Laissez-faire Hong Kong could do with some leadership steel from a Lee Kuan Yew
Mak Kwok Wah says a look at the leadership style of the late Lee Kuan Yew might throw light on the extent of government intervention needed to solve livelihood problems in laissez-faire Hong Kong
The death of Lee Kuan Yew, the founding father of modern Singapore, has revived much attention in Hong Kong about the way the city state has been governed, in the hope that it may shed some light on our own future.
Lee is highly regarded as a distinguished statesman who led a small territory with few natural resources - like Hong Kong - to become a first world nation. Former US presidents Bill Clinton and George H. W. Bush called him a "remarkable leader and statesman" and "one of the brightest and most effective world leaders" respectively.
Some critics attributed his success to the efficiency and authority attained by his government through an authoritarian regime. If we measure his governance against the "core values" we often talk about in Hong Kong - that is, democracy, freedom and the rule of law - the negative comment may well be true. Paternalism does not go down well with a democratic government, nor does it embrace freedoms. The harsh punishment for some minor offences and the frequent use of libel suits against adversaries speak volumes about his "rule by law".
Irrespective of all these, Singapore has gone from strength to strength. It regularly tops global indices of competitiveness and places second in a list of the world's freest economies. Its per capita gross domestic product has long passed that of Hong Kong's and its housing policy is the envy of those in Hong Kong who have been hard-pressed by rocketing property prices.
The difference in the way Hong Kong and Singapore are governed boils down to one basic factor: the degree of government intervention. When China resumed sovereignty over Hong Kong, the special administrative region had to operate on its own and the people began to have their say in how the place should be run. They had more room to manoeuvre in making known their views and demands.
The so-called positive non-intervention approach inherited from the colonial government could no longer respond to the aspirations of the community. At the least, the basic "safety net" provided by social welfare services could not satisfy the needs of the people any more, and they were able to voice their demands through more representatives in the Legislative Council.
After the transition, the first chief executive, Tung Chee-hwa, was preoccupied with the need to transform a public machinery filled with bureaucrats into a ministerial government. With the rise of the democratic camp, Tung was put on the defence by attacks from the pro-democracy parties and a free media, not to mention the other challenges he faced, including the Asian financial turmoil and the severe acute respiratory syndrome epidemic.