Thoughts on China, Singapore's success and ensuring continuity

The Straits Times, April 28, 2007


At a dialogue yesterday, Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew was asked for his views on a range of topics, from how Singapore became successful, and whether China's political structure would hinder its growth, to leadership transition in the Arab world. Here are edited excerpts of what he told his audience of 150 business and civil society leaders from Arab and Asian nations






CHINA'S PRAGMATISM

'I cannot tell you what the Chinese are going to do but I can tell you what they have been doing, and my guess is they will do more of the same in an incremental manner.

They are not ideologues any more, they are pragmatists. They can talk about Marxism, Leninism, Maoism... I mean it's like a prayer before a meal and then they get on with it. And when they get on with it, it means how you make China prosperous, modern and respected.'
MM LEE, responding to a question on whether democracy would be a constraint in China's development



EDUCATING A COUNTRY

'I had three-quarters or more, about 80 per cent of the population already culturally geared to receive education. What we did was to switch the education from native languages to English and keep your native language as a second language. It was a very difficult thing to do emotionally. It could not have been done by legislation. We'd have riots.

So we did it by offering choices. You go to a Chinese language school, you will learn English as a second language. Same with Malay, same with Tamil. Or you can go to an English language school and you will learn your mother tongue as your second language.

And the market decided who got the better jobs. And so the parents began to shift their children into English language schools with mother tongue as a second language and today we are, 40-plus years down the road, we are connected with the world, we can connect with India, we can connect with China, we can connect with the region.'
MM LEE, on how Singapore educated its population, a necessary pre-condition for popular participation. He said the Chinese and Indians here already had a tradition of scholarship



ENSURING CONTINUITY

'In the case of Singapore, we have many foreign talents joining us... Of our population of four million, only about 3.2 million are Singaporeans. So, one-third of the working population are foreigners. But the core management team is Singaporean. Therefore, we have continuity.

You take Citigroup... you can find many Indians and others, non-Americans, but when I meet (Citigroup chief executive) Chuck Prince... and the team around him in New York, they are all Americans, there's a solid core of Americans who will provide the continuity.

It's like a Christmas tree, I mean... he's a big decoration of that Christmas tree and he must be outstanding or he wouldn't be there. But it's the Christmas tree that holds him up and the more ornaments you put on the tree, the stronger the tree must be.'
MM LEE, on how continuity of leadership is key in the management of every enterprise