Transcription
In the Philippines, before Martial Law, it was an Asian version of the United States system. The Philippines press enjoyed all the freedoms, but they failed the Filipino people.
The late Lee Kuan Yew was once a strong advocate for the Philippines, recognizing it as one of the most developed nations in the 1950s and 60s. In his memoirs, he famously stated there was no reason why the Philippines should not have been one of the more successful own countries. In the 1950s, economic development in the Philippines was better than that in Korea, comparable to that in Taiwan, and was at the lower end of the same bracket as Japan.
However, after decades of observation, he would become critical of various aspects of the Philippines, including its US-style political system, pervasive corruption, and media. Warning all the way back in 1992 that if they didn't put their act together, they would be surpassed economically by their neighbors. Every Filipino knows that all the other ASEAN countries have overtaken or are about to overtake the Philippines. If the next 6 years are wasted, the Philippines will lag behind even Vietnam, as Vietnam surpasses the Philippines in GDP per capita for the first time since the 1990s.
Let's first examine Singapore's initial relationship with the Philippines and Lee Kuan Yew's insights on the country, its leaders, and its culture. If I were a Filipino, to cheer myself, I would count my blessings and start in a positive frame of mind. The Philippines is immensely better off than Afghanistan, or Lebanon, or Sri Lanka. All these three have been torn apart by strife and war. Now, unlike these countries, the Philippines can pull itself together and get on with the job, and it has a good chance of success because it is part of a region which is set for high growth.
Lee Kuan Yew's first official visit to the Philippines took place in 1974, where he was warmly welcomed by then-President Ferdinand Marcos. Initial relations were friendly, with Lee invited to stay at the lavishly furnished Malacañang Palace, where they would play golf and talk about the future of ASEAN. Two years later, in 1976, the two countries further solidified their partnership by agreeing to a 10% reduction in tariffs as part of a broader trade initiative, laying the groundwork for enhanced economic collaboration and a more integrated Southeast Asia.
However, following the assassination of opposition leader Benigno Aquino Jr. in 1983, Marcos's administration faced immense political and financial pressure, grappling with over $25 billion in debt after foreign banks halted loans to the Philippines. Unable to meet interest repayments, Marcos's administration would ask Singapore for a loan of $300 to $500 million, to which Lee would bluntly reply, "We'll never see that money back." Nevertheless, Singaporean banks would lend the Philippine government $8 billion, fully aware that repayment could take decades.
In one of their last meetings, Lee would urge Marcos to hand over power to someone more capable of stabilizing the country, and to his surprise, Marcos agreed and referred to Lee as a "true friend." But Marcos only let go of power a few years later, after growing public discontent surrounding his autocratic rule and allegations of embezzling around $10 billion from public funds. The People Power Revolution ultimately forced him and his close associates to flee to the United States in 1986. The democratic system malfunctioned. Fortunately, a miraculous demonstration of people's power in February 1986 saved the country from impending disaster.
However, Lee observed that many of Marcos's family and close associates would gradually return to the Philippines over the years. In his memoirs, he criticized Filipino society for welcoming them back, describing it as a "soft, forgiving culture." "Only in the Philippines could a leader like Ferdinand Marcos, who pillaged his country for over 20 years, still will be considered for a national burial. Insignificant amounts of loot have been recovered, yet his wife and children were allowed to return and engage in politics."
Have you ever engaged in any corrupt [Music] practices?
Not long after, Lee met Marcos's successor, Corazon Aquino, the first female president of the Philippines and widow of the assassinated Benigno Aquino Jr. In a notable departure from tradition, when newly elected presidents typically make their first overseas visit to Washington, Aquino chose to visit Indonesia and Singapore instead, underscoring her commitment to strengthening ties in the region. Lee had high hopes that she would lead the Philippines to success, describing her as a "sincere, devout Catholic who wanted to do her best for her country." Convinced of her potential, Lee successfully convinced the US administration in 1988 to initiate a foreign aid program that resulted in over $10 billion in pledges from various countries by 1991, all aimed at helping the Philippines get back on track.
However, ongoing political instability deterred donors and delayed planned projects, with more than a dozen coup attempts since the overthrow of the Marcos government. Lee observed a critical absence of cohesion within Philippine society, stating that "something was missing, that gel to hold society together." He would highlight the severe inequality that characterized the nation, describing it as divided into two distinct societies: the elite, mixed-race mestizos living in luxury, and the impoverished peasants, whom they cared little about.
In his memoirs, Lee also expressed profound concern about the brain drain affecting the Philippines during this period, stating that "something had gone seriously wrong." Millions of Filipino men and women had to leave their country for jobs abroad, beneath their level of education. "Filipino professionals when we recruited to work in Singapore are as good as our own. Indeed, the architects, artists, and musicians are more artistic and creative than Singaporeans. In Singapore, there are over 1,500 Filipino professionals: engineers, accountants, architects, managers, more than those from all other ASEAN countries. They hold their jobs on their merit. You will find that Filipinos can perform as well as Singaporeans or Thai or Malaysians or Indonesians."
After Aquino stepped down, Lee would meet Fidel Ramos in 1992, whom he described as "more pragmatic and instrumental in establishing greater stability in the country than his predecessor." In the same year, Lee would reluctantly accept an invitation to speak at the Philippine Business Conference, mindful of not wanting to offend his hosts. But Filipino businessmen and public figures were eager to hear his candid insights, hoping to gain valuable perspectives on their country. "When I received your invitation to speak, I hesitated. You must have known my attitudes from reports over the years."
