on his will. It did not move his sugar mills.
How Oei Tiong Ham Built a Sugar Empire
His father, Oei Tjie Sien, founded a trading house, Kian Gwan, in Semarang in 1863. According to the NLB, Oei took it over in 1890 and turned it into a limited company in 1893; other sources date both steps to 1893. The group around it became known as the Oei Tiong Ham Concern.
The first big money came from opium. The colonial government auctioned the right to sell opium in each district to private “farmers”. Oei bought farms in Semarang, Yogyakarta, Surakarta and Surabaya and reputedly made about 18 million guilders in net profit before the state took the trade over in 1904, according to the historian Onghokham.
Sugar came next. After a sugar crisis in the 1880s, many mill owners in Java could not repay their loans. Oei used his rights as a creditor to take over five sugar factories and modernised them. By 1910 he had a London sales office, and in 1912 Kian Gwan was capitalised at 15 million guilders. He hired Dutch managers and engineers, but top positions stayed in the family, the NLB notes.
Why He Moved to Singapore
The move came in 1920 according to the NLB, or 1921 according to Onghokham. Each source weighs his reasons differently:
- The NLB says he “probably” disagreed with Dutch succession law, under which daughters could inherit, and that a 30% tax on First World War excess profits was another “likely” reason.
- Onghokham, writing in 1989, cites that tax and his wish to escape Dutch civil law, which restricted his freedom to choose which children inherited.
- His youngest son, Oei Tjong Tjay, told an interviewer in 1988 that East Indies law did not allow a father to disinherit children, while British law did.
- CNBC Indonesia, drawing on Indonesian biographies, stresses colonial tax demands instead.
The legal mechanism is forced heirship: rules that reserve a minimum share of an estate for children whatever the will says (see our post on Italy’s forced heirship rules). Singapore, then a British colony, followed English law, under which a will could leave children out.
There was a second step. Under a 1910 Dutch law, a subject living abroad had to register with a Dutch consulate within three months. Oei did not, and lost his Dutch status; Onghokham concludes that he “could now determine his successors as he wished”. He already owned a shipping line and a Kian Gwan branch in Singapore. He also gave $150,000 toward a central hall for Raffles College.
The Will and the 1939 Settlement
Oei died in Singapore on 6 June 1924. His will named nine sons as heirs, according to the NLB and his youngest son; Wikipedia says eight. Only two, Oei Tjong Swan and Oei Tjong Hauw, were adults. The estate was valued at 200 million guilders, which earned him the nickname “Man of 200 Millions”.
The 17 children left out went to court. Their argument, as Oei Tjong Tjay described it, was that their father had moved to Singapore only temporarily, so he remained domiciled in Java. Domicile is the place the law treats as a person’s permanent home; it often decides which country’s inheritance rules apply, and it is harder to change than residence. The case ran until 1939, when each of the 17 received 400,000 guilders, about US$250,000, by his account. He added that the estate also faced heavy death duties under British law.
Why Moving the Owner Did Not Save the Assets
Oei Tjong Hauw ran the group until his death in 1950; from 1951 Oei Tjong Tjay headed its Indonesian business. In July 1961 Indonesia’s economic court ordered the group’s Indonesian businesses confiscated on charges of economic crimes; a Supreme Court ruling on 27 April 1963 ended the family’s legal fight, the son recalled. On 12 October 1964 the assets became a state company, PT Rajawali Nusantara Indonesia. In 2022 it became the parent of Indonesia’s state food holding, under the name ID FOOD.
The overseas Kian Gwan companies, not owned through the Indonesian firms, stayed with the family. A will can follow its owner’s domicile, but factories and land stay under the law of the country where they sit.
Singapore has had no estate duty since 2008. Instead of a fixed reserved share, its Inheritance (Family Provision) Act 1966 lets a court order reasonable maintenance from the estate of someone domiciled in Singapore for a spouse, certain daughters, an infant son or a disabled son. It does not apply to Muslim estates. Our Singapore guide covers the family office route.
A fair caveat
Oei’s motives are reconstructed by historians and relatives, not stated by him, and the sources disagree on the year of the move and the number of heirs. Much of the will story rests on one son’s recollection decades later. The opium profits are an estimate, and all the laws involved have changed since.
Five lessons to take away
- Inheritance rules follow domicile, not a plane ticket. The excluded children argued that Oei never really left Java.
- Heirs who are left out can still sue. Seventeen did, and won a settlement 15 years after his death.
- Assets stay where they are. The Java mills remained under Indonesian law and were seized in 1961.
- Separate ownership abroad can survive. Kian Gwan companies held outside Indonesia stayed with the family.
- Weigh tax and family law together. Oei escaped a reserved share but, by his son’s account, met heavy death duties.
Questions to bring to your advisors
Where is each member of our family domiciled today, and which country’s inheritance rules would apply to their estate? Which of our assets would stay under another country’s law whatever we decide about residence? If someone is left out of a will, what claims could they bring, and where? These are questions to bring to your lawyers and tax advisors, not advice.
