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Tag: Tharman Shanmugaratnam

  • What A Minister’s Reluctance To Be PM Says About Race In Singapore

    What A Minister’s Reluctance To Be PM Says About Race In Singapore

    The move on Wednesday by Singapore’s popular deputy premier to emphatically quash suggestions he wants to take over from Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong exposes the conservative ethnic consensus in the country’s leadership, despite a public clamour for greater political openness, observers say.

    Public speculation about Tharman Shanmugaratnam’s fit as Lee’s successor has been swirling in recent years, and resurfaced on Monday after an independent survey showed nearly 69 per cent of Singaporeans would support the 59-year-old ethnic Tamil as the country’s next leader.

    “Just to be absolutely clear, because I know there’s this talk going around… I’m not the man for PM, I say that categorically. It’s not me,” Tharman told local media late on Wednesday.

    Tharman said the top job was not his ambition.

    He is one of two deputy prime ministers and oversees financial and social issues. The former central bank chief took the job in 2011, having entered politics in 2001. He was finance minister from 2007 to 2015, and an education minister before that.

    “I’m good at policymaking, good at advising my younger colleagues and supporting the PM, not being the PM,” he was quoted as saying.

    Political observers told This Week in Asia Tharman’s comments revealed his tacit acceptance of the long-ruling People’s Action Party’s (PAP) belief that the Chinese-majority country was not yet ready for an ethnic minority leader.

    “It may be that he genuinely does not want the job but it is also possible that the results of that survey have exposed the gulf between popular thinking and many of Tharman’s senior PAP colleagues on ethnicity and politics,” said Garry Rodan, professor of Southeast Asian politics at Australia’s Murdoch University.

    “The PAP orthodoxy…emphasises that most Singaporeans are reluctant to support candidates from outside their own ethnic group for top leadership posts,” Rodan said.

    Singapore’s resident population of 3.9 million is made up of 74.3 per cent Chinese, 13.3 per cent Malays and 9.1 per cent Indians, with others making up the remaining 3.2 per cent.

    Alex Au, a prominent political blogger, said Tharman was “being a very loyal colleague”.

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    “He does not wish pressure to build on his cabinet colleagues to choose certain options when it comes to leadership succession,” he said.

    Singaporean leaders – including current premier Lee and his father, the late founding prime minister Lee Kuan Yew – have said the country’s conservative majority Chinese electorate had some time to go before it would accept a non-Chinese leader.

    But the survey of 897 Singaporeans, commissioned by Yahoo Singapore and conducted by independent polling firm Blackbox Research, showed 73 per cent of people disagreeing that the race of the premier is an important factor.

    “The poll results confirm data from other Blackbox surveys that race is not the primary criterion as a basis for choosing a preferred candidate among the Singapore public,” the polling firm said in the report.

    Long-time Singapore political observer Bridget Welsh said Tharman’s popularity “stems from his support of spending for social welfare and services, and management of the economy, as well as his ability to bridge groups as a more liberal and open leader compared to his peers”.

    But “as an elite-orientated party, the PAP categorically rejects selection by popular opinion,” said Welsh, a Southeast Asian politics expert at the National Taiwan University.

    “Tharman is too liberal, too popular, and an ethnic minority – all features that do not fit with today’s hardline PAP,” she added.

    Tharman, who concurrently served as the chief of the International Monetary Fund’s powerful policy-steering body from 2011 to 2015 while in government, grabbed the limelight at last year’s general election as he used his avuncular speaking style to take apart the opposition’s economic policies and explain the government’s position.

    Video clips of his speeches at the hustings went viral on social media, spurring the hashtag “#TharmanforPM”.

    Tharman led a team of legislators to sweep the five-seat Jurong district with 79 per cent of the vote in the country’s unique system of bloc voting. It was the highest winning margin in the country. The PAP won the election with 69.9 per cent of the popular vote.

    But the economics-trained Tharman, with degrees from the London School of Economics, Cambridge University and Harvard University, has repeatedly denied having designs on the top job. In July last year he used a sporting analogy to describe his aversion to being premier.

    “I was always, in sports, a centre-half rather than centre forward. I enjoy playing half-back and making the long passes, but I am not the striker,” Tharman told CNN anchor Fareed Zakaria in a forum.

    “Unless I am forced to be, and I don’t think I will be forced to it, because I think we have got choices,” he was quoted as saying.

