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WITH the recent Cabinet reshuffle, Singapore is closer to a third generation of leaders who will take charge - in a few years - of one of the fastest changing societies in the world. In recent months, the media has been full of reports on how this city of four million people is being forced to change by crises that increasingly depend on individuals more than the government to resolve. Joblessness, terrorism, a weak economy - and now SARS - are hastening the process of transformation of this highly-regulated city, making its people look more to themselves than to the government. In most of these matters, Singapore suffers more than Malaysia, so the rate of change is faster. It began more than a decade ago when the new generation of Singaporeans, supported by parents, sped up its pursuit of education and Internet knowledge. I remember dropping in on a crowded library in Toa Payoh during the financial crisis and seeing a few Malay women patiently sitting by their children and grandchildren as they pored through books. They would sit there for hours silently watching the kids. By their side were lunch-boxes and bottled water. They couldn’t afford to leave for lunch for fear of losing their seats. The role that education played in Singapore’s change was tremendous. Helped by the Internet, it raised a confident breed of youngsters in a controlled society, a conflicting combination. But with the recent spate of crises, the level of - and need for - government controllability has declined. Take SARS. This week, all primary school pupils were given thermometers and taught how to read their own body temperature and keep a record twice a day. "Do you know what you must do if the reading goes above 37.5°C?" asked a teacher of her class of tiny tots shown over TV. "We must tell teacher or mummy and go to a doctor," they replied in unison. In the next two months, all 600,000 students and national servicemen would be doing this. It would then be the turn of the 850,000 families to get free thermometers so that every Singaporean would take responsibility for ensuring he hasn’t got SARS - and check in when he has a fever without any prompting. This requires every person, from seven to 70, to play a personal role in the war. Social responsibility and personal hygiene is the society’s new watchwords. "If you have fever and a cough, see a doctor, quarantine yourself, don’t go out and infect others, don’t even go to work." "What if I don’t have an MC (medical certificate)," some workers ask. "That’s okay, we trust you" is the reply. In a SARS-threatened world, employers, neighbours, colleagues and classmates all need to be able to trust people, and be trusted in return, on a large scale. The government can’t legislate against all lying. This self-reliant mood is extending to jobs, too. "We can’t depend on others to get jobs for us. The only people who depend on the government for jobs are government scholars," said an IT graduate. It wasn’t so long ago the government was controlling even how many doctors or lawyers Singapore should produce a year. Do it today and people would leave the country. It’s bad news, of course, for the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) to have Singaporeans losing faith in its ability to find jobs for them - but it is good for character building here. Their confidence in the PAP’s ability to steer the country out of the present downturn is at an unprecedented low, said Dr Wang Kai Yuen (MP for Bukit Timah) during budget debate in Parliament. "Based on this budget statement, there is a mismatch between people's expectations and the ability of the government to deliver," he said. Deputy Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong recently told 1000 community leaders that Singaporeans are undergoing a "baptism of fire" that is serving as "formative years for the new generation." The six years since the 1997 financial crisis are "very significant years." Lee, who is likely to take over the premiership from Goh Chok Tong by 2007 (possibly earlier), added: "If we can overcome all these problems, I think we have inoculated the national population for another generation." Admitting the government’s shoulders are not broad enough, Lee repeatedly called on Singaporeans to change their mindset and work with it. He was talking about a troubled era producing a tougher, more resilient lot, different from the stereotype spoilt, whining Singaporeans raised during a stable, affluent life. In this, Singapore lags behind bigger nations with a longer history of wars, pain and suffering. Crises make the people strong and bond them to each other. Shared misery, on hindsight, contributes to nation-building. Several years ago I saw a scene on a CNN documentary that has remained in my mind: a big rugged American farmer sitting in front of rubble that was once his home, and weeping uncontrollably. A hurricane had destroyed his home, his farm, and a life that had taken him decades to build. He now had nothing. That, of course, is nothing compared to many of Asia’s poor countries hit regularly by killer floods, typhoon, drought, famine and violence. These crises, one after another, have also suppressed the habit of young Singaporeans to complain about everything they don’t like. Some of the Internet chat-rooms for young people are now less quarrelsome with less rhetoric than had been for a long time. Most youths seem more preoccupied with the crises of the day – jobs, salaries and the threat of SARS. The practical ones, I believe, realise what they are confronted with, that they are living in dark times and there's no place for frivolous action. People are fearful about chances of finding a job - or losing it; in general they are worried about their future. The importance of the Cabinet reshuffle, obvious as it is, is overshadowed by people’s worries. For now at least,
most Singaporeans are too busy counting their own personal losses
than speculate on what the new Cabinet will bring.
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