"tripod" article

now, i don't like to be negative, but this ST article is what i would term a "tripod" article. Yes, there are references to whether the 5-day work week was delayed so that he could announced it, plus other points, but the main crux is one of praising. left out were issues like leaving out all the present NMPs in the new list. plus, the number of questions that can be asked in parliament have been reduced.

Nov 20, 2004
INSIGHT: PM LEE'S FIRST 100 DAYS
'Don't call me PM, just Mr Lee will do'
Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong marked his 100th day in office yesterday. Lydia Lim looks at his first three months on the job.
A WEEK after he delivered his maiden National Day Rally speech, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong went on his first walkabout as PM.

During a dialogue that capped his five-hour visit to Boon Lay, the residents were effusive in their congratulations and praise for his Rally speech.

He held them back.

There was no need for all this, he said, eager instead to hear what questions they had for him.

He also urged them not to address him as PM Lee. He preferred plain Mr Lee.

It was an insight into the man and the kind of prime minister he wants to be.

He has little use for the formalities of his new office and prefers to get straight to the nub of issues.

In an interview with Fortune magazine published in September, he said: 'When you become prime minister, people bow and scrape even more, you have to make a conscious effort not to allow that to become the norm.'

Wary of the attention - even adulation - accorded most prime ministers, he has done his best in these first 100 days to ensure that the spotlight is trained not on him but on his policies.

His Aug 22 Rally speech set the tone: it brimmed with substantive changes that he had reportedly been mulling over for two years.

That he delivered it with warmth and unexpected humour was a bonus.

Since then, he has guarded his profile closely, granting no interviews and eschewing media coverage at functions unless there are policies to announce.

The focus, says political scientist Kenneth Paul Tan, seems to be on 'walking the talk'.

'There has been a concerted effort to make sure there was practical follow-up to his Rally speech, that what he said would be more than rhetoric,' Dr Tan says.

The walls come down

POLICY equivalents of the Berlin wall have come tumbling down in these 100 days.

Just to name a few: a new five-day work week for the civil service; singles allowed to buy Housing Board flats larger than three-room ones; and more funding and resources to educate children with special needs.

These are changes that the Government has resisted for years because it worried about sending the wrong signal about government efficiency and resources.

Sceptics may wonder if these changes were in fact held back so Mr Lee could announce them and launch his term with a big bang.

After all, the five-day work week was proposed by the Remaking Singapore Committee and rejected just in April.

But other reasons could account for the change of heart between then and August.

Bukit Timah MP Wang Kai Yuen says the changes are significant as they reflect 'a shift from the uncompromising stance in the past'.

In his 14 years as deputy prime minister, Mr Lee gained a reputation for being a reformer in areas directly under his charge - the economy, the finance sector and the civil service.

Now that he is responsible for the whole of government, he seems keen to extend his reformist instincts into the social and political spheres as well. He surprised and moved many with his vision of an inclusive society which embraces even those at the margins.

Many said they had never heard a minister describe the disabled as 'who are our brothers and sisters too'. But Mr Lee did when he urged Singaporeans to have a place for them in their hearts and lives.

Society should give second chances to those who had failed as they 'may be the wiser and stronger ones among us', he said.

Miss Chau Yeng, 22, a therapist who works with autistic children, believes Mr Lee's speech has set in motion changes to the social ethos.

'It will take time but I believe something is happening. It's what I want to see, people being more tolerant of those who are different,' she says.

Tanjong Pagar GRC MP Indranee Rajah says his words dispelled the notion that Singapore is only for the elites, 'and reiterated that Singapore is for all Singaporeans'.

In education, Mr Lee also turned accepted practices on their head. In doing so, he brought into currency a new catch phrase to encapsulate the spirit of many of the changes being introduced in schools.

'We've got to teach less so our students can learn more,' Mr Lee said, even as he announced that 3,000 more teachers would be deployed to schools and junior colleges by 2010.

His words generated both excitement and confusion, with some seeing them as the enlightened way forward while others questioned if they were realistic.

Regardless of the tide of public opinion, education reform is one area where Mr Lee and his Cabinet are moving ahead with speed and confidence.

On the political front, however, the pace has been far more cautious. The initial excitement he generated when he spoke of relaxing rules on indoor public talks and performances at the Speakers' Corner petered out when the actual details were released a few days later.

