• Penghulu di Zaman Kolonial

Sedikit perihal Syed Yahya (Penghulu Cheras):-

• Anak kepada Syed Idris yang berasal dari Acheh, dan tinggal di Rekoh. Sekitar 1883-1898, beliau memiliki tanah dan sebuah rumah di Kampung Rekoh. Rumah ini telah musnah dalam sebuah kebakaran beberapa tahun sebelum 1898.

• Bersama bapanya Syed Idris mengusahakan tanaman lada hitam seluas 3 ekar, sebanyak 7,000 pokok. Menyeru penduduk setempat untuk turut serta, namun tidak mendapat sambutan disebabkan kekangan kewangan.

• Berkahwin dengan anak Che Ngah, Penghulu Cheras sebelum beliau,

• 18/03/1883: Lawatan J.P. Rodger dan H.C. Syers: Pernah menawarkan khidmat pembinaan sebahagian Jalan Cheras-Pudu.

• Meninggal dunia beberapa tahun sebelum 1905, akibat luka tembakan ketika membantu menumpaskan sekumpulan perompak di sekitar kawasan premis perjudian di Cheras: “That it is deferentially submitted as being well known that one Syed Yahya was serving the Government of Selangor for quite a number of years, as Penghulu of Cheras Mukim, the old man having afterwards, some few years back, met with his untimely, sad and deplorable death, the result of a gunshot wound, which seem(?) turned fatal, at the hands of one of the gang robbers who raided the Cheras Gambling Farm; the unfortunate deceased Penghulu having gone to the assistance of the Farm, to subdue the raid.” (PEJABAT SETIAUSAHA KERAJAAN NEGERI SELANGOR @ Arkib Negara Malaysia, 12/06/1905: |"ASKS THAT THE POST OF PENGHULU, CHERAS BE OFFERED TO SYED MOHAMED BIN SYED YAHYA"). Setelah beliau meninggal dunia, makam beliau pernah dianggap “keramat”.

Sumber utama: “In 1883 the semi-traditional regime of Raja Kahar as Malay Magistrate was replaced by the formal creation of the Ulu Langat administrative district, though shortage of staff made it necessary that Syers, the superintendent of police, should act temporarily as the first district officer. The district was divided into five mukim (subdistrict), each in the charge of a Malay penghulu (headman), three of whom deserve mention. Raja Mahmud of Ulu Semenyih was the youngest son of Sultan Mohamed, who in his last years appointed Mahmud, a boy of about 10, to the post of Raja Muda. But in the power struggle that followed his father's death in 1857, Mahmud lost the succession (and the office of Raja Muda) and retired to the periphery of his lost kingdom. In the absence of an established local Malay dominant family, Mahmud, who was intelligent and capable, became the recognized leader of the Ulu Langat Malay community. Raja Daud of Ulu Langat mukim had, as a young man, been the paramour of the wife of Sultan Abdullah of Perak (r. 1874-6). He was 'a man of pleasing features, extremely quiet, and of courtly manners [which] … concealed a firm determination and a dauntless courage'. In his later years at Ulu Langat, Daud was 'a charming old man to meet' and no one would have suspected his scandalous past. Syed Yahya, penghulu of Cheras, was the son of an Achehnese immigrant, Syed Idris, who had settled at Rekoh. After his death, he became a saint whose tomb was a local keramat (shrine). Yahya had married the daughter of his predecessor, Che Ngah, and, like his father, he was 'a great advocate of pepper planting' with 3 acres under 7,000 pepper vines. But his efforts to persuade his people to follow his example were ineffective as 'the want of money is the stumbling block'. It was one sign, among many, of the gap between the general body of Sumatran settlers and the upper-class penghulu.” (J.M. Gullick, 2007: |"A Short History of Ulu Langat to 1900"), m.s. 11-12).