Politics: Location, location, location?
The dictum that Singapore has no natural resources sounds shallow when one considers our deep natural harbour and geographic location—beneficial both in terms of trade centrality, from at least 1819 onwards (if not long before), and as a point uniquely insulated from the natural disasters that ravage our neighbours every year. The British and then later the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) both leveraged this for enormous economic gain. As the men in white mimicked the white men’s trading patterns, Singapore’s importance to global supply chains grew. “Transport is the foundation on which our economy is built,” said Jeffrey Siow, acting transport minister, addressing a motion this week on the sector. He noted that it accounts for some 10 percent of GDP and seven percent of jobs held by Singaporeans.
But how long can the joyride last? Will Thailand slice a canal through the Isthmus of Kra? Will the fabled Northern Sea Route from Europe to East Asia via the Arctic ever really materialise? Will much longer-range aircraft render Singapore’s traditional hub-and-spoke aviation model irrelevant? How might geopolitical turbulence, from protectionism and nearshoring to wars, affect Singapore’s long-term viability as a trade centre?
These are some long-standing existential concerns. Though some are beyond our control, Singapore can do more to increase our relevance beyond physical infrastructure alone. “Supply chains are becoming more fragmented and more distributed. If Singapore is merely a place through which flows happen to pass, then one day these flows will simply pass us by,” said Siow, arguing that we need to be seen as a global thought leader in transport. This explains the government’s new investment of S$800m in transport research over five years, doubling its previous expenditure. Two-thirds will go towards autonomy and digital twins for connectivity, with the rest earmarked for sector-specific research in aviation, maritime, and land transport. Siow and Baey Yam Keng, minister of state for transport, offered more granular detail on developments in each.
Responses from the opposition Workers’ Party (WP) MPs offered further proof of its ever-maturing policy chops. Jamus Lim offered, among other things, a useful macro-economic primer on the shifting global order, and the relative importance of goods and services, as well as different partners, to Singapore’s trade. “We must foster more growth in tradable services, which has the added benefit that it is also less subject to the need to undervalue our exchange rate…if we are focused on trade in services, we should keep in mind that we export more to the European Union than to the United States, and more to ASEAN than mainland China.”
Several WP MPs questioned our seeming over-reliance on mega projects such as Tuas Port and Changi Airport Terminal 5. “To hedge our exposure to physical trade volatility, Singapore must pivot from being just a physical gatekeeper to also becoming the sovereign digital architect of global trade,” said Gerald Giam. Among his suggestions was a rebalancing of long-term capital spending to reflect this. Seeking to understand the future through the past, Kenneth Tiong bemoaned the 2016 sale of Neptune Orient Lines. “We treat the airline, SIA, as strategic and rescue it [during Covid], but we treat the sea carrier, NOL, as a commodity and sell it,” he said. Edward Chia, PAP MP, countered that Singapore’s maritime success was premised on functioning as a neutral platform that doesn’t “favour one shipping line over another”.
Creating an integrated gateway for aviation and maritime connectivity in the east, near the Batam-Bintan-Karimun free trade zone, was just one of numerous other suggestions from the 24 MPs who spoke for over six hours. For those of us who’ve grown tired of some recent petty politicking, it was refreshing to hear the evolution of a discussion on an essential, centuries-old issue for our little red dot.
Politics: Alvin Tan, Lawrence Wong, Michael Thng, David Neo, Stephanie Tan, Goh Meng Seng
The PAP as arbiter of truth. The case for one-party dominance. The reality of elite governance. Some classical concepts from the Singapore consensus were this week dusted off and given a contemporary shine by younger politicians, sparking the usual rebuttals. On Saturday, the PAP’s youth wing celebrated its 40th anniversary with a bash for 1,200 people at MBS. It announced a new youth academy that will run training workshops to “serve Singaporeans on the ground”; alongside a new fellowship programme that will give 40 Young PAP (YP) “activists” a S$5,000 seed grant each to run programmes. Alvin Tan, a minister of state and YP chairman, made an impassioned speech that sought to draw a distinction between the “artificial” elements in the world today and what it means to be “authentic”, a word he uttered 16 times.
