Saturday, October 13, 2007

Our neighbour's big ego.


Lately our MM Lee gave some remarks about how Singapore (government) might feel if we were to rejoin Malaysia.

"They have got all the resources. If they would just educate the Chinese and Indians, use them and treat them as their citizens, they can equal us and even do better than us and we would be happy to rejoin them," Lee said.

First of all, the thought of that even being mentioned shutters me. The comfort zone that most Singaporeans has taken granted for would be totally distorted. But of course if one thinks deeper, the execution of the merger is way too complex to even be considered more than a passing remark.

More over each country is still doing quite well by itself. The only thing that may pave way for such scenario is if somehow Singapore financial status become like, say Burma. Given the stringent manner governance is conducted, I doubt that would be a reality anytime soon.

And as usual, Malaysian Malays on hearing his remark wasn't particularly pleased. I wouldn't be surprised. If someone were to even criticize my hometown Tampines, I might be annoyed.

This sentence provoked a comment in Utusan Malaysia that the remark is borne out of unease at seeing Malaysia's growing competitiveness, which in some aspects have surpassed Singapore.

With the Singapore dollar still rising, I agree with that to a certain extent. That is if I look at things through a telescope.

They may have resources, land, people. The 3 key things for an economy to work. But if things are that simple, North Korea should be one of the better economy.

Poor security, ever-growing red tapes and blatant discrimination of non-Malays are just tip of the iceberg. Their inefficiencies, unprofessionalism and you always have youth leader of political parties who just shoot off their mouth without thinking. The worst thing is people actually buy that.

Yes, Singapore might be proud. If any other countries has done what we did since the birth of the country, they would too.

I hope their big Malay ego would continue to sustain or even grow bigger. Because with that impeding them to make the right decision for the country, the possibility of a Singapore-Malaysia merger would never happen.

And that's good news.


Powered by ScribeFire.

No comments: