Politics: Donnie Darko?

The flurry of executive orders signed by Donald Trump, US president, again, during his first few days in office has been matched only by the Niagara of congratulations, analyses and prophecies pouring forth from across the world. What, oh what, is Donnie going to do? “I am confident that under your leadership, the US will continue to exercise its global role,” said Lawrence Wong, prime minister, in his felicitations to Trump. It is not known whether Trump yanked the US from the World Health Organization (WHO) before or after reading Wong’s epistle.

Bilahari Kausikan, establishment elder, was rather nonchalant about the incoming administration’s foreign policy. Its misadventures in Vietnam and the Middle East aside, the US has taken a hard-nosed, transactional approach to Asia in the last 50 years. Indeed, in Bilahari’s telling, the arc of America’s global foreign policy, traced back to 1776, bends towards introverted self-interest rather than global leadership laden with bonhomie and Western values. Donnie is simply old wine in a uniquely repellent bottle. “Rather than hankering after the imagined common values of a bygone age, then,” he advised, “U.S. allies and partners would do well to regard the foreign policy of Trump’s second administration as a return to the natural position of the United States.” Bilahari did concede though that Trump’s threat of tariffs was worrisome. 

Bilahari was echoing the sentiments of Tommy Koh, another foreign policy mandarin. Donnie loves that Singapore runs a trade deficit with the US, Koh wrote in November. But if he were to tax imports across the board, and single out China for higher tariffs, as he has threatened, the effects would ripple out towards us. “Free trade is the lifeblood of ASEAN,” wrote Koh. 

Donnie 2.0 is more experienced, has a bigger mandate, the backing of both houses of Congress and an ideologically aligned Supreme Court. He is more likely than before to follow through on his threats. If that happens, the answer, said Danny Quah of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, isn’t to become China’s “plus-one”, possibly by rerouting Chinese exports to the US through Singapore. We’d simply draw Donnie’s ire, Quah believes. Instead, he called for greater trade within ASEAN; that remains quite tepid. Linda Lim at the University of Michigan was even less sanguine in a commentary for CNA. Small economies like Singapore have “little room for discretionary action in advance. They can only react.”

So, what, oh what, is Donnie going to do?

Politics: A few good men

In the week that Donald Trump began his second term as US president, The New York Times published a video, “How tyranny begins”, featuring “lessons on authoritarianism from around the world”. It chose four leaders as case studies: Russia’s Vladimir Putin, Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega, Hungary’s Viktor Orban, and Singapore’s Lee Hsien Loong. Each country’s “tyranny” was depicted through four exiled interviewees, with Li Shengwu, Harvard professor and son of Lee’s estranged brother and sister-in-law, flying the Majulah.

Singaporeans might reasonably object to our membership of this tyrannical guild. But rather than succumb to the usual bashing of “Western liberal media”, perhaps it’s more productive to contemplate any similarities between these four illiberal democracies, to understand what the slippery slope to tyranny looks like.

“The steps were gradual, and every one of them was unbelievable for me,” said a Hungarian academic. “We thought, no way, they cannot cross that line—until 2020, when the Hungarian government forced my university to leave the country.”

“Vladimir Putin, he always has these legal steps first,” said the Russian exile, a journalist. “Russian president Vladimir Putin has signed two controversial security bills into law,” a TV news presenter then said in a voiceover. “And then he does what he wants,” the journalist finished. 

“I wish I would have paid more attention to those flashes of authoritarianism,” said a Nicaraguan activist. “We ignored it because the economy was going really, really well.”

Society: Shan is wrong about the death penalty

K Shanmugam, law and home affairs minister, rarely misses an opportunity to transform perceived liberal detritus into scaffolding for his conservative agenda. This week he seized on the commuting of 37 death sentences by Joe Biden, outgoing US president, to repeat a point made by the Wall Street Journal about “Biden’s personal conscience overriding the law”. He then contrasted the supposed excesses of the US’s individualistic norms to the collectivism of Singapore’s. “For me, the public interest of Singapore is the primary consideration: what is in the best interests of Singaporeans as a whole?” What followed was the usual cherry-picking of anecdotes and statistics—from Swedish students carrying not books but drugs in their backpacks, to the ills of fentanyl in the US—to bolster his support for the death penalty. “Our tough approach has saved thousands of lives: many potential abusers, victims of crimes that come with drug abuse, and their families.” 

Unfortunately for him, there is no solid evidence that the death penalty acts as more of a deterrent to drug-trafficking than, say, a life sentence. In “Evidence Does Not Support the Use of the Death Penalty”, the editors of Scientific American last year stated that “Study after study shows that the death penalty does not deter crime…” Shanmugam’s assertion relies partly on the fact that the number of drug abusers caught in Singapore has halved in the past 30-odd years. But that is a circumstantial data point that could be more correlation than causation. Daniel Nagin, criminologist and professor at Carnegie Mellon University, has argued that the certainty of being caught has a greater impact on deterrence than the severity of punishment. Is it really the death penalty that deters would-be traffickers from entering Singapore? Or the fact that our efficient border security increases the certainty of being caught? 

It would be more intellectually honest for Shanmugam to contend, as Nagin does, that the evidence about the deterrent effect of the death penalty is inconclusive. A genuine discussion about criminal justice in society should involve more serious research into deterrence, and elevate the voices not just of the families who face the trauma of addiction, but also those who face the trauma of a vulnerable relative turned drug mule—nobody grows up with the dream of trafficking heroin. Unfortunately, such voices are regularly muffled, most notably with the steady crippling of the Transformative Justice Collective (TJC), which just took offline its popular website and Instagram pages after the government designated them as declared online locations. (You can still follow TJC on Telegram and WhatsApp.)

The government loves to trumpet the fact that a majority of Singaporeans believe in the death penalty, yet ours is a society long drip-fed on capital punishment cheerleading, deprived of the revelatory morsels TJC offered. Some may deride TJC’s content, sometimes vulnerable to being sensationalist, though we believe the dire urgency of the situation—yet another person is about to be hanged on our watch—demands this arresting approach. The greater danger is that a hegemonic conservative discourse about what’s in the “best interests of Singaporeans” is commanded by a pugnacious, take-no-prisoners minister.

Society: Should we prune the banyan or tame its gardener?

“The problem now is that under a banyan tree, very little else can grow,” George Yeo, then acting minister for information and the arts with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP), said in 1991. “When state institutions are too pervasive, civic institutions cannot thrive. Therefore, it is necessary to prune the banyan tree so that other plants can grow.” Over three decades later, it’s clear that an overbearing state is still a hindrance to the maturing of society. Perhaps the metaphor needs updating, suggested Cherian George, professor at Hong Kong Baptist University’s School of Communication, this week. The PAP is not the banyan, but the “over-enthusiastic gardener armed with axes and shears and pesticides. Unwittingly, George Yeo put his finger on the problem: he reflected the PAP’s techno-authoritarian impulse, deeply distrustful of life around them, believing that educated elites must apply their superior capacities to correct citizens’ ways.”

Speaking at the annual Singapore Perspectives conference—this year’s edition themed “Community”—George cited recent instances of state repression, involving: pro-Palestinian and anti-death-penalty activism, theatre productions, and academic and media freedoms. “[T]he cumulative impact is to persuade Singaporeans that the people out there are self-centred; that minority opinions and views that sound controversial may be dangerous; and that people who express them should be shunned and excluded.”

George, an astute analyst of Singapore, was partly sharing thoughts from his just-completed manuscript of a book on political polarisation. Even though Singapore ranks relatively low, globally, on political polarisation, he said that “we don’t have the kind of horizontal, people-to-people trust that would allow community to flourish.” The PAP, like the British colonialists before, has promoted vertical trust and horizontal distrust, he said. “So it’s not surprising that, after not just 60 years but two centuries of state propaganda, most Singaporeans lack trust in others, and are happy to delegate people-to-people relations to the state.” 

