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By SEAH CHIANG
NEE
Search is on for next S’pore PM
HE has been in office for hardly
three years and so when Singapore premier Lee Hsien Loong, 55,
announced recently the hunt for a successor, it caught many by
surprise.
The government has started the process of selecting a successor
prime minister, but unlike in the past, Singaporeans are hard
put to name any clear-cut figure.
The same front-runners often crop up in public discussions but
sadly – at least from the public’s point of view – no one seems
to readily fit the bill.
Lee made the announcement in Parliament while explaining how
crucial the unpopular high ministers’ salaries were to his
recruitment of capable leaders.
He also said that he should be able to come up with a name by
the next election in 2011.
He went further on the matter but downplayed political renewal
as a continuous exercise and blurred any timeframe for stepping
down although he gave the impression that he would step down in
about 10 years’ time.
He said a team to be assembled in the next five to 10 years
would choose the next prime minister, signifying that neither he
nor his father, minister mentor Lee Kuan Yew, would individually
make the choice.
“That’s how the next PM would have to be chosen, not by me but
by the team which I hope we would have assembled in the next
five to 10 years,” he said.
“We have already got part of the team. We brought in some in the
last election. But the job is never done and we are hunting hard
right now.”
Hsien Loong, who recovered from cancer in 1993, has made it
clear that he does not intend to follow the path of his father
Kuan Yew to hang on to power for long.
He said he did not think it wise for a prime minister to stay on
in the job until the age of 70.
People have started speculating who his successor could be but
are finding it hard to come up with a clear-cut name.
The front-runners are experienced but old or too young or
without the tough qualities of leadership and yet not
unacceptable to the voters.
Lee Senior has said the fourth generation leaders would have to
be chosen before 2011 from those in the 30s and 40s.
To some political observers, this lack of ready leaders who are
considered suitable to lead a changed Singapore does not augur
well for the future.
This could indicate that – despite the mega-high salaries – it
has failed to come up with top leadership material.
Or it could mean a tougher criterion to select someone capable
of leading – and bonding with – a sophisticated but divided lot
of Singaporeans.
The present prime minister, for example, is faced with a whole
new host of complex issues that his father did not have to deal
with.
This has led many Singaporeans to feel that today’s ministers
are below par compared with the first generation leaders like
the visionary Kuan Yew, Goh Keng Swee and S. Rajaratnam.
Recently, Hsien Loong dismissed this, saying: “Today’s cabinet
is as good as it can get. It is not inferior and in some ways
has higher standards than the first cabinet. What it lacks is
‘combat experience’.”
Yet it is not only the public that is unsure of the next man,
but Hsien Loong himself has said he is uncertain which of the
newly chosen political leaders can make it.
He said in January that it would take another two or three years
to find out.
Contributing to a perception of decline is the increasingly
active role played by Lee Senior, 84, in the past two years on
many issues.
Since he stepped down as prime minister, he has largely kept his
promise to stay out of the limelight on day-to-day affairs,
although he retains a powerful influence from behind the
curtain.
But this changed when the going got tougher for Singapore both
at home and abroad and public disquiet increased over several
policies.
Kuan Yew emerged to play a much higher profile, at times hardly
a week passing without making a pronouncement or two to explain
hard decisions to the people.
“This shows he is less than satisfied with the cabinet
performance or at least its ability to ‘sell’ policies to the
public,” one old-timer said.
He has always had a higher standard of judging political
successors than possibly any contemporary leaders East or West.
It is hard to meet his criterion.
At any rate, in most countries, the deputy prime minister – the
next in line – is a strong if not automatic choice. In
Singapore, this may not be the case.
It has two deputy prime ministers – Wong Kan Seng and Prof S.
Jeyakumar – but neither has the all-round political experience
or public standing to be prime minister.
At 61 and 68 years of age, respectively, both are older than
Hsien Loong.
If the successor comes from party ranks, defence minister Teo
Chee Hean, who is the People’s Action Party’s second assistant
secretary-general (ranking just behind PM Lee and Wong) would be
a front-runner.
At 53, he is two years younger than Hsien Loong.
The decision will become clear in the next three to four years
but one thing is certain.
One man will have a powerful say on who Singapore’s fourth prime
minister should be: Kuan Yew.
Note: The writer is a former newspaper editor in Singapore
and currently writes a weekly column in The Star newspaper in
Malaysia.
 
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