Sg Govt worry we will all leave
I suppose this is from the Straits Times:
July 26, 2006, 6.36 pm (Singapore time)
Govt warns of youth leaving S'pore: Lim
YOUTH, having been groomed by a first class educational system and equipped for the challenges of a competitive and global market would choose to leave Singapore for greener pastures.
This is a worry that Minister of Transport Raymond Lim voiced out to more than 400 junior college students on Wednesday.
He was speaking at the 16th Temasek Seminar, organised by the Ministry of Defence, to share with students Singapore's need to eke out a relevant role within the international system.
He stressed the importance of youth, citing them as 'stakeholders of a common destiny'.
Speaking to the audience, he said, 'For me, nothing is more urgent now than a dialogue with the sons and daughters of our country, to understand and work with you to build a home that you would call their own.'
'If you end up marrying them, that is alright but please settle down in Singapore to raise your children,' he said jokingly of meeting people from other cultures.
Mr Lim's worries are likely to be well-founded.
A recent survey by Singapore Press Holdings - based on a poll of 2,548 teenagers from India, China, Malaysia, Japan, and Singapore - found that 53 per cent of Singaporean teens would consider emigration.
This sentiment is much more prevalent among Singaporean teens, than with their counterparts in India (39 per cent) and Malaysia (28 per cent).
The survey also revealed the top reasons teens here gave for emigrating: stress and the perception of better job opportunities overseas.
Also present at the annual seminar was Defence Minister Teo Chee Hean who addressed the need for Singapore to remake itself 'to possess the right qualities and attributes for the 21st century world city'.
'While many of the challenges facing us, such as our country's small size, have not changed, the world around us has,' he said, pointing out that Singapore has already begun to adapt.
Us? Stakeholders? Bullshit.
3 comments:
i remember trawling through your archives and reading about how the sg govt woos and courts you when you are overseas... anything interesting happened recently?
I don't really like anonymous comments.
What exactly is this 'common destiny'? Catchphrases and state-spun mantras... I grow tired, then immune to it all. You reap the systemic seeds you sow in education.
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