A few months ago, I travelled to Dhaka to see one of my younger brothers, who was seriously ill. It was a short trip full of emotional encounters with friends and relatives, whom I had not seen for many years. These meetings were filled with the memories of dear ones, who had long disappeared and reminiscences of the past. We travelled to Savar and prayed at the family graveyard behind the mosque, where our parents are buried. I came back to Madrid, feeling very sad and certain that further bad news from Dhaka would soon follow Sure enough, only a few days after my return. I was informed that my brother's health had worsened and that he had been taken to Singapore for further medical treatment and that he had only minimal chances of survival. So with a heavy heart. 1 packed my bag. bought a ticket from the nearest travel agent and left for Singapore. This letter comes as a result of that trip.

I knew that Singapore. ("Lion City" in Sanskrit), like Hong Kong and Macao, was one of the last trading outposts of European colonial powers in Southeast Asia. So I had imagined it to look and function more or less like Go I. Calcutta, Karachi or at best like Bombay. What I found was completely different. Tbe airport usually conveys the first impressions of the city to the newly-arrived. The Singapore Changi Airport which was modelled on the Schiphol Airport in Amster-dom is a completely modern transportation hub and can be compared with any modern airport in Western Europe or North America. It was impeccably clean and the ground staff

seemed to be extraordinarily efficient. Unlike most of the taxi-drivers at the Madrid airport; their counterparts at the Changi Airport were highly disciplined and completely honest. This was the second surprise in about ten minutes after my arrival. So 1 braced myself up for further surprises, albeit pleasant ones. And 1 was not disappointed.

As we sped (always respecting the speed limits) across the city towards my brother’s flat by the Raffles Hotel (named after the founder of the city and the British empire in the Far East). I discovered a prosperous, vibrant, modern city with towering sky-scrapers, wide avenues. well-kept public parks and clean side-walks. Later I discovered a multiracial (Chinese. Malay. Indian and Eurasian) and harmonious city With neat well-planned housing estates and no slums. I talked to the doctors and nurses at the hospital, travelled by the Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) underground system ( all the trains were air-conditioned), hopped on the buses (the bus stops were fitted with overhead fans), visited the banks .used the telephones and everything seemed -to work as efficiently as a Swiss watch. What a miracle! How did it happen?

The Republic of Singapore, which comprises of the Singapore island and fifty or so small islets is situated at the southern end of the Malay peninsula. The main island is separated from Malay peninsula to the north by the narrow Johor Strait and from Riau-Lingga archipelago (Indonesia) to the south by Singapore strait, which links the Indian Ocean to the west

with the South China Sea on the east. Modem Singapore's growth and trading prosperity are largely due to this fortunate geographical position.

Singapore's total population of approximately three million consists mainly of Chinese (app.78%). who speak Fukien and Kwangtung dialects of Chinese. Malays (14 %) and people from the sub-continent of In-dia(7 %) and Eurasians! 1%). The Malays speak Malay and the Indians speak Tamil, Hindi. Bengali. Urdu etc. English is the common language. The Chinese are either Budhists or Taoists Or Christians. The Malays are predominantly Muslims while the Indians are either Hindus or Muslims. So this is truly a multiracial and multicultural society. Has it always been so? No. Then how did an island at the lip of Malay peninsula become a predominantly Chinese city-state? How did it achieve such political stability and economic prosperity’?

The island of Singapore, whose main settlement used to be known as Tumasik in the fourteenth century was an out-fiost of the Siamese empire Ayutthaya) . Its local ruler Parmasevara declared Tu-masik's independence . was defeated by Ayutthya and as a result fled to Malacca where he founded the Malaccan kingdom with the protection of the Chinese emperor. Tumasik ( Singapore), which was at that time nothing more than a fishing village, was sacked by the Siamese army. One may wonder why Tam going so far back in time while writing about modern Singapore. Well, whatever Singapore is today. Malacca was that and much more five centuries ago. It was at that time that the Chinese immigrants started moving into various countries of Southeast Asia.

