Singaporeans a minority in the banking and finance sector

 Singapore has been the preeminent financial centre of South East Asia for decades. At one time we could boast of so many great Singaporean bankers in our midst. Today the stark reality is that Singaporeans are an absolute minority in this sector, especially in the top management level. Singapore not only lacked finance and banker professionals but also IT specialists despite the fact that Singapore is the most advanced nation in the region and boasting of three top world class universities.

And guess which nationals are the top bankers and IT specialists in Singapore? They came from a country that was never a financial centre, with not a single university in the top 100 rankings of world universities and regarded as a third world developing country. How is this so, how is a top notch first world nation and being the financial centre of the region unable to produce the top talents in the field of banking and finance and IT and has to rely heavily on a third world country for top talents and accepting the fact that its graduates are unsuitable for employment in the top echelon of banking and IT?

There was a short article hiding in the bottom half second page of thenewpaper on 19 Aug that clearly described this pathetic state of affair in the development and growth of our talents in these two industries. The title of the article, 'Protecting and growing Singaporean jobs top prority: MAS' highlighted the problems raised by Raymond Koh, a retired senior banker and Ravi Menon, MAS MD's response to this call. The problem as written by Raymond Koh, 'As a retired senior banker, I can say categorically that in the past two decades, many foreigners hired in Singapore's finance sector have been for upper-middle to senior management positions.' Ravi Menon's reply was that while not where we want to be, the picture was not that bad.  

Goh Keng Swee must be turning in his grave. Goh was instrumental in demanding that top banking jobs must be helmed by Singaporeans and took the foreign banks to task for any delay towards this goal. But since his passing, this mission was forgotten and allowed to slacken until this pathetic state of affair becomes a shame to the glory of Singapore as a financial centre. Whose fault is this? Education, MOM or MAS?

The articles exposed so many controversial and unsavoury happenings in the banking and finance industry with everyone trying their best to hide the unappetizing truth, that Singaporeans are a minority in the industry, especially in the top management level. The stats quoted were hiding a lot of things that they did not want Singaporeans to know. MAS estimated Singaporeans make up 70% of the sector's workforce sounds comforting, estimate only. But only 43% of senior management jobs went to Singaporeans. How many percent of top management jobs went to Singaporeans was not mentioned. This one better not to tell, or no statistics.

And the three local banks proudly announced that Singaporeans and PRs made up more than 80%  of their employees. What they refused to say is how many of the 80% plus employees are Singaporeans. Why is there a need to hide these numbers? Not pleasant to tell? Might as well say this is a state secret that may harm the nation's interest if disclosed?

Every organisation and govt dept would always used this number, Singaporeans and PRs or locals as a single data and not wanting to tell what is the percentage of Singaporeans versus PRs in the numbers. Why? Why? Why? Singaporeans can understand that when one is getting paid with obscene salary it is quite embarrassing to tell. But how many Singaporeans are employed cannot be a state secret right?

The more they hide, the more suspicious it becomes, the more people are unhappy and to know the truth. Singaporeans can only guess that the truth is going to be very painful and unacceptable to Singaporeans and Singaporeans' interest.

What do you think? When there is nothing to hide, no need to hide. Is it so difficult to tell a simple statistical truth?

At the way it is going, with opportunity for top banking jobs going to foreigners, giving foreigners all the trainings and exposure they need but could not get in their home countries or elsewhere, it is only a matter of time when there will be no Singaporeans holding top banking and finance jobs in Singapore. If Singapore is not going to train and give opportunities to Singaporeans, no other country will do that for Singaporeans.