—Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, when asked about the significance of President Lee Teng-hui's official visit to Singapore.
This front-page quotation from the March 10, 1989 edition of the Straits Times illustrates the importance of the relationship between the Republic of China and Singapore. In addition, the official visit by President Lee Teng-hui and an entourage of Cabinet ministers and other government officials indicated an opening up of more maneuvering room for the ROC in the diplomatic arena.
Proclaimed by the United Daily News, one of Taiwan's leading newspapers, as "a giant step for this country toward adopting a more flexible diplomacy," President Lee, at the invitation of Singapore President Wee Kim Wee, for the first time visited a nation with which the ROC does not have official diplomatic relations.
This was the President's first trip outside the country since assuming office in January 1988 upon the passing of President Chiang Ching-kuo, and it was also the first state visit overseas by a ROC chief of state since former President Yen Chia-kan made a three-day visit to Saudi Arabia in 1977.
Indicating the importance the ROC attached to this visit, 66-year-old President Lee and his wife, Tseng Wen-fui, were accompanied by a high-ranking delegation including Foreign Minister Lien Chan, Defense Minister Cheng Wei-yuan, Economics Minister Chen Li-an, Taipei City Mayor Wu Poh-hsiung, Presidential Deputy Secretary-General Cheyne J.Y. Chiu, Trade Representative to Singapore Chiang Hsiao-wu, and Government Information Office Director-General Shaw Yu-ming.
Approximately 30 members of the Taiwan press corps also flew to Singapore to cover the President's March 6-9 official visit to this tropical city-state located on the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula. An independent nation since 1965, Singapore's international importance is far greater than its limited land area of 243 sq. mi. would suggest. First selected by Sir Stamford Raffles in 1819 as a trading station, Singapore has taken rich advantage of its location on the crossroads of East-West trading routes and at the heart of the resource-rich region of Southeast Asia.
President Lee Teng-hui addresses overseas Chinese during a reception party in Singapore.
In the March 1988 issue of Fortune, Singapore was given a triple-A rating for its receptivity to foreign investment, political stability, and income distribution. More than 3,000 multinational corporations from the United States, Japan, and Europe—including many key industrial leaders—have set up operations in Singapore's cosmopolitan environment.
Foreign companies have been attracted to this free port off the Malacca Strait for many reasons, ranging from excellent infrastructure and a skilled work force to freedom of ownership and operations. In addition to being the world's third largest oil-refining center after Rotterdam and the U.S. Gulf Coast, and being one of the busiest ports in terms of shipping tonnage, Singapore has recently emerged as an international financial center. Its 2.6 million population—primarily a combination of 76 percent ethnic Chinese, 15 percent Malays, and 6 percent Indians—boasts one of the highest standards of living in Asia with a per capita GNP close to US$9,000 in 1988.
Taiwan investors have been quick to realize the potential of Singapore's marketplace—investments in Singapore reached US$6.43 million last year, a figure assisted by the preferential tax agreement signed in 1981, despite the absence of diplomatic ties. Overall trade between Singapore and the ROC increased from US$2.3 billion in 1987 to US$3.1 billion last year.
President Lee and his entourage met with high-ranking Singaporean officials, including Acting President Lim Kim San (President Wee Kim Wee was recuperating from recent surgery), Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, the First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defense Goh Chok Tong, Minister for Trade and industry Brigadier-General Lee Hsien Loong, Minister for Foreign Affairs Wong Kan Seng, and Minister of the Environment Ahmad Mattar. They exchanged views on matters of mutual concern, including major topics in Asian affairs and the world situation in general. The President and accompanying governmental figures specifically sought to investigate and further understand the city-state's successful development strategies.
The ROC delegation visited the Singapore International Monetary Exchange, Science Park, the Pacific Biomedical Enterprise, environmental protection projects, and various social welfare organizations.
Popular visitors—President Lee and his wife, Tseng Wen-fui, meet with well-wishers during their visit to Singapore.
President Lee, during a courtesy call to Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew on March 6, presented him with several sets of Chinese classical texts reproduced in Taiwan. The most lavish of these sets was the 1,500-volume Ssu Ku Chuan Shu, an encyclopedic anthology of Chinese books. Originally compiled from 1772 to 1787 in the Ching Dynasty, the Ssu Ku Chuan Shu has a total of 3,451 book entries in four major categories covering Chinese classics, history, philosophy, and literature. Originally bound in 36,358 volumes, the total length of the set exceeds 7 billion characters. It is generally listed along with the Great Wall and the Grand Canal as one of China's "three most prominent works" in the areas of defense, transportation, and culture.
