Although I had already completed my series of commentaries on GE 2011, one of them—on Lee Kuan Yew—had attracted so many responses from readers (more than 300) that I thought it would be useful to follow up with a supplement to the commentary, in order to recapitulate the readers’ most cogent arguments in their pro- or anti-LKY stand, and in so doing, indicate my own.

Any controversy surrounding Lee Kuan Yew attests to his phenomenal influence and impact on the society: Singapore will never see his like again.

My political commentary had, oddly, provoked completely opposing responses—praise from his critics and condemnation from his supporters, both sides also vigorously attacking each other. Their positions crystallized around a pivotal point in the debate: what was owing to Lee Kuan Yew as the founder of modern Singapore. The supporters said, ‘He’s done so much for Singapore. How dare you criticize him? You’re being ungrateful!’, and the critics retorted, ‘He’s also done much harm too. How dare you criticise those who are only telling the truth about him?’

The rancorous debate is likely to go on as long as Mr Lee is still around, and perhaps even after he passes from the scene. But for now, in our need to do some calm and level-headed stock-taking after a historic GE 2011, it will be important to take a closer look at a quandary that has dismayingly polarized Singaporeans, and see how we can clarify and try to resolve it. Read more

It looks like the entire saga of GE 2011—the excitement of the campaigns, the unfolding of each surprise development, the breathlessly awaited results, the shocking post-election announcements—is finally over. What is not over, and will not be for a while, is the wait-and-see attitude of the people. Overnight, it seems a whole society has become watchful and alert.

Having commented extensively on the PAP leadership in my previous commentaries, I will now, in what is likely to be my last article on GE 2011, train the spotlight on ourselves, the people who, in my opinion, are the real winners. It will be useful to do some stock-taking and some thinking about the role we would like to play in the new political setting.

If one looked for clear winners in the intensely contested GE 2011, the electoral numbers told very little; in fact, they seemed to show confusing anomalies. Thus the PAP’s 60% share of the votes which appeared a convincing win, and would have been considered a landslide in other countries, had actually thrown the PAP leaders into a turmoil of disappointment and shock that only losers would experience, and the unprecedented, much celebrated gain of six Parliamentary seats by the opposition Workers’ Party was only a paltry 10% of the total. The huge asymmetry between the raw figures and the reality was a reflection of the unique Singapore political landscape: the 60% was the worst slide in the PAP’s performance at the polls in forty years, and if extrapolated into the next one or two elections, could spell the end of the party’s dominance.

So who are the real winners? Read more

I am absolutely delighted by the tremendous response to my latest commentary on Lee Kuan Yew, a response which reflects his unique position in Singapore. This, in turn, is reflected in the amazing range of attitudes towards the man, from sheer adulation at one end to intense dislike at the other. The result is that the same commentary has, to my astonishment, provoked the extremes of outright condemnation and enthusiastic support. (This is all part of the work of a political commentator, so I say, ‘Keep those comments coming, whatever their tone!’ Indeed, I am learning a great deal from them.)

It is a measure of my continuing fascination with Lee Kuan Yew that I wanted to explore one aspect of his post-GE 2011 situation that can never be adequately represented through formal exposition. This is the psychological dimension which is clearly the most complex-–-and the most engrossing-–-because it deals with the impossibly vast, constantly changing landscape of human emotions, passions, needs, drives and motives, which the political commentary, constrained by fact and logic, can never capture. But literature can, because this genre is given the privilege of literary licence allowing for the free play of the imagination. Indeed, far from being precise, logical and rational, literature glories in nuances, ambiguities, allusions and paradoxes. Far from providing answers, it only wants to tease the mind and heart with questions.

I have therefore chosen to write a play about Lee Kuan Yew in a fictive setting. It is based not only on some recognisable events in GE 2011 but also on one person in Singapore’s history, who has impressed me as much as Mr Lee. He is Chia Thye Poh, the longest-serving political prisoner who was incarcerated on Sentosa Island for decades. Dramatised in a play, these facts become less important than the interpretation each reader will have for them. Thus the play may be seen as a kind of imaginative extension of my political commentaries.

Island

A Play

The action throughout takes place in a small, very sparsely furnished room in an old, run-down house on a small, deserted island somewhere off Singapore.