    Au, the blogger, said Tharman’s popularity signalled that the “public is hungry for a different style of governance”.

    There is a perception that he is more “approachable and intellectually flexible than some of the ministers in cabinet who perhaps because of their military background come across as rigid or inarticulate,” Au said.

    Former army chief Chan Chun Sing, the current PAP whip and leader of the powerful National Trades Union Congress, is seen as one of the ruling party’s preferred candidates to be the next prime minister.

    Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat, who returned to work in August after suffering a stroke earlier this year, is also seen as a contender.

    In the Yahoo poll, Chan scored 24 per cent support to be a prime ministerial candidate, while Heng got 25 per cent.

    Au said the current public debate on leadership succession is “a function of the moment”.

    In past leadership changeovers, prime ministers’ successors were named early and had lengthy understudy.

    “As the saying goes, nature hates a vacuum,” Au said. “This is causing public speculation to circulate but the window will close soon when the successor is anointed.”

     

    Source: www.scmp.com

  • Tharman: S R Nathan Led Fulfilling Life, Never Lost Human Touch

    Tharman: S R Nathan Led Fulfilling Life, Never Lost Human Touch

    Mr S R Nathan (3 July 1924 – 22 August 2016).

    What a life he led! From the time he ran away from home at 16, to his early job as a clerk in Muar, then as medical social worker, later unionist serving the seafarers, through a life of public service: culminating as President of the nation he was utterly devoted to.

    I have met few people who lived and breathed Singapore the way he did. His fondness for friends of every race and from all walks of life. His complete absence of airs. His love of food. And his remarkable memory of events in our history, small and big, and of everyone he had met along the way.

    He was active to the end, and never lost his human touch. Just in the last few months, he was sending letters to me and others with his sharp observations and advice on various issues, and always in his beautiful hand-writing. When I last saw him at his home, for lunch, he was in a mellow mood. He had recalled that I had liked the sambal udang the last time we had lunch, and made sure it was served again.

    We can never forget S R Nathan, his love of life, and his immense contributions to the nation he was devoted to.

     

    Source: Tharman Shanmugaratnam

  • Interview With Tharman Shanmugaratnam: I Wanted To Be A Sportsman

    Interview With Tharman Shanmugaratnam: I Wanted To Be A Sportsman

    Hockey, football, cricket, athletics, volleyball, sepak takraw, rugby… you name it, he has played it. Studies were not high on his priority list and he certainly harboured no ambitions of being a medical professional like his father.

    Studying medicine required arduous effort, so he decided to steer clear of it. “Studying medicine would have required time and academic effort, and I didn’t have that at the age of 17 or 18. I was completely disinterested in my studies at the time, and was put off by the fact that medicine would require six years of hard study,” he said.

    So it was in sports that Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam diverted his energy. Hockey held a special place in his heart and the Anglo-Chinese School (ACS) boy went on to represent Combined Schools.

    “At that time life was simpler and less competitive. There wasn’t a need for us to spend a lot of time on our studies. My aim was to put in minimum effort to get to the next level, and spend time on my sports. But I really enjoyed my youth,” Mr Tharman, 58, said.

    Anaemia affected his heart

    His sporting pursuits came unexpectedly to a standstill when he was diagnosed with a very severe case of anaemia when he was 17, which also affected his heart. Having to abandon his ambitions in sports was, as he put it, the “biggest setback in my life”.

    Doctors initially thought he had a hole in the heart, but after anaemia was diagnosed, he had to consume 25 pills a day for several nutrients that his body was not absorbing, for more than four years before he recovered. The big downside for him was having to scale back his sports life. But he was still able to play for the premier hockey league for Singapore Cricket Club and Singapore Recreation Club.

    Looking back, he said sports taught him tremendous discipline.

    “As someone who took sports seriously, you had to put a lot of effort into it, week after week, year after year. For some reason, I didn’t use that discipline in my studies at the time. But the discipline was somewhere there in the mind, and became useful later,” he said.

    Having been forced to pay less attention to sports because of his health, his interest turned to reading.

    “I started reading more. I had a very strong interest in social issues after my pre-university years, so my reading was mainly about society and politics. I became quite driven by an interest in society.”

    Mr Tharman considers himself fortunate that his parents allowed him to be himself and never told him which career path to choose.

    “In those days we didn’t have a lot of career advice or career counselling. I had done economics in A levels and although I did double mathematics, I decided I wasn’t going to go into engineering. But I never had a job in mind, no ambition in terms of career.”