Separately, the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS), conference organiser, presented new research that showed social cohesion weakening, because of, it said, income inequality, social media and immigration. Compared to 2018, last year the average Singaporean had fewer close friends; and was more likely to prefer interacting with people of similar socioeconomic backgrounds. Society is increasingly fractured along class lines. Even as our brilliant intellectuals keep pontificating about community in exalted spaces, and relentlessly updating our compendium of metaphors, each of us should do our part to nurture interpersonal bonds through a somewhat quaint practice that George mentioned: face-to-face dialogue and deliberation. 

Some further reading: “The banyan tree and the people out there”, George’s full speech.

Society: Billion-dollar private tuition industry a huge cost to education equality 

Residents living in landed properties are spending about 28 times more on average per month on education than those in 1- and 2-room HDB flats. Based on figures released in the latest Household Expenditure Survey, it’s a whopping S$888-divide—a monthly average of S$33 for some of the country’s most impoverished compared to S$921 for some of the wealthiest. Nationwide, the average monthly expenditure on education increased from S$374 in 2017/2018 to S$404 in 2023, due to higher spending on pre-primary education and private tuition. The amount spent on the latter, both at home and at centres, rose to S$1.8bn from S$1.4bn in 2018. The top 20 percent of households by income spent on average more than four times what the bottom 20 percent did.

Despite the government’s efforts over the years to loosen up Singapore’s education system, by increasing flexibility and reducing the stress on students, it’s been tougher for anxious parents to let go, as they continue to fuel the billion-dollar tuition industry. Competition and keeping up with peers are key reasons for paying top dollar to send their kids for extra classes. In a letter to The Straits Times (ST), Maybel Chong wondered whether efforts by the Ministry of Education—removing mid-year examinations and changing the PSLE scoring system—to soften the national obsession with grades has instead achieved the opposite effect. Chong concluded that the reforms had “heightened parents’ anxiety and persuaded them that tuition is a necessity, not an option.” 

Singapore routinely ranks among the top performers in educational attainment globally, but its academic success appears to be heavily supplemented by the additional hours and dollars spent on private classes. The widening disparities in tuition spending risk exacerbating existing social inequalities. Without the edge that private tutoring offers, school performance, so heavily dependent on a family’s resources, is invariably impacted. This in turn hurts a student’s chances of qualifying for “good” (read: elite and brand name) schools, ultimately affecting their job prospects. Some countries have explored ways to reduce the inequity of privatised, or “shadow” education: China mandated that private tuition providers operate on a non-profit basis; while England piloted a National Tutoring Programme. Maintaining a “world-class” education system here will take more than high calibre teachers and state resources. Failing which, public education’s manifest potential to foster greater equality will only further diminish.

History weekly by Faris Joraimi

After SG50, then the Bicentennial, comes SG60: the nation’s diamond jubilee. For the first two, little expense and effort was spared in re-telling the Singapore Story. In 2019, we were even presented with a new historical narrative loudly boasting a revision of the old 1819 founding by John Company, with an expanded “700 years” plot. A new history, like a potion of blissful forgetfulness gifted in a bottle, tied in a ribbon and left at our doorstep. But the charm only worked so far. What do we do with that large, troublesome shadow still taking up space in this new history, which we can only approximate with the word “colonialism”: a system of domination, an exploitative class structure, a way of organising knowledge about ourselves, time and space? 

