For all of Lee Kuan Yew’s accomplishments as the founder and architect of Singapore, his death has unleashed reminders by many that he could be petty and uncommonly vindictive. At 91, Lee had outlived most of his critics, but not all.
There are too many episodes of that vindictiveness to be able to list them all. But one in particular, known as Operation Spectrum in 1987, blighted the lives of 22 young Singaporeans and, if the intent, as the Chinese say, was to kill the chicken to scare the monkey, it was successful. The operation intimidated a generation into staying studiously away from social causes or any other kind of agitation.
Tan Wah Piow, now a lawyer in the UK, was forced to flee the island republic in the wake of the conjured crisis. “In life, Lee Kuan Yew’s sole concern was to be feared by his countrymen,” Tan said in a statement released to the press upon Lee’s death. “He was so spectacularly successful in this pursuit that by the time of his death, he was left with no cohorts: only minions.”
Lee, Tan said, “will be remembered as an accomplished dictator who maintained a veneer of democracy and the grand illusion of the rule of law to his very last breath. Such was his achievement that dictators elsewhere viewed his system of control with envy.” Full story...
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There are too many episodes of that vindictiveness to be able to list them all. But one in particular, known as Operation Spectrum in 1987, blighted the lives of 22 young Singaporeans and, if the intent, as the Chinese say, was to kill the chicken to scare the monkey, it was successful. The operation intimidated a generation into staying studiously away from social causes or any other kind of agitation.
Tan Wah Piow, now a lawyer in the UK, was forced to flee the island republic in the wake of the conjured crisis. “In life, Lee Kuan Yew’s sole concern was to be feared by his countrymen,” Tan said in a statement released to the press upon Lee’s death. “He was so spectacularly successful in this pursuit that by the time of his death, he was left with no cohorts: only minions.”
Lee, Tan said, “will be remembered as an accomplished dictator who maintained a veneer of democracy and the grand illusion of the rule of law to his very last breath. Such was his achievement that dictators elsewhere viewed his system of control with envy.” Full story...
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