    Early professional life at MAS

    He eventually did well enough in his A levels at ACS to secure a place in the London School of Economics and graduated with a BA in Economics. He later went to Cambridge University to do his master’s in Economics. It was much later, when he was with the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), that he took up an MAS scholarship to study Public Administration at Harvard University.

    He spent most of his early professional life at MAS where he was the managing director and is grateful to have worked under “some exceptionally good leaders in the civil service such as Mr J.Y. Pillay andMr Lim Siong Guan”.

    Politics came naturally to him and he was elected MP for Jurong GRC in 2001, going on to serve as a Minister in Education and Finance, among several other portfolios. He is currently DPM and Coordinating Minister for Economic and Social Policies.

    “I actually enjoy politics, both as a Member of Parliament and as a minister. Part of the reason is because I was always interested in politics from my student days. I spent a lot of time on student activism when I was in the UK.

    “I also enjoy chatting with people, listening to them and trying to figure things out with them. You must enjoy it. If you don’t enjoy politics, it can be a chore, or a cloud in your mind. But if you enjoy it, it keeps you going. Everything becomes an opportunity to help someone, an opportunity to understand an issue better so that we can find a solution, or do something novel in the community.

    “So it’s very important to enter politics for the right reasons. We must enjoy serving, enjoy being with people, working with them and immersing yourself in a community.”

    Mr Tharman noted that working in education was the most meaningful part of his career. “I really enjoyed working with teachers and principals, who were so well motivated. It is a tremendous asset to have a well-motivated teaching force. People who themselves are willing to learn new skills, and to shape changes in the school, so they can do the best for their students.

    “Whatever change you are thinking of, whether you are introducing computers in primary schools or changing the literature curriculum, we have to adapt the pace and nature of change around our teaching force. Their ability to absorb and to shape change in the school is critical.

    “You can’t impose things from the top. That’s the key ingredient in a successful education system – the quality and motivation of our teaching force. I found it very rewarding, but it is also very different from other vocations because you have very little certainty of success in what you set out to do. You will know only years later whether we truly get the outputs we desire, whether we get socially responsible people, innovative people in each new generation.”

    Hectic schedule

    Mr Tharman has a very hectic schedule and often works late into the night. Finding time for his family can be challenging. He is married to Ms Jane Yumiko Ittogi, a lawyer by training, who is currently actively engaged in community work and in the non-profit arts sector. They have a daughter and three sons.

    “My children have adopted their own sleeping habits, which also has meant sleeping later and later. We all keep in touch via WhatsApp now. A couple of my children are based overseas and so we share jokes, pictures and messages through WhatsApp. We try to find every opportunity we can to spend a bit of time together.

    “Despite the fact that they went to SAP schools, they have developed a set of friends of different races. They have Malay and Indian friends. They just felt that they wanted it that way.”

    Children too love sports

    As parents, Mr Tharman and his wife encouraged their children to take their CCAs seriously and develop their own interests. But they left it to their children to decide on their interests, and to let them evolve naturally. For example, the children have taken an interest in culture on their own. Daughter Maya took up Indian classical dance when she was younger.

    “I just trust them to find their own way, and make the most of life. We cannot force them in one direction or the other.”

    One thing all his children have in common is their love for sports. Much like himself, Mr Tharman pointed out with a laugh.

    “My father told me at the end of my Pre-U years that I have to find my own way in life. And that is my attitude as well towards my children.

    “Encourage them in whatever they are doing. Let them do what they enjoy. Encourage them to take it seriously, whatever it is they enjoy, and trust that they will find their own way in life. You have got to trust them.

    “The signals we send our children are extremely important. Respect the things they want to do, and are enjoying. That is how we can develop people who are imaginative, who do something different.”

    Mr Tharman also re-emphasised the importance of life-long learning, the need to develop new interests which may arise midway through life and how SkillsFuture was created to address this issue. “As we go through life, everyone is going to require some renewal in skills, and to refresh ourselves. That’s what SkillsFuture is about. Some people will take some time off from work to study again, some others will continue working but learn while at work, as well as outside work. Whichever way, it should be made as convenient as possible for everyone to keep learning. That is a very exciting possibility: to maximise the potential of every citizen through life. You can’t just achieve it through education in the early years,” he said.