As some of us ponder away, we now have another birthday bash promising “A Refreshed Spirit”. More like last week’s lunch, refreshed in the microwave. I’m relieved that there are no unwelcome surprises. The official website of SG60 says this year’s activities will honour our “shared values of multiculturalism, boldness, resilience and openness that have united us and allowed us to prosper against the odds over the past 60 years.” Compared to the Bicentennial and SG50, though, the whole thing feels a bit muted, with several humdrum national-campaign events (“Singapore World Water Day”, “Racial and Religious Harmony Month”) alongside the usual annual affairs like the National Day Parade and Chingay. In keeping with tradition, there will be yet another “immersive multimedia journey” for the patriots out there who can’t get enough of the “Bicentennial Experience”, which was 2019’s audiovisual dramatisation of national history. Held from July this year at the National Museum of Singapore, the “Experience at the Glass Rotunda” will highlight the “importance of the sea in shaping our history and identity over the past 700 years.” 

There are some fun ways to be involved as a member of the public, most notably by joining “Project Citizens – The First Million”, which needs 160 volunteers to interview seniors who registered as Singapore citizens after the National Registration Act came into force in May 1966. If you’re a natural kaypoh who doesn’t mind acquiring oral history interview skills in a one-hour workshop, sign up here. Maybe our technocrats know Singaporeans aren’t in the mood for anything more festive. Given foul economic weather and increased scrutiny of elite excesses, it’s probably not a good look to throw another grand year-long extravaganza. The 2020s seem bent on proving that favourite ST headline: an “uncertain” and “far more dangerous world”, where SG60’s recycled mantras of stability and harmony feel less reassuring than ever. Into the gathering dark, we lurch.

Arts: Eastsiders on the West End

Three Singaporean actresses have carved out a space in the spotlight on London’s busy theatre circuit: Anjana Vasan, Nathania Ong and, most recently, Victoria Chen, who’s clinched a starring role in the stage adaptation of Studio Ghibli’s beloved “My Neighbour Totoro”, the 1988 Japanese animated film. Chen will join the play’s West End transfer from March this year as the character Mei, the younger of two girls who move to the rural Japanese countryside as their mother convalesces from a debilitating long-term illness. There, the sisters discover a world of magical forest creatures who keep them company as their mother teeters between relapse and recovery. The stage show is a feat of ingenious puppetry and set design, and Mei is its capacious heart in a small body, a wide-eyed counterpoint to her elder sister Satsuki’s old-soul, preternatural maturity. “As a middle child, I am both a younger and older sister, and I carry so many fond memories of growing up with my siblings. Our secret languages, inside jokes, squabbles, and habits,” Chen told Jom. “I can’t turn back time, but as Mei, I can live through many moments like that again and again.”

Singaporean theatre artists have a long history of pursuing their craft and winning plaudits in the UK, from director Glen Goei, who did a gender-bending star turn as a Chinese spy in “M. Butterfly” also on the West End; to playwright Joel Tan, who’s just landed the premiere of a play interrogating museums, decolonisation and repatriation at the Royal Court Theatre. Ong got her breakout role as Eponine in the classic musical “Les Miserables”, and is now in the blockbuster hit “Hamilton” playing Eliza, the wife of the titular character, at the Victoria Palace Theatre till at least this June. Vasan last year pocketed a Laurence Olivier Award, the British stage’s highest honour, for her role as Stella Kolwalski in the London revival of “A Streetcar Named Desire”. She’s been candid about her experience as a minority woman in a cutthroat industry. “They see what you look like and where you come from, and it’s easy for them to say, ‘Ok, you’re this person and you only play this role’,” she told Vogue Singapore “At every stage of your career, you’re constantly trying to bend those expectations.” These three women certainly have.

Arts: Play it forward

From a S$3m endowed musical directorship to the regular sponsorship of piano lessons for underprivileged students, Singaporean artists and organisations are both giving back and paying it forward to pad out the classical music scene here. The Singapore Symphony Orchestra (SSO) has just announced its largest-ever single personal gift since the orchestra’s inception by an anonymous Singaporean donor related to Quantedge, a Singapore-founded hedge fund. The SSO has since renamed its musical director position to reflect this sizable contribution: it’s now called the Quantedge Music Director, one presently occupied by Austrian conductor Hans Graf. He will be succeeded by Finnish conductor Hannu Lintu next July, who was appointed after a year-long search. Lintu is currently the music director of the Gulbenkian Orchestra, based in Lisbon, and also chief conductor of the Finnish National Opera and Ballet. 

