Better to nurture talent than import them
May 30, 2006
The Straits Times
I FIND it disheartening that a table tennis star such as Xu Yan
would choose to leave Singapore after obtaining her citizenship a
few years ago (Xu Yan may play for German club - ST, May 26).
Despite Singapore Table Tennis Federation's push to train her as a
top player by sending her to overseas matches, she has chosen to
leave Singapore to search for greener pastures elsewhere.
While she may have her reasons for doing so and I am in no position
to judge her patriotism towards Singapore, it is saddening to learn
that she could be replaced by a more well-deserving local table
tennis player who may not be better in skills but has the heart to
play for Singapore.
Singapore has always been under pressure to buy off-the-shelf
foreign talent rather than invest time and resources in developing
our own talent. In cases such as awarding bond-free PhD
scholarships to foreign students, or hiring foreign talent to play
for Singapore sports, these have always have sparked debate.
The issue is always 'build or buy?'
One of the six messages in national education for school children
includes 'No one owes Singapore a living. We must find our own way
to survive and prosper.'
This message is self-contradictory in some ways. If Singapore has
to find her own ways to survive, the first survival instinct is to
look to her own people for help.
If Singapore has always relied on outside help, it implies that we
are no good, that we are always second grade citizens. For national
education is to be effective, we have to ask what is it in a nation
that creates loyalty in citizens and what alienates them?
Issues such as sending our scholars overseas for studies, providing
bond-free scholarships to foreign students, allowing foreigners to
take part in the Singapore Idol contest, and talent-hunting foreign
students to come to Singapore to study only serve to alienate
citizens.
With the reverse migration of students from India and China going
back to their homelands, Singapore will face another uphill
challenge to attract more talented foreigners.
It has been said that first-tier foreigners go to America and
Europe while the second-tier foreigners come to Singapore. Very
soon, Singapore can attract only third-tier foreigners because many
of the brightest foreigners from India and China will be
talent-hunted aggressively.
If this is the case, rather than attracting third-tier foreigners,
we may as well do more to nurture our own people because we have
the capability to be first-tier citizens as well.
Once Singapore can achieve that, even first-tier foreigners will be
strongly motivated to come to Singapore to contribute.
It is easier to take a sapling from the greenhouse to grow it
rather than planting from seeds. The fruit-bearing phase is shorter
for the sapling than for seeds. However, if the seeds grow
successfully into strong healthy fruit trees, other insects will
travel from afar to the flowers for pollination, thus enhancing the
quality of the next generation of seeds.
Edmund Lim Wai Hoong
