I refer to the article: http://therealsingapore.com/content/we-owe-mr-lee-debt-gratitude-singapo...
“We owe him a debt of gratitude for Singapore’s success story – our nation is what it is today because of his energetic passion and prophetic vision. His foresight, courageous leadership and pragmatic policies decisively transformed Singapore.”
With regards to the above, we must bring this statement of gratitude under the right context.
Lee Kuan Yew isn’t a superman. He made his success due to a variety of circumstances and events at a time period in the 1950s. There are many examples of similar characters like Ferdinand Marcos, Fidel Castro or
Saddam Hussein.
Lee Kuan Yew rose because there was opportunity to do so at the time he set out to.
His pragmatic success was not purely his own. It was determined by world powers, political movements, multinational economy, and other societal school of thoughts. In this case Lee utilized them perfectly to bring about success.
However the system he entrenched is not permanent. It can be at great risk of collapse as well.
Success is not permanent. It is very volatile and vulnerable to forces all the time. We can be successful at one time period but a failure the next.
Despite entrenching a system to supposedly prevent this, Lee can’t prevent failure.
We also cannot attribute Singapore’s success to Lee alone. Singapore is a country and the sum of its parts is greater than its whole. Lee would not have been successful without the groundwork put by our forefathers and the ruling predecessors which came before the PAP in 1959.
We shouldn’t be blinded by motherhood statements of gratitude because we can only thank Lee Kuan Yew for making Singapore successful at a specific time period. This in any way does not mean Singapore will be successful all the time because Lee Kuan Yew cannot prevent failure of Singapore. The eco system of success and failure is simply too large for anyone to influence or gain total control over it
There is a saying in investment banking. “You are only as good as your last deal.”
So similarly, Lee was only as good as his last deal.
Truth