Lee Kuan Yew

Prime minister of Singapore (1959–1990)

• Born: September 16, 1923
• Birthplace: Singapore
• Died: March 23, 2015
• Place of death: Singapore

Lee’s popularity as prime minister came from his ability to govern fairly, to unite a multiracial society, and to make Singapore, which is only 224 square miles in area with 2.6 million people, into the second busiest port in the world. It has the third largest oil refinery and a standard of living second only to that of Japan in all of Asia.

Early Life

Lee Kuan Yew (lee kwahn yew), whose given name means “light that shines,” was born in the British colony of Singapore. His parents, Lee Chin Koon and Chua Jim Neo, saw to it that he, their eldest son, would have the best education that the British could provide. His grandfather, an admirer of British culture, gave him the nickname Harry, which is still used among his closest friends and family. Lee excelled in school, but he had to postpone his admission to an English university because war broke out in Europe. He won a scholarship to Raffles College in Singapore, where he studied English literature, mathematics, and economics. He was determined to write and speak English well. To accomplish the latter, he joined the debating team and honed his skills as a public speaker.

Lee’s education was interrupted by the Japanese conquest and occupation of Singapore in 1942. By age twenty, he had learned enough Japanese to work in the Japanese news agency Domei. He experienced Japanese cruelty and atrocities and saw the humiliation of the British colonial masters by the new conquerors. After Japan’s defeat, Lee left Singapore for Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge University in 1946. There he distinguished himself as an honor student. He also found time to discuss independence with other Malayan students and helped form the Malayan Student Forum, several of whose members became prominent political leaders in both Malaysia and Singapore. While in England in 1947, Lee secretly married Kwa Geok Choo. Both earned distinguished law degrees from Cambridge. After returning to Singapore in 1950, the pair remarried publicly. Besides running the successful law firm of Lee and Lee, the couple produced three children—two sons and a daughter.

Life’s Work

Lee entered politics when he helped form the People’s Action Party (PAP) and became its first secretary-general in 1954, a post that he held until 1992. In 1955 he won a seat in the legislative assembly from the working class constituency of Tanjong Pagar. Lee’s goal was independence from Great Britain, which afforded Malaya complete independence in 1957 but agreed to provide Singapore with only internal self-government in 1959. This meant that Singapore would have a fully elected legislature with domestic control, while Great Britain was in charge of external affairs. Lee and PAP ran for elections and won forty-three of the fifty-one seats. As head of the majority party, PAP, Lee became the first prime minister of Singapore.

Lee knew that complete independence for Singapore could come about only by merging with Malaya. He also knew that Malaya, like Singapore, was made up of three dominant ethnic groups—Malay, Chinese, and Indians—with the Malays having a slight majority. The Malays would not want to accept Singapore, which has a majority of Chinese who could tip the delicate racial balance against them. This dilemma was solved in 1961 when Tunku Abdul Rahman, the first prime minister of Malaya, proposed a new Federation of Malaysia that would include Malaya, Singapore, Sabah, Sarawak, and Brunei. This formula was favorable for Malaya because Malays would form a majority race. Lee was satisfied simply to have a Singapore independent from the British and to be able to play a larger political role in a broader political stage. The British agreed, because they were ready to relinquish their empire east of Suez.

Thus, on Lee’s fortieth birthday, September 16, 1963, the Federation of Malaysia was formed. (Brunei opted not to join.) Lee aggressively challenged the other political parties with the slogan a “Malaysian Malaysia,” implying that the old racial politics, which favored the Malays, was “un-Malaysian.” This challenge aroused ethnic, religious, and racial confrontations; compounding such divisive democratic electioneering was the military threat from Sukarno of Indonesia, who saw the federation as a British trick to deprive Indonesia of its rights to Sabah and Sarawak, which share common boundaries with Indonesia on the big island of Borneo.