Then there are other kinds of long-term generosities, including the work of Nabillah Jalal, a pianist and entrepreneur who co-founded ArtSee, a music mentorship programme for Muhammadiyah Welfare Home. The non-profit shelter cares for underprivileged boys who are often recovering from neglect and abuse, or are juvenile offenders. Nabillah’s experience of being a recipient of unconditional financial assistance led her to shape the community programme that ArtSee is today. Its pilot started with smaller taster sessions that encouraged the boys to explore different art forms. They were especially drawn to traditional Malay music, she observed, and now every Saturday evening you’ll hear the sonorous sounds of gamelan music pealing through Pasir Ris East Community Club from their weekly lessons. Nabillah scrimped and saved for her bachelor’s in piano performance at the Royal College of Music in London. “All my friends were already starting their time at the local universities,” she told CNA. “Yet, I was juggling between odd jobs, practising for auditions, saving money to send my audition tapes to the schools and applying for financial help for the school fees.” This paid off; her degree was funded by an outpouring of support from grassroots organisations and charities. She would go on to open a boutique piano school, and sponsor lessons for low-income students. One of her collaborators, Razin Mohamed from the Djoko Mangkrengg Performing Arts Group, says: “It’s not always easy to teach the boys...But seeing them grow in terms of their music skills and general confidence can be really fulfilling.” 

Tech: Phone repaired and privacy breached 

A recent CNA investigation into tech repair shops revealed that three in 10 technicians viewed private files, with some even transferring data to external devices. Even more alarming was many shop owners’ blasé reactions when confronted. Some absolved themselves of any responsibility for outsourced technicians’ actions; others suggested that users should delete photos before handing in their devices for repair. 

The number of repair shops here has more than doubled since 2010. The potential privacy risks from unscrupulous individuals range from casual snooping to malicious activities like blackmail or identity theft. One such case occurred in January 2021, when a repair technician was charged with forwarding sensitive images of his client’s fiancée to himself. Two laws, the Computer Misuse Act and Protection from Harassment Act, provide some protection against unauthorised data access and exploitation. However, safeguarding personal data begins at home. Regularly backing up data to cloud services or external storage can mitigate risks. Before handing over devices for repair, users should remove storage components or supervise any repairs involving sensitive information. Such proactive steps are crucial in protecting one’s privacy.

Tech: Chip Bees

With one in 10 chips being produced in Singapore and over US$18bn (S$24.4bn) in research and development and manufacturing investments over the last two years, Singapore’s status as a key node in the global semiconductor supply chain is unquestionable. The question is: can the surge in demand be met with a concomitant increase in the 35,000-strong qualified workforce? The recent tie-up between Singapore’s Institute of Technical Education (ITE) and two global semiconductor firms, Siltronic and Vanguard International, should help.

The agreement, supporting ITE’s Work-Study Diploma programme, will provide sponsored internships, job placements, and curriculum guidance for over 500 students. This initiative not only aims to produce industry-ready graduates but also assists companies in developing training blueprints and certification courses for both young and mid-career employees. The cooperation with industry leaders, facilitated by the Singapore Semiconductor Industry Association (SSIA), extends beyond training, involving mentorship and career conversion programmes. To keep up with the growing demand, other talent initiatives that aim to prepare Singapore’s workforce in the semiconductor industry include a new six-month training programme jointly developed by the SSIA, Nanyang Technological University and the Economic Development Board. The programme will train up to 150 people in integrated circuit design over the next five years. With the semiconductor industry contributing to eight percent of Singapore’s GDP and employing 10 percent of its manufacturing workforce, fostering a skilled workforce is integral to maintaining and growing the Republic’s role in the global supply chain.

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