do you all think it is possible to have a military coup in
Singapore?
Lee Kuan Yew warns of army intervention
As last resort, if an opposition government plunders hard-earned
reserves. Possible?
By Seah Chiang Nee., litterspeck.com
Sep 24, 2006
AS he ages in the midst of an undercurrent of political pressures,
Lee Kuan Yew seems to become more concerned about the safety of
Singapore's US120bil (RM454.4bil) reserves accumulated over four
decades.
His worry is two-fold; firstly, the rising popularity of opposition
that he said could result in 'freak' defeat for his ruling People's
Action Party (PAP), and secondly, corrupt opposition leaders
squandering the nation's wealth.
He had earlier warned that PAP must not take for granted that it
will always win.
Lee had valid reasons to worry. There's a political wind blowing
across the land and politics may be entering - helped by the
Internet - a less predictable era.
In the May election, the PAP's popular vote fell from 75.3 to 66.6%
with no sign of reversing.
If it erodes further, more Singaporeans will hop on to the
(currently weak) opposition's bandwagon.
The new recruits could include the bright and honest, but also
crooks and self-serving people with an eye on the nation's
riches.
In an interview with a Harvard University professor last week he
hinted that in case of a plunder - and the elected president could
not or would not prevent it - then "in two or three years" the army
would step in to stop it.
His talk of possible military intervention - no mention of coup -
caused a stir among Singaporeans.
Ironically the warning came only three days before the military
coup in Thailand.
Singapore is one of the richest countries when it comes to reserves
per capita. Lee once promised to 'rise up from the grave' if future
leaders lead it into chaos.
Before he resigned as PM in 1990, Lee created 'a second key' to
safeguard the reserves, an elected presidency that could stop the
Cabinet of the day from spending money it had not accumulated
during its own five-year tenure.
No government could dig into funds earned by previous governments
without approval from a public referendum.
But this is the first time Lee has spoken of 'military
intervention' if the elected presidency was absent or captured by
the opposition, to save the nation's billions.
Educated Singaporeans, however, have often discussed the prospect
of a military coup here if PAP loses an election, not to protect
national assets. Lee probably sees the two as connected.
In 1984 when the PAP suffered a 12.4% vote decline - a mini-crisis
to him in those days - a small think-tank committee set up by the
newspaper that I edited had discussed this possibility.
Lee had angrily accused young voters of being ungrateful when so
many turned against a party that did 'so much for them'.
We discussed what would happen if something worse were to happen
like losing an election: Would Lee stage a military coup to stay in
power? Almost to a person, we dismissed it for several
reasons.
Firstly, the United States, Singapore's powerful trading partner,
would come down hard on it, foreign investors could dry up but more
crucially, Singapore's army and people - unlike others - would
strongly oppose it.
It would even split the PAP. In short Singapore could not survive
the impact.
Besides, the full-time army is a small one. Singapore's frontline
soldiers are overwhelmingly made up of 'reservists'.
This would have meant that if the country voted out the PAP, these
soldiers - sons, brothers and husbands - were likely to have voted
along with it, so a coup against the elected leaders was
far-fetched.
The army here is vastly different from the Thais, Vietnamese,
Filipinos and other coup-marked countries. Its value comes from its
colonial British 'no-politics' traditions.
So how seriously are Singaporeans taking Lee's coup warning? Most
dismiss it as next to impossible.
If it wasn't possible 20 years ago, it is even less so today as the
society has become more sophisticated.
"It will be a sad day if it is attempted. One coup will lead to
another and start a culture," said a businessman.
Besides any takeover general would probably enjoy power too much to
want to return to the barracks."
Nothing could then prevent them from plundering the reserves
themselves, the very thing Lee wanted to stop.
So far none of the other PAP leaders or rank-and-file has echoed
Lee's sentiments, so it is far from being a party position. I don't
think it was seriously discussed.
To put it into perspective, Lee did not condone a military takeover
but probably mentioned it as a last option if everything else
failed to stop a corrupt government.
Instead he advised Singaporeans to preserve the present political
arrangement, which could also mean - to his critics - 'don't vote
in an opposition' or "don't introduce a multi-party system."
In his interview with Prof Lawrence Summers, Lee said: "Once you
break that, by military intervention, you have destroyed a system
which works on the basis of who was voted into office," he
said.
There are, however, some old-timers who believe Lee never says
anything flippantly and that he must have given it much
thought.
So where can an out-of-office PAP, assuming the scenario were to
unfold, get the troops to grab power from the (corrupt) government
other than the 'people's' army?
Singapore is a small island that doesn't take much to start a
coup.
Imaginative Singaporeans believe the PAP may one day launch a
highly paid Presidential Guard-type unit, while others say a
battalion of Gurkha troops now used for security duties could be
used.
Lee, however, insisted his goal was maintaining the present
governance. "My ambition is not to preserve the PAP," he said.
