The racial problems Singapore founding father Lee Kuan Yew sees in Malaysia are just as prevalent in the republic, according to a columnist writing for Utusan Malaysia today.
“Kuan Yew has never changed; he always harps on Malay special rights and Malay supremacy to slam Malaysia,” the University of Defence lecturer wrote in his column.Saying that Singapore prospers because of Malaysia, Ridhuan Tee Abdullah wrote in his editorial that Lee should not be so eager to find fault with Malaysia’s race-based affirmative action policies that the latter said was bleeding the country of talent.
“What is wrong with Malay special rights or Malay supremacy? Are the non-Malays homeless and enslaved because of these rights and supremacy?”
Last week, Lee launched his latest book, “One Man’s View of the World”, in which he touches on Malaysian issues, among others.
In one portion of his book, Lee said Malaysia was bleeding talent due to its insistence on promoting “one race” over all others.
“They are prepared to lose that talent in order to maintain the dominance of one race,” read an excerpt of Lee’s book.
“This is putting the country at a disadvantage. It is voluntarily shrinking the talent pool needed to build the kind of society that makes use of talent from all races,” Lee continued.
Today, Tee accused Singapore of practising the same racial discrimination that he said has dried up its pool of Malay talent.
“Where’s the talent like Dr Lily Zubaidah? Malay talent that seeks to defend Malays and Islam in Singapore are discarded.
“Only Malay yes-men are kept in their government,” Tee added.
Lily Zubaidah Rahim is a Singaporean lecturer now based in Australia. She wrote “The Singapore Dilemma” that examines the fortunes of Malays in the island state.
In his book, Lee points out the dwindling number of non-Malays in Malaysia, many of whom he said were now in Singapore.
“The Chinese made up 35.6 per cent of the population in 1970. They were down to 24.6 per cent at the last census in 2010,” Lee wrote in his book
“Over that same period, the Indian numbers fell from 10.8 per cent to 7.3 per cent,” he said while adding “40 per cent of our migrants are from Malaysia”.
Malaysia experiences a severe talent flight issue with an estimated 5 per cent of skilled locals exiting the country on an annual basis, with the main beneficiary being Singapore.
A World Bank report from 2011 concluded that 20 per cent of Malaysian graduates opt to quit the country, again with Singapore cited as the preferred destinations. Worryingly for Malaysia, the report concluded that these migrants were being replaced by unskilled and uneducated foreigners.
Tee also asserted that Lee was trying to eliminate the Malay special “rights” he said were contained in the Federal Constitution to pave the way for Singapore to rejoin the federation.
Singapore joined Malaya together with Sabah and Sarawak to form the Federation of Malaysia in 1963. It was later expelled from the country in 1965.
Source: The Malay Mail online