    Asked how he would like to be remembered,Mr Tharman replied: “As someone who worked with others, his colleagues and grassroots leaders, to make a better society, with hope for every individual. We each can only do so much in our short span of life. You’ve got to do the best you can. If I can be remembered as someone who served Singaporeans well, that is enough reward.”

     

    Source: http://news.asiaone.com

  • Why Should Singapore’s Prime Minister Be Chinese?

    Why Should Singapore’s Prime Minister Be Chinese?

    Talk of the “rising star” of Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam has raised the old question of whether Singapore is ready for a non-Chinese Prime Minister. But why shouldn’t Singapore be ready?

    If Chee Soon Juan of the Singapore Democratic Party captured people’s attention during the general election period, Finance Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam has undoubtedly emerged as the darling of the post-GE period.

    There’s already a Tharman for PM Facebook page with, at the time of writing, over 760 likes. Reuters did aprofile on him as a “rising star”. As anchor minister of the Jurong Group Representation Constituency (GRC), his People’s Action Party (PAP) team coasted to victory with almost 80 per cent of the vote, an even better performance than the team in Ang Mo Kio GRC led by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.

    If Singapore had a more competitive democratic system, Tharman could probably mount a leadership challenge within the party and win power. Yet the matter of Tharman’s suitability for leadership consistently runs into another question (apart from his own apparent unwillingness): is Singapore ready for a non-Chinese prime minister?

    The question was first brought up in the 1980s, when Singapore’s first prime minister Lee Kuan Yew revealed that he had considered then Minister for National Development, S Dhanabalan, to be a worthy successor, only to decide that the country was not ready for an Indian prime minister. This message was endorsed by Dhanabalan himself in 2007, when he said that he was “not saying it’s not possible [to have a non-Chinese prime minister], but I think it will take some time.”

    Current prime minster Lee Hsien Loong reiterated this in 2008 shortly after Barack Obama was voted in as the first black president of the United States of America:

    Will it happen soon? I don’t think so, because you have to win votes. And these sentiments – who votes for whom, and what makes him identify with that person – these are sentiments which will not disappear completely for a long time, even if people do not talk about it, even if people wish they did not feel it.

    Lee now believes there’s more of a chance for a non-Chinese prime minister as Singapore’s younger generations grow more accepting and are more ready to connect across racial lines, although he still notes the need to communicate with voters in Mandarin.

    The question is thus an old one. But it’s high time it got turned on its head: why shouldn’t Singapore be ready for a non-Chinese prime minister? Why shouldn’t we be able to have a non-Chinese prime minister right now (or whenever Lee Hsien Loong steps down)?

    The question about winning votes shouldn’t actually be an issue, seeing that Singaporeans don’t get to vote for the leader of the PAP, and therefore the Prime Minister, anyway. (In fact, most PAP members don’t get to vote for the leader of the PAP either; only cadre members – who are selected by the Central Executive Committee of the party – get to vote on the leadership in the Central Executive Committee.) Singaporeans only get to have a say over whether that candidate gets elected as an MP; once that’s done the leadership of the party is out of our hands.

    In any case, Tharman’s ability to win votes has been amply demonstrated in the recent general election, showing that it is not the ethnicity of the candidate, but the respect that he/she can command, that does the trick.

    The issue of being able to communicate in Mandarin might be more of a consideration. Chinese Singaporeans do make up the majority of the local population, and it would of course be important for the prime minister of the country to be able to connect with his citizens.

    Yet being a Chinese majority country has not stopped Singaporeans from electing non-Chinese leaders before. Singaporeans got to vote in their first general election in 1955, following the Rendel Constitution that gave all local citizens the right to elect the majority of seats in the Legislative Assembly. The Labour Front won enough seats to form a minority government. Their leader, and therefore Singapore’s first Chief Minister, was David Marshall, born to a Baghdadi Jewish family.

    Research by historian Dr Thum Ping Tjin based on the Chinese newspapers of the time shows that despite not being Chinese, Marshall was popular among the Chinese in Singapore, as they felt that he stood for labour rights and freedom from colonialism:

    While the Chinese press avoided endorsing any specific politicians, their editorials and readers’ letters show a clear respect for Marshall. They believed that he understood the Chinese, and felt the Labour Front would represent Chinese working class interests better than the businessmen of the [Progressive Party] and [Democratic Party].

