S'pore has done well over last decade despite
challenges: Dr Ng
By Satish Cheney, Channel NewsAsia |
Posted: 22 January 2010 2241 hrs
SINGAPORE: Singapore's Education Minister Ng Eng Hen has
said that the country has done well to weather the storms of the
past decade, because of its fundamental systems of nation
building.
He was speaking at a wide-ranging dialogue session organised by the
National University of Singapore Society.
In the past decade, Singapore has grown five per cent on average,
despite many challenges such as 9/11, SARS and the global financial
crisis.
Moving forward, Dr Ng said the key is in focusing on the
fundamentals that got Singapore to where it is today.
"Whoever is in charge must continue to deliver clean, competent
leaders across all domains - not only political but civil service,
education, security and social domains. And they have to ensure
they are coupled with united committed citizenry," said Dr
Ng.
He added the country must continue to restructure into an
innovation- and knowledge-based economy as well as attract and
retain talent, both local and foreign.
However, the minister pointed out the important question being how
both can add and build Singapore.
Dr Ng said: "We may not need to keep growing at that level. Slowing
down and consolidating is not always bad and at certain growth
phase you may want to do that. But that is different from being
parochial and being complacent - let's make sure the two are
clearly different.
"It makes sense for us to decide if we can't grow with so many
people, how do we continue to value add? That is the right
question. Because it is not only the absolute number of your
population, the characteristics of the population are all
important."
The future though looks bright for Singapore as Dr Ng highlighted
several key infrastructure developments. These include the upcoming
integrated resorts and the expansion of the country's rail
system.
- CNA/sc