A unique geographical position. good government. Chinese imperial military protection, a liberal policy of virtual free trade converted a small fishing village into the most important trading centre in that area for merchants from far-flung places like Arabia, China. India etc. Soon Tumasik (Singapore) as indeed the whole of Malay Beninsula became part of the ialaccan empire. In early fifteenth century, the descendants of Parmasevara embraced Islam. From this time onwards. Islam became an Important factor to be reckoned with in this area because the rulers and the ruled in many countries of Southeast Asia took up the new faith with great zeal. Malacca played an important role in

spreading Islam all along the Malaccan trade routes. So far we have seen how Malacca became an important trading centre, when the Chinese settlers started moving Into the Southeast Asian peninsulas (even today Malacca’s population is predominantly Chinese) and islands and when most Malays became Muslims. But what about the European influence? When did it start? After all, Singapore looks more like a modern European city than a thousand year-old Asian Metropolis?. Its streets, parks, squares carry undeniably British names. Does this mean to saj^that the British were the first and only European colonisers of this area? No.

Looking for the spice trade the Portuguese were the first Europeans to arrive in this area. They captured Malacca in 1511. Although , it continued as a Portuguese trading post until 1641. when it was lost to the Dutch, It never recovered its earlier glory. The once powerful Malaccan empire quickly disintegrated. The British conquered Malacca in 1795 but were unable to restore its important position as a trade centre primarily because of unusual silting of the Malacca estuary, In December 1810, Sir Stamford Raffles arrived in Malacca on orders from the East India Company Governor General in India to ensure British control of the trade routes . The British and the Dutch fought for the next 14 years for military supremacy in that area .Britain's superiority was finally acknowledged in a treaty with the Dutch in 1824. Raffles was a man of vision. He wanted to find a substitute for Malacca. After several reconnaissance voyages along the straits, in January 1819. he and his assistant Major General William Farquhar (whose excellent collection of Natural History Drawings was on display at the Singapore History Museum) arrived at a fishing village called Singapore and entered into an agreement with Sultan Hussein Shah, (who was the claimant to the Johor-Riau sultanate to which Singapore belonged) for the establishment of a trading post fofthe East India Company. The rest of the story is well-known to the students of history.

Sir Stamford Raffles is definitely the founder of modern Singapore, a strategically placed sea- port which soon replaced Malacca as the most important trading centre in this area. There was so much activity that by 1823 over five thousand Chinese. Malays and Eurasians (Mixed Asian -Portuguese and mixed Asian-Dutch) had moved from

Malacca to Singapore. The Chinese. who in search of tin. were still migrating in significant numbers to Malaya provided another source of labour and entrepreneurs for Singapore. Establishment of rubber plantations all over Malaya in the late nineteenth century opened up opportunities for immigration from south India. Thousands of them started flocking into Malay, some of whom later found their way to Singapore. Foundations were thus laid for future racial tensions and conflicts both in Malaya and Singapore. Actually racial tension was at the root of the political separation between Singapore (which had obtained self-government in 1959 and had merged with Malaysia in 1963) and Malaysia in 1965 because Chinese-dominated Singapore and Malay- dominated Malaysia could not get over their mutual distrust.

The current situation seems almost unbelievable: racial tension has eased; population problem has been solved; unemployment rate has been brought under control; the economy no longer depends entirely on entrepot trade; ninety Krcent of the population has en provided with public housing; corruption in public administration is minimal and in thirty three years the GNP has gone up by twenty five times to transform a resource -poor developing country into a High-performing Asian ■ Economy. It is indeed a rerrfarkable achievement by any standard.

ft a)so provoked two questions in my mind. How did this miracle happen? Can we. in Bangladesh learn anything from this example?