    Throughout Singapore’s history there have been non-Chinese politicians who have managed to connect across racial lines and represent the people’s interests:Devan Nair, S Dhanabalan, Othman Wok and Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam among them. These men stood as candidates even before GRCs – supposedly introduced to help racial minorities get into Parliament – and have arguably done more to prove themselves and convince voters than any Chinese Singaporean former army officer parachuted into parliament on the coat-tails of an established anchor minister.

    Chinese-ness has for years been positioned as desirable, a criteria for success and power. Lee Kuan Yew has been described as a Chinese supremacist who believed that certain “Chinese” traits were crucial to Singapore’s success. Under the government’s CMIO (Chinese, Malay, Indian and Others) system of classifying everyone into neat racial categories, Singapore is an incredibly race conscious country.

    Yet this might not be giving Singaporeans enough credit. As voters, Singaporeans are more than capable of discerning who is or isn’t able to represent their best interests, regardless of the individual’s race. When push comes to shove, what really matters is the person’s ability to prove that he or she is a worthy representative and leader, and that’s a challenge for Chinese and non-Chinese politicians alike.

    It is therefore strange that comments that Singapore is “not ready” for a non-Chinese prime minister is accepted as a reasonable political statement, and not some sort of ahistorical concern trolling.

    Even if Singaporeans are voting along racial lines or according to racist assumptions, then what is needed is not a ruling out of a non-Chinese leader, but to tackle head-on the skewed value judgements and uneven playing fields faced by different racial groups, and to find the common ground and common concerns that Singaporeans have for their country. A prime minister, after all, represents the entire nation, not just the majority.

    Lee Kuan Yew himself said in 1965 that “[t]his is not a Malay nation, this is not a Chinese nation, this is not an Indian nation.” Singaporeans have been reminded of this often this year, the year of the nation’s Golden Jubilee as well as the year of his death. If this is indeed the vision of Singapore that we want to live up to, then there is no reason to doubt our readiness for a non-Chinese prime minister.

    The above article was first published on byline.com .

    Source: www.theonlinecitizen.com

  • Tommy Koh: 10 Reflections On GE2015

    Tommy Koh: 10 Reflections On GE2015

    On Cooling-off Day, a good friend invited me to lunch with a group of eminent Singaporeans. I decided to use them as a focus group and asked them to predict whether the PAP’s popular vote would go up or down.

    The majority said it would go down. I asked them whether the PAP would lose any more seats to the opposition. The majority predicted that the PAP would lose one group representation constituency (GRC) and one single-member constituency (SMC).

    Like the pundits and the bookies, my friends at lunch were wrong in their prognosis. The following are 10 of my reflections on the People’s Action Party’s surprising and extraordinary victory.

    SG50

    First, 2015 is not an ordinary year. It is our Golden Jubilee year. Singaporeans from all walks of life, and of different political persuasions, are very proud of what we have achieved in the past 50 years.

    ST ILLUSTRATION: MIEL

     

    The SG50 Steering Committee has adopted a low-key, bottoms-up and people-centric approach to the year-long celebrations. The positive mood was boosted by the excellent performance of our athletes at the SEA Games, and by the conferment of World Heritage status on our beloved Botanic Gardens by Unesco.

    Anyone who attended the National Day Parade would have been inspired by the pride, patriotism and unity of the occasion. I am sure that SG50 increased the popularity of the PAP at the polls.

    THE LEE KUAN YEW FACTOR

    Second, I think that the Lee Kuan Yew factor played a part in the electoral success of the PAP. Mr Lee’s passing triggered a spontaneous outpouring of love and respect for him by Singaporeans. The people of Singapore acknowledged that the success of Singapore was due, in large part, to the vision, courage and determination of Mr Lee and the other founding fathers.

    I am sure that some of the goodwill for Mr Lee was transferred to the political party that he founded and led. The combination of the first and second factors made 2015 an exceptionally good year for the PAP. Tactically, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong was right to hold the election this year, instead of next year.

    FEAR OF A FREAK ELECTION

    Third, the opposition made a big mistake in contesting all 89 seats in Parliament. Although many of the candidates, from parties other than the Workers’ Party (WP) and the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP), had no prospect of winning, the fact that all seats were contested made it possible for the PAP to warn against a freak election.

    The bottom line is that, while the electorate wants a credible, constructive and responsible opposition in Parliament, it also wants the PAP to continue to form the government. If the opposition had been wiser, it would have refrained from contesting 45 of the 89 seats so that, on Nomination Day, the PAP would have won enough seats to form the government. In such a scenario, the electorate would have been more at ease in voting for good opposition candidates.