To avoid racial turmoil in Malaysia and destabilize the area of Sukarno’s expansionist policy, Lee accepted Tunku Abdul Rahman’s suggestion that Singapore leave the federation on August 9, 1965. Cast adrift, the new independent Republic of Singapore was like a ship with no port. Singapore has no natural resources—even its drinking water has to be piped in from Malaya. Yet Singapore had well-trained, highly motivated, and industrious citizens. With such human assets, Lee embarked on a course inspired by countries such as Israel and Switzerland. The former is a nation of tough and resourceful immigrants surrounded by enemies, and the latter is a well-established multiethnic society of excellent craftspeople and service industry workers. Lee resolved that Singapore would adopt the best from both. First, Lee believed that Singapore must have security and stability. Lee and his associates went on a mission to win friends from around the world. Friendships with Afro-Asian leaders were cultivated, and the members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) were made aware of Singapore’s geographical importance. Moreover, Singapore joined the United Nations just a month and a half after independence.

The Vietnam War and the downfall of Sukarno proved favorable for Singapore. After all, the war was to check the spread of communism, and Lee was a staunch anticommunist. What was more important, to gain cooperation and respect from immediate neighbors, Lee had Singapore join the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and worked closely with fellow members Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, and the Philippines. Diplomacy and alliances formed one leg of Singapore’s security. The other was the development of a formidable military that was trained by Israel. This was necessary to bring to fruition Lee’s military concept of the “poison shrimp” strategy—that is, no other nation could swallow tiny Singapore without itself being destroyed.

With security and stability accomplished, Lee forged a domestic agenda that would make Singapore a global city, a nation that would tap into the postindustrial grid of prosperous Japan and the United States. At the same time, he sought to establish a national identity among its racially mixed population. Singapore recognizes four ethnic groups; in 1997, 75.2 percent of the population was Chinese, 13.6 percent was Malay, 8.8 percent was Indian, and 2.4 percent was “other.” By 2013, according to the Central Intelligence Agency, 74.2 percent of the population was Chinese, 13.3 percent was Malay, 9.2 percent was Indian, and 3.3 percent was "other." Four official languages are recognized: Mandarin, English, Malay, and Tamil. Lee ensured that every student would be at least bilingual. English became the de facto first language and the language of administration and international commerce.

Education became the cornerstone for building an economically viable, internationally competitive Singapore. To this end, students are streamlined early, with the top 8 percent going to special preuniversity schools, the most famous of which is the National Junior College, which was inspired by Lee’s personal investigation and readings about Eton in England and Philips Exeter and St. Paul’s in the United States. Lee’s eldest son was in the first graduating class of National Junior College, and from there he went on to Cambridge.

The elitist system of education provided Singapore with the requisites of “problem-solvers and creators” as well as the needed technicians and skilled workers in the electronic and light industries. To ensure that Singapore would offer good jobs and pride of citizenship, Lee embarked on an ambitious program of government-subsidized housing and the establishment of industrial zones, of which Jurong Industrial Estate was the largest in Southeast Asia.

With education, housing, and employment secured, Singapore prospered. Lee, however, became worried that the best-educated class was bearing the fewest offspring. He saw moral deterioration in the leisure class, which was also drifting away from the industrious, Confucian, and rugged society that he had envisioned. As a remedy to such problems, Lee experimented on social engineering. Schools must teach religion and ethics, the young must be imbued with respect for their elders and law and order, and women, especially those with university degrees, must be encouraged to marry and produce children. To help graduates find compatible mates, the government established free computer matching and ran socials and outings, some of which won the sobriquet “love-boat.” Lee’s pro-marriage program was backed by financial incentives of tax deductions and the ease of employing housemaids and servants from abroad, mostly from the Philippines. Much opposition to social engineering came from parents and teachers, who saw children being forced to compete in school and facing an anxiety-filled childhood of constant studying and private tutoring. However, Lee persisted with his “nature and nurture” policies, and the economic success of Singapore and the constant victories in general elections by Lee and his PAP legitimized such policies to many. He also fought corruption with the creation of the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau, with broad powers to examine financial irregularities. In 1994, to forestall the temptation of corruption and to make government jobs attractive, he recommended that the salaries of top state officials be made equivalent to the salaries of top professionals outside of government.