During his speech, Lee outlined the numerous challenges facing the Philippines and some solutions for getting its economy back on track. One challenge Lee identified was with the Philippines' adoption of the US political system. "One problem which you have is that the Philippines has an American-style Constitution, one of the most difficult to operate in the world. The Americans wrote this constitution in 1787 in Philadelphia. They wanted a weak executive president, having suffered at the hands of King George II of England. They wanted the opposite of a strong monarch. But you are a developing country, and developing countries faced with disorder and underdevelopment need strong, honest executive government. The system worked in America because of a super abundance of resources and riches in a vast, underpopulated continent. I do not believe that Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, or Singapore could have succeeded if they had to work under such a constitution, where political gridlock on every major issue is a way of God. And you will notice for some 28 years now, the United States system has not functioned well in the United States."
Another problem is the Philippines' adoption of US-style free speech and press, stating that it has led to much confusion and contention among the people. "The Philippines press enjoyed all the freedoms, but they failed the Filipino people. A wildly partisan press helped Filipino politicians to flood the marketplace of ideas with junk and confused and befuddled the people so that they could not see what their vital interests were in a developing country."
How Lee would outline a series of tasks that the Philippine government could address more effectively, starting with tackling crime and corruption. "There must be a cleanup of racketeers in the police, whether for kidnappings or other crimes. The kidnapping of a Japanese executive in the Philippines, which took 6 months to settle, was enough to abort most Japanese investment plans. Kidnappings of local Chinese have increased; three victims, two university students and one businessman, have been killed. Other crimes, especially corrupt corruption, must be suppressed and punished. It can never be eliminated, not even in Singapore. It is possible to weed out corruption, provided top political leaders set the examples and the pace. An efficient and a strong anti-corruption unit under the president, with powers to investigate any person, however high, and to carry it to a successful prosecution, will work wonders."
Next, Lee emphasized that the government should dismantle the policies that protect inefficient oligarchs to dominate the economy. "The second task is to free the economy from controls and monopolies. A nationalist industrialization rhetoric has benefited only a group of inefficient oligarchs, including some heading some heading US-owned firms. The tariff barriers had been a major element in an in of an intricate web of regulation that have shackled the Philippines, shackled its entrepreneurs, and only nurtured the favorite few cartels and monopolies from banking to telecommunications to shipping. If you stick to your old policies because vested interests are too strong, too powerful to overturn, then Filipinos will lag further and further behind her Asian neighbors. Lift restrictions on trade and invest. Dismantle the web of measures which keep out foreign companies and make Philippine companies compete to survive, not thrive at the expense of the ordinary Filipino."
The next task will be getting Filipinos to take politics more seriously, calling on the press to educate the masses. "If the Ramos administration can make ordinary Filipinos understand that politics is not simply elections with singing and fiestas and giveaways, but that it is about their lives, their jobs, their wages, their homes, schools for their children, hospitals, then the situation can change dramatically. The Philippines has a lively and luscious press. I think they should undertake this vital job of educating the Filipino voter of the link between political policies, macroeconomic reforms, low inflation, confidence, law and order, with is welfare. And if they take that as their national duty, it can do not."
And finally, Lee emphasized that the Philippines must address its infrastructure challenges, particularly noting that frequent electrical blackouts significantly deter foreign investment. "So build up your infrastructure like power stations, roads, communications, either in partnership with or completely through the private sector. It is huge losses suffered by industrial and commercial establishments due to the electricity shortages and scheduled power blackouts averaging 7 hours a day. With foreign investors closely monitoring the country for a stable political transition, the infrastructure problem is publicity it can ill afford."
They concluded that the Philippines can overcome all these challenges. "There is no reason why they can't succeed. I hope I have provoked you, provoked you into setting your priorities for getting your act together so that you can achieve your potential. If you maximize the next six years of the Ramos administration, then you will get yourselves back into the mainstream of growth and development and be in the same lead as Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia. The OECD calls them now the new dynamic economists of Asia. You can be and should be one of them. Thank you."
More than 30 years after Lee Kuan Yew's speech, the Philippines has made significant strides across various sectors. However, issues that Lee pointed out, such as kidnappings, corruption, and frequent blackouts, remained prevalent in 2024. Lee himself rarely referenced the Philippines in his later writings and speeches. And while relations between the Philippines and Singapore have generally been strong, the treatment of overseas Filipino workers have occasionally sparked contention.
A significant flashpoint occurred in 1995 with the execution of Flor Contemplacion, a Filipino domestic worker convicted of murdering another maid and a 3-year-old boy in Singapore. This incident provoked widespread outrage and protest in the Philippines, even prompting future Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte to call for a boycott of Singaporean goods and even urge Filipinos to burn the Singaporean flag.
In response, additionally, in 2003, during the economic fallout from the SARS crisis, Lee would find himself defending Filipino workers amid rising discontent among Singaporeans regarding foreign labor. "And the boys are asking, 'Why are the Filipinos still here when we are losing our jobs?' If we say tomorrow, all foreign workers leave, I think Singapore will be worse off. So I'm sorry if I cannot give you a simple answer, 'Yes, let's sack the [Music] Filipino.' Can't be done."
Fast forward to today, the Philippines and Singapore celebrate a robust partnership, marking 55 years of diplomatic relations. This enduring relationship encompasses cooperation across various sectors, including economics, technology, education, and defense. With a young, English-speaking population, Lee recognized the Philippines' immense potential, and today, Singapore continues this trend as one of the Philippines' largest investors and trade partners, with the ambitious New Clark City development catching the eyes of various Singaporean firms eager to capitalize on the country's growth.
In his memoirs, Lee concluded that if the Filipino people could hold their leaders accountable, there'd be no limit to what they could achieve. [Music]