SCENE 1

An old man is standing at an open window, the only one in the house, and looking out upon the desolate scene outside. He sees, in the far distance, a lighthouse, and fairly close by, what seems to be an old, abandoned stone fortress.

Minister Supremo—he hates the name now—once the most powerful man in the ruling government of Singapore, advising and guiding a succession of prime ministers, is now in self exile. There is a look of fierce intensity on his face, rather at odds with the scanty white hair, the deeply furrowed brow, the stoop, the occasionally trembling hands.

He hears the sound of footsteps approaching the door at the far end of the room, and quickly shuts the window, before returning to his place on an old wooden chair at a table on which the only items are a thermos flask and a porcelain tea mug. Hanging on a nail on the wall facing the table is the famous uniform of the ruling party, a short-sleeved white shirt with the recognizable party symbol in bright red on the right sleeve. There is a knocking on the door.

The announcement of MM’s resignation was so unexpected and shocking that I had to sit down, gather my thoughts into a coherent, cohesive whole, and come up with a proper, detailed analysis of the whys, wherefores and what-nows of what must be the greatest surprise of GE 2011, to share with my readers.

One of the greatest surprises of GE 2011 was the people’s unequivocal rejection of the PAP style of government. But none could have imagined that the biggest casualty would be Lee Kuan Yew, one of the founders of the PAP, Singapore’s first prime minister and subsequently, de facto Chief despite holding only an advisory role as Minister Mentor.

Indeed, the nations’ shock on 14 May, just a week after the election, at the resignation of MM from the cabinet (together with Mr Goh Chok Tong, Senior Minister) could only be described as seismic in the Singapore political landscape. It reflected the uniquely powerful position of the father of modern Singapore, presumably the only political leader in the world whose name was synonymous with the party he founded, whose name, in turn, was synonymous with the country it rules. The equation Lee Kuan Yew = PAP = Singapore had scrolled across the collective consciousness of the society for nearly half a century.

He was once compared to the immense banyan tree in whose shade only puny little saplings could grow. He was once the mighty Colossus in whose shadow little people cowered.

Was. Had scrolled. Once. Cowered.

It gives one a feeling of surreality to write about Lee Kuan Yew’s influence in the past tense. But that is exactly how it is going to be from now onwards, judging from the various public statements made by the prime minister, MM himself, Mr Goh and other PAP leaders, following the announcement of the resignation. Almost in one voice, they spoke about the need for the party to move on, to respond to the needs and aspirations of the people, so painfully made clear to them in GE 2011. The courteous, deferential tone called for by the occasion masked the urgency of the message: the prime minister must be free to act on his own without any interference from the overpowering MM who is also his father. Read more

I have been most encouraged by the great response to my first article on GE 2011, and have written another. Indeed, the historic election had so many different aspects worth exploring that I am inspired to do a few more to share my thoughts and musings with readers.

GE 2011 sprang so many surprises—the emergence of a bright, fearless young electorate, the star performance of the opposition Workers’ Party, the exit of Singapore’s most durable opposition member, Chiam See Tong, as well as of one of the PAP’s most highly regarded ministers, George Yeo—that one would be hard put to single out any one of them as the most attention-grabbing.

For me, the most significant of these surprises in terms of its potential for permanently changing the Singapore political landscape, was the crumbling of the PAP model of governance that had, for nearly half a century, been unabashedly held up by the leaders as the best model for Singapore, creating the famed hard pragmatic thinking and the stern, no-nonsense style.

Midway through the campaigning, the PAP leaders sensed, to their shock, what they would never have believed possible—the rejection of the model by the people. Overnight, the famed posture of overweening confidence vanished, replaced by self-doubt and fear. It resulted in a rush by the PAP team of campaigners, led by the Prime Minister himself, to apologise profusely, to astonished Singaporeans, for mistakes made in the past, and to promise humbly to do better in the future.

Very quickly, what had begun as an election ruse, morphed into an earnest promise to the people, with the Prime Minister reiterating the message in his first post-election speech, and reinforcing it, in the days immediately following, with a pledge to do some ‘soul-searching’. The need to change from within was discussed, in a disarmingly frank press interview, just days after the election, by the PAP’s biggest casualty, George Yeo. Mr Yeo, in a gesture both heroic and humble, pledged to devote his future, in whatever role, to helping the government ‘review the way it governs’ in order once more to connect with the people. Read more