Singapore's Lee Ruling Family have turned the island on it's head

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Singapore today is full of gleaming skyscrapers, Rolls Royce cars, fancy restaurants and luxury handbags. The question is, has all this glamour and glitter done Singapore or Singaporeans any good? I am sorry, contrary to what one would have expected, the Lee Ruling Family has done Singapore irreparable harm.

2 days ago, Singapore’s state controlled newspaper the Straits Times proudly reports (propaganda) in screaming headlines that the island is rated the 2nd best place to do business in the world. I suppose the newspaper thought we should all be grateful to the Lees for making it such a marvelous place. But is the ranking of a good place to do business necessarily any good for the average Singaporean? I am afraid it is not, and this is why.

This is what Lee has done. In his mad rush to increase the GDP, he has gone out to the world and claimed it is just another Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Anyone can come in and start a business anytime, no questions asked, just as in Dubai, one of the easiest places in the world to do business. And what is more, these foreign companies are free to employ any foreigner they want, bypassing local Singaporeans.

As it is necessary for Lee to become competitive at any costs, there are no minimum wage laws. Thousands of low wage Malaysians are allowed to cross the border each day to work in the multi national American companies. Even more impoverished foreigners are given work passes to work for measly wages, and take away jobs from native Singaporeans. This is the sort of competition that the Lee Ruling Family proudly proclaim.

In their mad rush to increase business and presumably their (Lee Ruling Family’s) wealth they initiate and create entirely new businesses in the island even though Singaporeans have no expertise in them whatsoever. Offshore secretive banking to keep the ill gotten gains of rich Chinese from Communist China are set up.

As Singaporeans themselves have no expertise in this field whatsoever, bankers from Switzerland, London and Amsterdam are flown in to run them, driving their Rolls Royce automobiles on the local streets, while the locals drool at them with their mouths open with envy.

Casinos are built for the first time, using the expertise of Las Vegas with employment passes for Filipinos to run the black jack tables.

Buildings standing perfectly well are demolished and rebuilt with rapid regularity, to energize the construction industry. To man the industry, thousands and thousands of low wage Communist Chinese from the Peoples Republic, India and Bangladesh are flown in for these low wage jobs. That too increases Lee Kuan Yew Singapore GDP.

The question is where is the local Singaporean’s place in all this opulent grandeur? Unfortunately he is nowhere to be seen; he is not in that Rolls Royce; in fact he is at the bottom of the economic totem pole, tragically in his own country. And that is one big difference with Dubai, but otherwise, it is just one big shopping and business center for the whole world.

In Dubai which has a much smaller population than Singapore the top of the pecking order are their citizens, citizens of the UAE. They are paid handsomely by the state to do just nothing, so I suppose they have nothing to complain. Below that is the American, the Englishman or the Australian. They live very well too, just like in Singapore, running the banks and the business houses. Below that comes the other Arabs, those not from oil rich countries, like Egypt. And below that are the Indians and Pakistanis. The local Dubai citizens only make 17% of the population by the way. Dubai is an island where the foreigners far outnumber the locals.

Singapore is not much different except for some minor differences. In Singapore, the Lee Ruling Family, by which I mean Lee Kuan Yew, his son, and his extended family which include several Ministers and business tycoons, are number one. Singapore is simply paradise on earth for them. Each one of them pays themselves millions over the people's objections, and like Kings they do whatever they want. Next come the expatriates, just as in Dubai. They run the banks, and dine and wine in the country clubs. Next below are his bootlickers, like Lee’s judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean who abuses the law to please her master. She does well too, if you can accept such a disgraceful way to make a living. Below them come the foreigners, professionals and ordinary workers of all sorts who are immediately given jobs by local businesses because they can pay less than they would to a local Singaporean. Last of all in the pecking order is the poor local Singapore born citizen. He can't find a job because the foreigner has taken it, and his government has completely ignored him. He finds himself in the worst position in society in his own country! And that is a tragic irony.

Today there is anecdotal evidence that the foreigner population in Singapore island has already exceeded the local Singapore born population as a result of the unrelenting emigration aboard of disgruntled and unhappy citizens, the almost non existent birth rate and a fast ageing population.

Recently President Obama made a hilarious joke about Mitt Romney. He said "Mitt Romney has said he is going to create an 800,000 jobs. There is only one problem to that statement. The jobs are not in the USA. They are in China"!

You could say more or less the same about Lee Kuan Yew's Singapore of today. It may be true that Singapore is the second best place in the world to do business. But business for whom? Not for Singaporeans but for Americans, Englishmen and Australians.

I would have approached it differently. I would have considered Singaporeans first, business or no business. A mad rush to increase the GDP is not the way to go. You don't simply create an industry out of thin air where Singaporeans have no expertise in it whatsoever. I would have allowed Singaporeans to do business, not foreigners. I would have educated Singaporeans, not foreigners. And I would have allowed Singapore to find its own direction for the future, not ramming industries which Singaporeans have no connection or understanding down their throats.

Today the vast number of Singaporeans are only good enough to be clerks and office minders in the lavish offices of Swiss bankers and English industrialists, in industries in which Singaporeans have not the slightest of clue whatsoever.

What Lee has done is simply to make the island attractive only to foreign businessmen. The local born Singaporean is not a factor in that equation. I fear in the end, it will only be the Lee Ruling Family and their cronies running an island full of foreigners doing business, not much different from Dubai. There won't be any local born Singaporeans left except for those foolish enough or incapable to leave to other parts of the world, where they count as human beings.

Gopalan Nair
Singapore born citizen in exile
Attorney at Law
Tel: 510 491 4375