I discussed the first question with my acquaintances among the resident foreigners and the local people. Almost everybody agreed that political legitimacy and political stability, (which flowed from this legitimacy) created the appropriate environment for sustained economic development. Given the lack of natural resources. Lee Kuan Yew adopted a plan to create a hospitable investment climate to attract multinational corporations from the West and Japan, to modernise the infrastructure of the country, to restrict import with a view to protecting infant industries and to initiate an export drive. The motto for the Singaporeans was simply to excel in every thing they aid. Today the industrial sector (app. 25% of the GDP) manufactures transport equipment, petroleum and electronic products and processes food. Ship-repairing, ship-building and a whole host of other small industrial activities are on the rise. Financial and business services (30% of the GDP) provided by Singapore can perfectly compete with similar services available in Tokyo, London or New York. Port facilities in Singapore are still considered as the best in the area. Transportation and communication provide more than 10% of the GDP. Wholesale and retail trade account for 16 per cent of the GDP.

Because of the scarcity of, land''arid the' Very high co s it of building, the government decided to provide pufilic hoi ising to the population and stat.- ted a crash programme to I wild high-rise apartment blocks. The plan has been so suer? ;ssful that approximately nineb / percent of the population rich v lives in public housing. I mus t confess I did not find any : jhanty towns anywhere in Sings ipore.

Minimising corrupt ion in public administration v ras the next item on the PAP (I 'eople’s Action Party) agenda. Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew decided to bring up the salarie s of the civil servants in differ* >nt categories to the level olf similar categories in the priva te sector. He said, "Pay top salaries and get *dear government or underpay them and risk the Third World disease of corruption." At the name time he also gave addition lai powers to The Anti corrupt)? on department to enforce the law. Graft has today been larg, ely flushed out of the system. 1 am convinced that Singapor e's success, to a great extent is d • ue to honest and efficient civij servants. This has also create d a healthy general climate whore cheating as a normal meth od of doing business has been eliminated.

Upon my return. from Singapore. I was asked by a friend. "Since the people of Singapore come from different ethnic, linguistic and religious backgrounds. do they n 1 least have a common religion.'?" I hesitated for a moment and then replied. “ Yes. they indeed! have a common religion and that is education." I found that almost everyone wanted t< i study. About 91 percent of the people aged 15 and over can r« :ad and write. Parents, employ* irs. unions and the government help children, employees, mei nbers and the citizens in every way possible to acquire acadeUnic education and profession al training. No wonder, accor ding to some highly respect table international agencie s, Singapore's workforce is rat? td as the best tn the world. I wa s certainly very impressed by t heir work ethic

^arjd discipline.

Singapore ha's scrapped the colohial system of promoting civil servants on the basis of seniority alone. Instead, meritocracy has been established as the major criterion for promotion and opportunities for retraining. This emphasis on efficiency is not restricted to the government servants alone. Actually it is applicable also to the politicians and the business executives.

Willingness to learn from others has been and still is one of the major strategies of the government. The idea is. first of all. identify a problem clearly. Then identify who had similar problems before. Send a team of experts to find out how that problem was solved. Invite the foreign experts to give their ideas, if need be. Finally, change or modify their ideas to suit Singapore’s circumstances.

By European standards, law and order situation seemed to be excellent during my stay in Singapore. Yet. I did not see many uniformed police. I was told later that and there were a lot of plain clothes policemen mingling with the public. Corruption in the police force has been greatly reduced by offering better pay and training. Crime rate is quite low because of tough law enforcement measures. Indeed there is a Joke which says. "Singapore is a fine city because you can get fined for everything from spitting on the pavement to dropping litter or any such minor offence".

Can we. in Bangladesh learn anything from Singapore? My short and simple answer is , "Yes". Having said that I should add that if in 1978 the Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping thought that China could learn from Singapore and as a consequence sent no less than four hundred delegations to Singapore on study missions, then surely Bangladesh can at least study (it is more than probable that it has already been done) some relevant aspects of Singapore’s economic transformation from a resource-poor developing dquntiy into a High-performing Asian Economy.