7/27/2007
Educating Tribal Chiefs about honour and trust
LKY is on an education mission to Indonesia to educate the tribal chiefs about honour and obligations. This all started with the signing of the Extradition Treaty and Defence Cooperation Agreement, DCAET.
The Indonesian politicians were told of the consequences of backing out of an international agreement signed voluntarily between two govts after thorough negotiations. This kind of attitude and precedents have dire consequences.
LKY should remind them of the two glaring examples, Malaysia and Indonesia. Once the trust is lost, it will take a long time to rebuild and regain it. Malaysia was the first culprit of changing their laws and applied them retroactively to the detriment of foreigners. They thought they were smart. Now they are living with the consequences of all their backtracking and volte face in their commitments to international practices and the rule of law. The IDR is going to be hanged until assurance be given that these kampong mentality and practices will not be repeated and foreign investments are protected by law. Otherwise who is going to pump in millions of dollars of investment into the country?
Thailand is a newcomer to this game of highhandedness and unravelling of legal practices and obligations. They tried to forcibly recover the assets of Shinsat after being sold to Singapore. All at once the international community stood up and held back all their investment plans. It shocked the military junta and they are backtracking to correct their error. But the investment funds are not coming in so fast until they really affirmed that this is not going to be the way Thailand conduct its business.
Do the tribal chiefs in Indonesia think they can get away with their tribal ways and still think Singapore and the foreign communities will pump money into Indonesia? Do they really think that Singapore can be blackmailed or has its arms twisted by them? They can kiss their Batam, Bintang and Karimum Economic Zones goodbye if they don't play by international law and practices.
Like it or not, they will have to learn to live by the norms of a modern world.
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6 comments:
>Malaysia was the first culprit of changing their laws >and applied them retroactively to the detriment of >foreigners. They thought they were smart. Now they >are living with the consequences of all their >backtracking and volte face in their commitments >to international practices and the rule of law.
When had this happened, Red Bean?
What transpired? Care to share?
Thks. :)
off hand, the first was the regulations on singaporeans buying residential properties. the second was the clob saga.
there maybe some on investment in biz. anyone want to add on?
Thks for your reply, Red Bean. :)
Let's guess - is it tribal politics the Malaysians are indulging in? ;P
i must say the local politics and voices of the tribal chiefs are very loud. and these voices drown out economic objectives. during the property boom, many housing estates were built with singaporeans as the targetted buyers.
imagine the rules changed and all the singaporean buyers were hit so badly that not only they dare not buy but also not allowed to buy. and the estates were abandoned, some half completed, some 3/4 and some fully completed.
imagine the losses to the developers and those singaporeans who have bought. how many singaporeans would dare to try another time after being burnt?
Since we know they speak tribal - most if not all the time, why pander to their whims & fancies?
Once bitten twice shy? Not for Sengkapolian leh. Many among them don't seem to know when they're banging headon wall but persist on blindly..
Sigh..
But at least we'r not tribal. :)
in politics, there is no permanent friends or enemies. tomorrow a new leader may be our best buddies. then the next one may start another confrontation.
we have to try to live with everyone in good and bad times just like here. we must try to live with other people even if we don't think or agree with them.
that's life. you only distance yourself when there is no way out and the other party declars war with you.
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