The Search for Talent by Lee Kuan Yew, Prime Minister
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
1 THE SEARCH FOR TALENT BY LEE KUAN YEW, PRIME MINISTER What was the most important single factor for Singapore’s rapid development since 1959? Without hesitation, my answer is the quality of the people. For not only are our people hardworking, quick to learn and practical, Singapore also had an extra thick layer of high calibre and trained talent . In the protocol list of the first seven persons in Singapore, I am the only Singapore- born. The President, CV Devan Nair, the Chief of Justice, Wee Chong Jin, the Speaker, Yeoh Ghim Seng, the two Deputy Prime Ministers, Goh Keng Swee and S Rajaratnam, and the Minister for Finance, Hon Sui Sen, were not born in Singapore. One Singapore-born out of the top seven Singaporeans! This is the size of the contribution from the non-Singapore born. The slowness and difficulty we faced in the 1970s when trying to find successors worthy of my colleagues of the older generation baffled me for many years. I was puzzled by the dearth of the able, the dynamic, and the dedicated, to become MPs, Parliamentary Secretaries, and Ministers. One day, in 1972, I stumbled upon the key to this mystery. A head count of the top men in the Cabinet and in Parliament showed that we had reinforced Singapore-born talent. I also recalled that over two-thirds of the leaders of the Communist United Front were also outside-born: Lim Chin Siong, Fong Swee Suan, James Puthucheary, lky/1982/lky0812.doc 2 and S Woodhull. So was Devan Nair, the only one who honoured their written commitment to the PAP, made public when they released from Changi jail in June 1959. Their political activism was derived from a harsher and more challenging political environment. The Singapore-born has had less to spur him to political action. The able young, especially after independence, have found the professions and business more attractive. So in the 1970s the quest began in earnest, to talent scout for able successors. The original group had come about spontaneously. Talent from the region had gathered in Singapore before the new political boundaries were demarcated, when Singapore became independent on its own in 1965. If we leave it to the normal process of attrition and change, and to the vagaries of chance, we run the danger of leaving Singapore in the hands of mediocrities. To allow this to happen would be criminal. More than our share of talent If we had relied solely upon the talent of our natural population pyramid, Singapore’s performance would not have been half as good. From 23 years of experience in government, I have learned that one high-calibre mind in charge of a Ministry, or a Statutory Board, makes the difference between success and failure of a major project. A top mind, given a task, brings together a group of other able men, organises them into a cohesive team, and away the project goes. lky/1982/lky0812.doc 3 That was the way Goh Keng Swee set about the Ministry of Finance in June 1959. He picked Hon Sui Sen as his principal lieutenant, Permanent Secretary (Ministry of Finance), and then in 1961 made him Chairman of the EDB. Hon Sui Sen collected an able team in the EDB and Singapore’s industrialisation slowly and steadily gathered steam. Even in 1982, I find it difficult to imagine how we could have made the economic development of the last 23 years without the ability, the creativity, and the drive of these two able men. Whenever I had lesser men in charge, the average or slightly above- average, I have had to keep pushing and probing them, to review problems, to identify roadblocks, to suggest solutions, to come back and to discover that less than the best has been achieved. To be exasperated and, often, to be totally frustrated, is the price for not having an able and talented man in charge. Without this extra number of talented men, born outside Singapore, in charge of the principal ministries and the key statutory boards, Singapore would not be what it is today. Non-Singapore-born talent: uplifted Singapore When I formed my first Cabinet in 1959, only two of the nine Ministers were born in Singapore. Seven came all the way from Jaffna, from Malaya, and from South China. Even now, in 1982, with the exception of E W Barker, all my lky/1982/lky0812.doc 4 senior colleagues are not Singapore-born. Of the key men who launched and made our housing programme a success, only Lim Kim San, the first Chairman of HDB in 1960, is Singapore-born. Howe Yoon Chong, whom he picked to assist him, came from China. Without his support, Lim Kim San could not have succeeded. Teh Cheang Wan, Chief Architect of HDB in 1960, later in 1970 Chief Executive Officer, now Minister for National Development, was born in