    THE SILVER VOTE

    Fourth, since 2011, the Government has done several very significant things to win the hearts and minds of senior citizens. The Pioneer Generation Package, MediShield Life, and the Silver Support Scheme have been very well received. The belated recognition of the pioneers and their contributions to Singapore has touched the hearts of many older Singaporeans.

    The SG50 Steering Committee has adopted a low-key, bottoms-up and people-centric approach to the year-long celebrations… I am sure that SG50 increased the popularity of the PAP at the polls.

    My hypothesis is that the majority of the half a million voters, over the age of 65, would have voted for the PAP.

    REMEDYING THE PAIN POINTS

    Fifth, the PAP has brought relief to three of the pain points that emerged in the 2011 General Election. These are housing, immigration and transport. National Development Minister Khaw Boon Wan has increased the supply of public housing, and cooled the overheated property market.

    The Government has also reduced the intake of foreign workers. Transport Minister Lui Tuck Yew worked very hard on both the bus system and the MRT system. He has brought relief to the bus system. The problem of the frequent breakdown of our train system has, however, not yet been solved, in spite of his best efforts.

    On the three pain points, the PAP has brought relief to two-and-a-half of them. The electorate, which is fair-minded, has therefore decided to reward the PAP for having listened to its concerns and for responding to them.

    THE CHALLENGE OF INEQUALITY

    Sixth, the PAP has also responded to the growing concerns about inequality in Singapore. It has introduced schemes like Workfare and the Progressive Wage Model.

    It has opened two schools for students who failed their Primary School Leaving Examination, or PSLE. It has upgraded the quality of technical and vocational education offered by our Institute of Technical Education. It has introduced a new educational initiative called SkillsFuture, based on the successful apprenticeship system in Germany and Switzerland. It has expanded its support for early education.

    It has also reassured the public that social mobility is well, and stronger, in Singapore than in Europe and America. Therefore, although Singapore continues to be a very unequal society, and life is hard for the bottom 30 per cent of our population, the Government was given credit by the electorate for the many initiatives it has taken to address the problem.

    CREDIBILITY OF THE WORKERS’ PARTY

    Seventh, the ascendance of the WP was seriously affected by the PAP’s allegation that it had mismanaged the Aljunied-Hougang-Punggol East Town Council, and that it had exposed an integrity issue.

    Although the WP rebutted the PAP’s allegation and had, in turn, accused the PAP of bullying and using the town council system to impede the progress of the opposition, the exchange left some voters in doubt about the competence and integrity of the WP. This factor could have explained the loss of Punggol East, the drop in the support for the WP in Hougang and Aljunied GRC, and its failure to capture East Coast GRC and Fengshan SMC.

    Going forward, it is important for the WP to clear its name, and to restore the electorate’s faith in its competence and integrity.

    PAP’S ELECTORAL STRATEGY

    Eighth, the PAP did a better job managing the electoral campaign this year than in 2011.

    PAP organising secretary Ng Eng Hen proved to be a capable campaign manager. Although the PAP was outgunned by the opposition in the staging of rallies, it devoted more manpower and resources to door-to-door campaigning and retail diplomacy. The party also decided to capitalise on the popularity of PM Lee by putting up his poster in every constituency.

    It was like a referendum on him, and it could have backfired. Fortunately for the PAP, the strategy seemed to have paid off.

    AN INSECURE WORLD

    Ninth, the sentiments of the electorate have always been affected by the external environment. The 2001 GE is a case in point.

    Following the Sept 11 terrorist attacks in the United States, the electorate rallied to the PAP, which has a good track record of keeping peace at home, and a strong defence against any external threat. In that election, the PAP’s popular vote was 75.3 per cent.

    In this election, the PAP’s narrative about the terrorist threat from ISIS and the uncertain global economy worked to its advantage.

    VOICE OF REASON

    Tenth, I am glad that the PAP leader whose team scored the highest popular vote of 79 per cent was Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam. He was always calm and measured.

    He never uttered an insult or a threat.

    Instead, he explained the PAP’s policies and rebutted the alternatives put forward by the opposition in a clear and rational way. He was intellectually brilliant but came across as humble and open-minded.

    I hope other politicians would seek to emulate him.

    • The writer is a Special Adviser at the Institute of Policy Studies, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore.

     

    Source: www.straitstimes.com