One of the highlights for Mrs. Lee Teng-hui occurred on March 7 when she visited Singapore's colonial-style Botanic Gardens. Covering approximately 80 acres, the gardens are renowned for their Orchid Enclosure where 2,500 plants of 250 different hybrids and species are on display. In honor of Mrs. Lee's visit, a new orchid species, Wen-fui, was named after her.
On March 8, President Lee demonstrated his openness to the media by meeting the press corps accompanying him during a specially-arranged breakfast meeting. Later in the afternoon, he took time off to look at Singapore's waterfront and play a round of golf at Sentosa, a nearby island resort.
Another priority during President Lee's visit was to carry regards to Taiwan fishermen who have established one of their major deep-sea fishing bases in Singapore. On the morning of March 9, President Lee paid a visit to Jurong Fishing Port, where he talked with fishermen from Taiwan and inquired about their working and living conditions. While the President was visiting the fishing base, Mrs. Lee, accompanied by Mrs. Ong Teng Cheong, wife of the Second Deputy Prime Minister, called on the Singapore Cheshire Home, a special home for the disabled.
Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, who has visited Taiwan more than 20 times, later the same day granted a 45-minute interview with three ROC journalists from the United Daily News, the China Times, and the Central News Agency. In this wide-ranging interview, Prime Minister Lee stressed that the substance of the relationship between Singapore and Taiwan will not be affected by any diplomatic relations between mainland China and Singapore.
Prime Minister Lee also spoke warmly about the late President Chiang Ching-kuo, describing him as a man of few words who always stayed calm and unruffled under very stressful conditions. He added that President Chiang had a consistency in his beliefs that he admired.
The Prime Minister at the same time described President Lee Teng-hui as "an activist chief executive, one who wants to move things, to get things to move faster and get things done." He found the President to be thoroughly committed to the welfare of ordinary people. In his opinion, this visit has put President Lee's personal imprint on Taiwan's relations with Singapore.
A warm welcome in lights from the Westin Stamford hotel in Singapore.
Touching on areas of future cooperation with Taiwan, Prime Minister Lee said Singapore could benefit from learning how Taiwan runs its small business schemes, as well as how it planned and developed its fiber-reinforced plastics industry and its science park at Hsinchu. He also pointed out that Singapore's National Computer Board could learn from Taiwan's information industry in such areas as software engineering, integrated systems, and personnel training, especially in the field of Chinese-language computers. On the other hand, the Prime Minister said that Singapore's advanced oil-refining industry and international financial operations may provide valuable development models for Taiwan.
Immediate concrete results from President Lee's visit include two expected economic agreements. One is the Investment Guarantee Agreement, which seeks to promote investment between Taiwan and Singapore. The other is designed to ease the import and export of goods intended for trade fairs and exhibitions.
The two countries also agreed in principle to hold ministerial-level meetings to consider bilateral cooperation projects. The annual consultations will be held alternately in Taipei and Singapore, with the first tentatively set for next year in Taiwan.
President Lee's historic visit to Singapore was followed by a major press conference held at Taipei's Sungshan Airport. The news conference, originally scheduled for only 30 minutes and limited to questions concerning the President's Singapore visit, expanded into a broad-ranging session lasting 80 minutes with almost all the reporters receiving a chance to ask questions. Through his candid answers and frank attitude, President Lee, in this second formal press conference since assuming the presidency, not only demonstrated his knowledge and his confidence, but once again illustrated his quiet yet effective charisma.
In reply to key questions about foreign policy, President Lee declared that the ROC must stand by its principle of maintaining the sovereignty of the nation. He stressed the importance of adopting a flexible foreign policy, but added that adoption of such a policy needs to be implemented step by step.
President Lee admitted that he did not like being referred to as the "President from Taiwan" in Singapore's press, but he felt that he could live with it. He pointed out that there have been setbacks and difficulties on the name issue ever since the ROC withdrew from the United Nations in 1971. But he said that people should not overemphasize the name issue. Instead, the nation should strengthen its economic power, increase its investment channels, and expand its foreign trade—and then greater attention can be given to talk about breaking new diplomatic ground.
In reply to a question about the possibility of ROC attendance at the annual conference of the Asian Development Bank in Peking in April, President Lee again referred to this "step by step" process, but declined further comment.
When asked how the relationship between the ROC and Singapore would be affected if Singapore established diplomatic ties with Communist China, as it recently announced, President Lee said that the announcement was merely a reiteration of Singapore's established stance. "Singapore normalizing ties with Peking is one thing; our relationship with Singapore is another," the President said. He also praised Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew as a great leader, saying he deserved the respect not only of the Singaporean people, but also of the whole world.
According to an ancient Chinese saying, "To climb a mountain, one must start from low ground; to go far, one must start from nearby." President Lee Teng-hui, through his recent official visit to Singapore, has clearly made an important step for the ROC's flexible diplomacy.