On 5 September 1942 , Japanese Field Marshal Prince Maida ( 前田利为 ) boarded a plane from Kuching to Labuan to officiate an airport that bears his name . However , he never arrived . One month later , the plane was found to have crashed off the coast of Tanjung Datu , Bintulu . The cause of the plane crash was not known . The Japanese later set up a wooden pole memorial made up of Belian wood in Bintulu . The wooden pole was later taken back to Japan by the family of Prince Maida .