Although performances are now allowed at the Speakers' Corner, banners, placards and microphones are still banned. And indoor talks featuring foreign speakers still need to be licensed.

Non-Constituency MP Steve Chia says: 'He has promised a quite a lot...about opening up society. But I have not seen concrete initiatives in that direction, just talk. I'm keeping my eyes open to see when it will happen.'

Given the mixed signals, some observers expect the real test to come at the next General Election, when Singaporeans will be able to gauge for themselves the new Government's tolerance for dissent in the heat of battle.

Wins over the youth

THREE young Singaporeans walked into Ang Mo Kio GRC MP Inderjit Singh's PAP branch office recently, after hearing Mr Lee's call to post-'65ers to come forward to play their part for the country.

For the last three months, they have spent 'long hours' helping out at his meet-the-people session each Thursday, he tells Insight.

Mr Singh thinks Mr Lee's most visible success has been in connecting with younger Singaporeans like them, and making them see they can play a significant role in shaping the country's future.

'In the past, it was very difficult to get younger Singaporeans to believe and to come forward to play their part,' he says.

The PM's message to younger Singaporeans was a simple one: Don't wait to be invited to tea.

'Step forward to make a difference to yourselves, to your fellow citizens and to Singapore,' he urged them in his inauguration speech.

Where some political speeches of the past focused on areas where young Singaporeans were found lacking - painting them as soft, spoilt and eager to emigrate - he tapped into their energy and enthusiasm.

Hundreds wrote to him to volunteer their services or recommend people they thought would make good future leaders.

About 2,100 young people responded through forums, SMS and e-mail when the Government embarked on a massive exercise to gather young people's ideas on how to build a better Singapore.

Some have been encouraged to join work groups to push their ideas forward.

It remains to be seen how many of their suggestions will eventually be accepted.

But the focus on youth has not been an unqualified success.

Some say it has been more form than substance to date.

The recent selection of a 27-year-old former beauty queen and game show host, Ms Eunice Olsen, as one of nine Nominated Members of Parliament, has also sparked debate on whether the Government is going overboard in its new obsession with younger Singaporeans.

A fresh start


IN THE lead-up to the handover, Mr Lee's controversial visit to Taiwan and the strident response it provoked from China caused some to question if he had as good a grasp of foreign affairs as he had of domestic policy.

But those concerns were allayed when he addressed the issue with both firmness and flair during his Rally speech, making clear Singapore's commitment to the 'One China' policy.

His speech was even described as a 'diplomatic masterstroke' by the Observer Star, a small Hong Kong daily.

Since taking over, Mr Lee has spent a large share of his time on diplomacy.

There are stories of how he is still adapting to the finer points of inspecting a guard of honour and posing for pictures with a foreign counterpart. But there has been movement on some fronts.

While in Kuala Lumpur last month, he and Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi pledged to seek new areas of cooperation, signalling a mutual desire to take relations in fresh directions despite unresolved bilateral issues.

No image problem

IN JAKARTA earlier this month, he and Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono agreed to move bilateral ties forward, with economic issues as the glue to cement links further.

Dr Yudhoyono also said that he found Mr Lee 'as bright and vibrant as the city state you lead'.

Mr Lee is currently in Chile attending the Apec leaders' meeting.

So real was the concern over Mr Lee's image that a committee led by a Cabinet minister was reportedly formed to take charge of this in his first few months in office.

If so, they may have found themselves with surprisingly little to do after Mr Lee's stellar performance at his first Rally address. The image question has since faded away.

Few could have predicted such a turn of events, especially when just over a year ago, Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong felt the need to address, during his Rally speech, the issue of his successor's 'no-nonsense, uncompromising and tough' public persona.

But in his first two speeches as PM, Mr Lee skilfully showed a different side of his personality.

In both, he came across as warm, open and down-to-earth, notes veteran MP Dr Wang. 'There is a major shift in the ground regarding his public persona. The outcome is very positive,' he says.

A prime minister's first 100 days in office provides but a glimpse of the leader he will be. It provides scant indication of what his legacy will look like. It does however set the tone for a new government's relationship with the people.

What Mr Lee has managed to do in these three months is give Singaporeans reasons to view the future with fresh optimism.

In the Fortune interview, he described the work of leadership thus:

'To build a nation, you have to do it every generation. You have to rekindle the excitement. That's what we're trying to do.'

He has lit a fire. It remains to be seen how well he stokes the flames.