Internationally, Lee worked with ASEAN to force Vietnam out of democratic Kampuchea. He also backed President Corazón Aquino of the Philippines whenever her legitimacy was challenged. He maintained close ties with Prime Minister Datuk Seri Mahathir bin Mohamad of Malaysia and President Suharto of Indonesia. He always had the respect of British prime ministers, and Margaret Thatcher was no exception. The constant travel and contact with foreign leaders made Lee very visible and accessible for consultations. Even Deng Xiaoping of China sought Lee’s help on the establishment of free trade zones and inexpensive but stylish public housing.

After winning reelection eight times, declining health prompted Lee to step down as prime minister in 1990; by then he had become the prime minister with the longest continuous tenure in the world. He remained in the cabinet with the role of senior minister of Singapore and continued to advise his successor, Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong, while his elder son, Lee Hsien Loong, a former brigadier general, was named deputy prime minister and head of Singapore’s central banking authority.

Although Lee’s ministerial position did not carry official administrative power, he nevertheless continued to participate in diplomacy. For instance, he helped negotiate with China’s vice president, Li Lanqing, to transfer the government’s administration software for management of one of China’s industrial development zones, Suzhou Industrial Park.

Lee’s governmental role changed again in 2004 when his son became Singapore’s third prime minister. Goh replaced Lee as senior minister, and Lee himself assumed the new position of minister mentor. In addition to advising his son Lee Hsien Loong, he led efforts to increase proficiency in Mandarin among the nation’s young, launching a television program, Cool!, in 2005 and later the same year publishing a book, Keeping My Mandarin Alive, in which he describes his own struggle with the language. Concerned that the nation needed a periodic renewal of talent to remain healthy, he encouraged the young to involve themselves in politics. As he often said, Singapore’s only national resource is its people.

Among his honors, Lee received the First Class Order of the Rising Sun from Japan in 1967, the Order of the Companions of Honour in 1970, the Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St. Michael and St. George in 1972, Freedom of the City of London in 1982, the Order of the Crown of Johore, First Class, in 1984, and the Most Esteemed Family Order of Brunei in 1990. In 2002, to honor his promotion of international trade and development of science, Imperial College London granted him a fellowship, and in 2007 the Australian National University, Canberra, awarded him an honorary doctorate of law.

Following the general election in early May 2011 that saw six seats relinquished to members of the opposition's Workers' Party and that saw the PAP experience its poorest results, Lee and Goh announced that they were resigning from the cabinet to make way for governance by a younger generation. However, he did retain his seat in parliament, continuing to win reelection. In February 2015 he was hospitalized for several weeks due to a struggle with severe pneumonia. He ultimately succumbed to his failing condition, passing away at a hospital in Singapore on March 23, 2015. He was ninety-one years old. Though his rather authoritarian but overall effective leadership and legacy will continue to be debated, around one hundred thousand mourners gathered along the route of Lee's elaborate state funeral procession and paid their respects.

Significance

Lee’s life was one of success in international and domestic politics and economics. His brand of nationalism, of building a Singaporean identity from such diverse racial and ethnic groups, came about without any threat of political opposition. His achievements in making Singapore stable, well educated, and prosperous were formidable and the envy of all developing countries.

Such successes come with a price. Lee was so worried the young nation could implode because of racial or ideological strife that he ran Singapore in a relatively authoritarian way. Lee’s opponents, whether the press, opposition party members, or dissidents from the church, came under the surveillance of the special branch of the Criminal Investigation Department. Unfavorable newspapers and magazines were censored, and critics, journalists, and social critics as a group were made personae non gratae, especially if they accused him of nepotism. Religious groups were discouraged from proselytizing aggressively, especially among the Muslim Malays. Moreover, Lee had a history of suing strident opponents for libel, which former president of Singapore Devan Nair denounced as a scare tactic. Unhappy with how readily juries could be swayed from rational judgments by emotional manipulation, Lee abolished the jury system in favor of the judicial model of the French system.

Lee tried to groom a successor from the younger members of his cabinet. He even announced that he would run for election as president of Singapore. This did not happen, but in any event he maintained a central role in the government, and his successor worked under his shadow until his son became prime minister.

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