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Mr Lee ‘was careful not to let personality cult grow around him’

SINGAPORE — The late Mr Lee Kuan Yew was exceptional among post-colonial leaders and other founders of countries in being very careful not to allow a personality cult to grow around him, said Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong yesterday.

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SINGAPORE — The late Mr Lee Kuan Yew was exceptional among post-colonial leaders and other founders of countries in being very careful not to allow a personality cult to grow around him, said Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong yesterday.

“Hence, you will not find portraits or busts of Mr Lee Kuan Yew all over Singapore,” said the Prime Minister, who noted these post-colonial leaders and founders were larger-than-life figures and often developed personality cults if they lasted long in office.

Mr Lee did have his portrait painted and his bust made, but he did not allow them to be displayed publicly — with only two exceptions that the Prime Minister said he knew of. After Mr Lee stepped down from the Cabinet in 2011, a bust of him made many years ago by British sculptor Sydney Harpley was displayed in Parliament House.

Another bust of him, made by French sculptor Nacera Kainou, is being placed at the Lee Kuan Yew Centre for Innovative Cities at the Singapore University of Technology and Design, with Mr Lee’s permission.

This bust was presented by the Lyon-Singapore Association as a gift to the Republic in 2013, as a token of friendship between the people of France and Singapore.

Mr Lee was also very careful when it came to lending his name to institutions and awards, said the Prime Minister. “When he consented, it was for causes that he was passionate about and where using his name served a greater purpose,” he said. “He was intent on showing his support for the cause or institution, rather than using the honour to glorify himself.”

For example, on Mr Lee’s 80th birthday, he agreed that the National University of Singapore should create the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy.

“The Cabinet had discussed this carefully and convinced him that having such a school and associating his name with it would help establish the Singapore brand of governance and advance the school’s mission to raise standards of governance in Asia, improve the lives of people and contribute to the transformation of the region,” said the Prime Minister.

For the same reason, Mr Lee supported Nanyang Technological University’s move to name its school of international studies after S Rajaratnam and the Singapore Armed Forces’ naming of its command and staff college after Goh Keng Swee. Rajaratnam and Goh were among the Old Guard led by Mr Lee in the Republic’s fledgling years.

The Prime Minister also cited the Lee Kuan Yew Water Prize and various other education awards in his name. The water prize honours contributions towards solving the world’s water challenges, because water was a lifelong obsession of Mr Lee, said the Prime Minister.

The education awards were intended to encourage students at all levels and of all abilities to strive for all-round excellence.

“One of his recent contributions to education for awards was the Lee Kuan Yew Fund for Bilingualism and this focuses on mother tongue learning,” the Prime Minister said.

“He paid close attention to this issue all his life, not just as a policy matter, but as someone who learnt Mandarin the hard way as an adult and kept up the effort till his last days.”

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