3 Lessons
from the US Elections
IS S'PORE READY FOR A MINORITY PM?
Can we see beyond the colour?
Not yet, but young are more colour-blind
By Tan May Ping
November 07, 2008
OVERNIGHT, American voters put us to shame.
They
voted in a black president, while Singaporeans will still baulk at
accepting a non-Chinese prime minister, say some political top guns
and many observers.
In the
evolution of democratic politics, Americans just took a giant step
forward.
Meanwhile, Singaporeans are still lumbering along like Third World
tribes, dragging our baggage of racial
hang-ups.
Of
course, not all Americans are enlightened
voters.
Half of
the country's population, who are older and mostly white, are still
living in the past and might well view President-elect Barack Obama
as an 'uppity nigger'.
As one
academic commentator noted: 'Today's radical Republican Party
represents a large segment of the population that believes that
abortions and same-sex marriages are immoral, God sent America to
Iraq...'
So while
Mr Obama was the favourite in polls, many expected whites to reveal
their true colours when put to the test.
Well,
they did the right thing by putting race in the background. Can
they continue to do so as America attempts to heal itself after
bruising campaigns?
And could
Singaporeans do the right thing and ignore the skin colour of a
future prime minister?
The
leaders of the People's Action Party believe that Singaporeans do
vote on racial lines, said Dr Gillian Koh, senior research fellow
at the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS).
Dr Koh
said: 'They feel that there are social faultlines that divide us,
especially on race, so Singapore is no where near to being a
de-racialised country.
'And that
is the whole basis of the GRC system.'
The GRC
or group representation constituency was introduced in 1988 to
protect Parliament's multiracial composition.
The need
for such a scheme shows clearly that we're still tribal folk,
flocking together like birds of a feather.
But the
immediate post-65 generation, said Dr Koh, would probably be more
ready for other ideas as to who the PM can be.
'They
were brought up to think One Singapore, One Nation, and would
probably not be averse to the idea because of the political ideals
of their time,' she added.
The young
and the cosmopolitan are likely to be even more colour-blind, say
some observers.
They will
let the best man lead.
Political
analyst Terence Chong from the Institute of Southeast Asia Studies
said: 'Many Singaporeans, especially younger ones, are ready
because the ideologies of multiculturalism and meritocracy have
become part of the Singaporean myth.'
Singaporeans are very
pragmatic, and will look for leaders with management ability and
people-skills, IPS' Dr Koh said.
Citing an
IPS post-2006 election survey, Dr Koh said respondents indicated
they voted their members of parliament based on whether they
thought they would be effective, fair and have a heart for the
people in general.
Another
survey last year by two academics at the S Rajaratnam School of
International Studies (RSIS) on race and religion also produced
surprising results.
It found
that over 91 per cent of all races polled said they would accept a
prime minster of another race, while at least 92 per cent said they
would vote an MP or a Singapore president of a different
race.
Among the
Chinese, 94 per cent did not mind if the PM was an Indian, and 91
per cent, if he was a Malay.
Referring
to the topic of race as an old issue, Workers' Party's organising
secretary Yaw Shin Leong said: 'If we truly believe in merit and
capabilities, then so long as the person is Singaporean and can do
a good job, there should be no reason why the person can't be given
the top job.
'To say
that certain ethnic groups are not suitable or ready for top office
is regressive'.
All that
debate might be purely academic given that the electoral system
here is focused on political parties, not individual
candidates.
The party
which has the majority forms the government and chooses the prime
minister.
Dr Koh
said: 'I think we would need a fully functioning two-party system
before we ever reach that scenario.'
The
question of race and prime ministership was on then-PM Lee Kuan
Yew's mind back in 1988.
He
publicly said then that he would have considered then-National
Development Minister S Dhanabalan for the PM's job if not for his
Indian ethnicity.
Singapore, Mr Lee said, was
not ready for an Indian prime minister.
Mr
Dhanabalan himself did not think Chinese Singaporeans were ready to
accept a non-Chinese PM. In a Straits Times report in November last
year, he said that such cross-racial acceptance takes
time.
Referring
to the RSIS race survey, Mr Dhanabalan felt that the respondents
probably gave 'politically correct' answers that did not reflect
their real feelings.
He said
then: 'I'm not quite convinced. It will take a bit more time. You
look at the United States. How long, how many years were they a
nation before a Catholic could be elected?
'Let's
don't even talk about blacks. Now Barack Obama is the first one.
Well, he may not even make it through the primary,
right?
'So these
are very deep feelings. I'm not saying it's not possible, but I
think it will take some time.'
Fast
forward a year later.
Mr Obama
has done it, despite the widespread fears of voting along racial
lines.
Commentators even spoke
openly of the prospect of his assassination by a white supremacist
group.
But, as
in Malaysia's general election, many voters surprised even the
experts by rejecting race to 'do the right
thing'.
All this
gives Singaporeans good reason to gaze in the mirror and ask
ourselves how deep runs a tribal instinct and how far we want to
evolve as a society.
It is incorrect to call Obama an African-American. His black
father dumped him and his white mother when he was a baby.
He is mixed of White and African ancestry, brought up by an
Indonesian step-father.