China and educated in Penang. The majority of Statutory Board Chairmen were born outside Singapore: 71% in 1960, 75% in 1970, and 61% in 1980. The Singapore-born form a minority of key Statutory Boards’ Chairmen. Only Lim Kim San in PSA is Singapore-born. Michael Fam, present Chairman, HDB, is from Sabah. Chairman, JTC, I F Tang, is from Anhui. Chairman, PUB, Lee Ek Tieng, is from Shanghai. Chairman, STPB, I T Tan, is from Sumatra. Chairman, SBC, Wee Mon Cheng, is from Fujian. The composition of younger political leaders is radically different. The second generation Cabinet Ministers are all Singapore-born, all five Cabinet Ministers and six Ministers of State. The trend towards more Singapore-born Permanent Secretaries is almost as powerful. In 1964, only one of seven Permanent Secretaries was Singapore-born. In March 1982, 14 Permanent lky/1982/lky0812.doc 5 Secretaries out of a total of 19 are Singapore-born. The five outside-born are the older ones, those over 45 years. Of the seven Acting Permanent Secretaries, all are Singapore-born. Five of them are below 40 years. In 1982, of seven Judges, only two are Singapore-born. This is because only one Judge is under 50 years. It was this extra concentration of talent which gave Singapore that “high compression” or “high rev” in its leadership. It was not chance that brought so many able and outstanding persons to Singapore. For decades before the war, Singapore was the centre of education. Before and after the war, many able students came to Singapore for their education - to secondary schools, several of which had hostels run by missionaries to Medical College (established 1905), to Raffles College (established 1928), and later, to the University of Malaya, sited in Singapore, when these two Colleges combined in 1950. It was only in 1962 that the university of Malaya moved to Kuala Lumpur. Even in 1982, the Vice- Chancellor of NUS is not Singapore-born. This flow pattern of brains has now changed. Fewer students from Malaysia and the region come to Singapore for education. They have their own universities in Malaysia and Indonesia. What is worse, many can afford to, and do, go abroad, to Australia, New Zealand, UK, US, and Canada. Most do not return. Of the few who come to Singapore for higher studies, some return to lky/1982/lky0812.doc 6 their homes, but most emigrate to Australia, New Zealand, US or Canada. This is a pity, for such men, prepared to start life afresh in a strange new environment, are usually exceptional in enterprise, drive and determination to succeed - Key attributes for high performance. Immigration ban to white countries lifted for professionals The most significant factor that altered the flow of talent adversely, away from Singapore, was the change in immigration laws of the big English-speaking countries. As long as these vast and wealthy English-speaking countries refused to admit immigrants with high brain power because they were Asians, Singapore benefited from their policies of self-denial. Unfortunately, they changed their immigration policies: Australia in March 1966, Canada in October 1967, America in July 1968 (law changed in 1965, implementation 1968), and New Zealand in 1974. Now, from the preferences of our ASEAN scholars, we notice that those who decide to leave their countries in Southeast Asia often decide to quit the region altogether. Having decided to uproot themselves, they want to strike roots in countries far away from the areas of possible conflict, and in countries with greater economic potential, even though they will be members of a not easily assimilated Asian minority and may well have to put up with race discrimination. lky/1982/lky0812.doc 7 Indeed, even some of our own Singapore-born Colombo Plan and Overseas Merit scholars who had studied in Australia, New Zealand, and Canada, have emigrated. Last year, in 1981, 40 scholars left the public service, half on completion of their bonds, half buying themselves out of their uncompleted bond periods. Amongst them, two Colombo Plan scholars, graduated in Australian universities, had emigrated to Canada. For them, Australia is too close to areas of potential conflicts. lky/1982/lky0812.doc 8 Being English-speaking facilitates brain-drain Now, we ourselves may be threatened by a brain-drain of Singapore-grown talent. Because our graduates are English-speaking, we are more susceptible to a brain-drain. A Japanese doctor or a Korean computer system analyst will think twice before emigrating to America, Canada, Australia or New Zealand. He has major adjustments to make, linguistically and culturally. The English-educated Singaporean is completely at home in the English language, and his cultural adjustment are minimal compared to the trauma a Japanese or Korean will suffer.