The Seven Days that changed Singapore

May 18, 2011

www.nst.com.my

General Elections 2011: The Seven Days that changed Singapore

by P.N. Balji*

The watershed general election and the exit of veteran politicians signal that a younger generation is poised to shape the future of Singapore, writes P.N. BALJI

THESE are heady days in a political oasis called Singapore. A country that is the envy of many for having transformed itself from a marshy backwater into an island of peace and prosperity is facing open angst, even anger, against a government that has its hand on nearly every lever of power.

The ripples of disaffection were there long before the May 7 general election. They started appearing with the audacious escape of captured terrorist Mas Selamat Kastari from a maximum security prison more than three years ago. Then came a host of other missteps, like the unchecked entry of foreigners into the country, the inability to anticipate and meet the demand for public flats thus letting their prices go up and up, the initial underestimation of the cost of hosting the inaugural Youth Olympics and the lack of anticipation to prevent humiliating floods in the iconic shopping area of Orchard Road.

Events like these may be tolerated in many other countries but not in superlative Singapore, where the population has been primed to expect nothing but the best. The best systems, the best leaders and the best government.

Zero defect was the mantra thrust into the Singaporean’s DNA. These issues came together like a perfect storm on polling day on May 7 and the public gave their verdict. The ruling People’s Action Party had its worst showing since independence. The voters sent six opposition members to Parliament, four more than what they did in the last election in 2006, and knocked out foreign minister George Yeo and two other officeholders. The ruling party’s share of votes plunged to a historic low of 60.1 per cent.

A couple of days after that, a dour Yeo said he was giving up politics altogether. Exactly one week after polling day came a bombshell. The revered Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew and the well-liked Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong issued a joint statement, saying they were stepping down from their cabinet posts.

Both these former prime ministers, despite their impeccable contributions, had not realised that a new mood was sweeping Singapore.

The voters felt their day-to-day existence had become more difficult and the government was not listening to their voices. If they were listening, then they were not acting on their grievances.

Like an old and weary warrior, Lee went into the election battle, even though he had a walkover in his Tanjong Pagar constituency, using techniques that worked when he was prime minister. He said at one press conference that if people voted against Yeo and company, they would live to regret it.

Goh attacked his former principal private secretary, Tan Jee Say, who stood as an opposition candidate, as being not worthy of a promotion.

An electorate that was not going to accept the browbeating and smear techniques of old voted against an affable and respected Yeo and gave Goh and his team in Marine Parade constituency below 60 per cent of its votes.

Despite their old-school pronouncements and the role they played in the election setback, the joint statement by the two senior statesmen announcing their resignations took Singaporeans by surprise. The Singapore style is not to link any such departures to a happening like an election.

Thus, the timing was uncharacteristic. The joint statement acknowledged as much. “After a watershed general election, we have decided to leave the cabinet and have a completely younger team of ministers to connect to and engage with this young generation in shaping the future of our Singapore.”

It was also a tacit admission that they had lost touch with a base that has become younger, bolder and ready to shake the box. Their departures will also give Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and his team of younger leaders a “fresh clean slate”, they said.

The obsession with the word young/younger was palpable in the short 148-word statement. There were six mentions, indicating this group is becoming a big priority in Singapore politics. The statistics show why: almost one in two voters was born after independence in 1965. And about one in three was born after 1975. The increase in the number of such voters was revealing: by half a million from 2001 to this year for the first group and by more than 400,000 for the other group.

A start will be made with making the cabinet younger, trimmer and leaner. The older ministers, like Deputy Prime Minister Wong Kan Seng, under whose watch the terrorist escaped, are likely to step down. After Kuan Yew and Goh, Wong is the oldest at 64.

An oversized and very expensive cabinet, which continued to keep older ministers, some with job scopes too narrow like ageing, will be a thing of the past. It had not escaped many voters’ attention that little Singapore had 21 ministers before the election while a big country like the United States had just 17.

With the decks cleared and a freer hand, the prime minister, who talked about soul-searching after the election, will have to move quickly and decisively to put his stamp on a political scene that is ripe for change.

But don’t expect the two senior statesmen, especially Kuan Yew, to disappear from the scene. His connections in and understanding of China and Goh’s affinity with the Middle East and India will be useful to fill part of the void being left behind by Yeo.

What else can be expected from a battle-scarred party that has ruled uninterrupted since 1959, most times with an iron fist? An important clue of whether the “deep resentment”, as one minister put it, has been understood will pop up today when the prime minister announces his new cabinet line-up. Singaporeans will be looking to see if unpopular ministers are dropped. Observers will be looking to see if reformers are moved into important positions.

The prime minister has the next five years to show that he and his team has learnt the lessons of the 2011 general election. If he does not move boldly and transform the ruling party and his government, something which Yeo articulated in public, the voter backlash will not just be in the form of ripples. A storm is what can be expected.

The writer is a veteran Singapore journalist and director of the Asia Journalism Fellowship, a joint initiative of Temasek Foundation and Nanyang Technological University

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