Though Lee was referring to Goh, he had echoed the same questions many Singaporeans at the time held about their new and relatively fresh-faced leader, who came with the added proverbial burden of birth as the scion of the country’s founding father.
In the last two decades since, though Lee, in making his mark as his own man, had steered Singapore through some of its toughest hurdles such as the Covid-19 pandemic and 2008-09 financial crisis, part of his legacy remains tied to his larger-than-life family, observers say.
Throughout his prime minister tenure, the Lees had encountered accusations of nepotism, the most notable of which included a New York Times writer who was sued and had to pay S$160,000 for including the two men in a 2010 list of Asian political dynasties.
“I don’t think that he will ever be able to escape being his father’s son – which of us can?” said Rebecca Grace Tan, a political science lecturer at the National University of Singapore (NUS).
“But my sense is that many Singaporeans will appreciate what he has done for Singapore, especially in the context of the various crises that he led Singapore through.”
Lee had a long apprenticeship before taking on the nation’s top job in 2004. He joined politics in 1984, a young widower then. Still, in those early years as prime minister, people compared him with the elder Lee.
In 2011 after a “watershed” election in which the long-ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) won its lowest-ever ratings with just 60 per cent of the popular vote, Lee Kuan Yew, then in a minister mentor role, announced his retirement from politics and called for “a fresh clean slate” with a team of younger ministers that could better connect and engage with a younger generation of Singaporeans.
Fast forward to the May Day Rally in 2024, with a visibly weary Lee Hsien Loong looking every bit his 72 years as he emotionally took stock of his report card in a final official speech before the May 15 handover of power to successor Lawrence Wong, it would be safe to say Lee was leaving the nation in a much better state than when he took the reins.
For starters, Singapore’s gross domestic product surged from S$194 billion (US$142 billion) in that year to more than S$600 billion (US$439 billion) last year.
The median gross monthly income of Singapore residents has also more than doubled from some S$2,300 to S$5,100, while the Gini coefficient – a measurement of inequality – after government transfers and taxes dipped from 0.42 to 0.37.
Under Lee’s leadership, Singapore also transformed from a trading and manufacturing port into an innovation and entrepreneurship hub, which led the compact city state to establish itself as a centre for start-ups and tech.
On the social front, Lee’s administration also repealed the controversial law criminalising gay sex in 2022, even as critics said it was lugubriously slow to do so, and introduced major reforms in the republic’s education system.
He had attempted to strike a different approach to governance during the course of his leadership, noted Terence Lee, a politics and communications professor at the Sheridan Institute of Higher Education.
02:30
Singapore to scrap anti-gay sex law, but upholds ban on same-sex marriage
Singapore to scrap anti-gay sex law, but upholds ban on same-sex marriage
He recalled when Lee at a lunchtime rally in 2011 apologised for several slip-ups, acknowledging that the government could have acted more swiftly to address issues in housing and transport, which emerged as hot-button issues during the general election.
“He issued a national apology at the 2011 general election when the spectre of losing Aljunied GRC loomed, promising to listen better. That’s something Lee Kuan Yew wouldn’t ever do. He probably raised the ire of Lee Kuan Yew in doing so, especially since PAP ended up losing Aljunied after all,” Terence Lee said, referring to a key battleground constituency.
Lee Hsien Loong had also officially appointed Workers’ Party chief Pritam Singh as Leader of the Opposition, a tactical yet significant gesture his father would have been loathed to contemplate, the analyst added.
Family matters
Against the backdrop of his journey to becoming a polished politician – and his admirers say, the most popular from his party – his family loomed large. His wife, Ho Ching, is very active on social media commenting on anything from Singapore’s economic development to social causes. She served as the executive director of state investment company Temasek Holdings for 17 years and is now chairwoman of Temasek Trust, its philanthropic arm.
Lee’s now-estranged younger brother Lee Hsien Yang joined a young but ambitious opposition party, following a very public spat in 2017 over the fate of their late parents’ bungalow that was their childhood home.
In 2017, Lee’s younger siblings, Lee Hsien Yang and Lee Wei Ling, publicly accused the prime minister of abusing his powers to prevent them from demolishing the family home in Oxley Road upon their father’s death – one of the patriarch’s final wishes expressed in his seventh and final will.
The falling-out grabbed the attention of some of the largest global newspapers and dominated conversations in the city state for months.
Lee rejected claims from his siblings that he exploited his father’s legacy for his own political gain, and described the accusations as “entirely baseless” during a parliamentary sitting in July 2017.
Most recently, Lee Hsien Yang was ordered to pay damages to two cabinet ministers over a Facebook post that they claimed was defamatory.
But the Oxley Road saga may just be the “greatest stain on Lee Hsien Loong’s premiership”, especially since it exploded just two years after “the most significant contemporary event in Singapore’s history: Lee Kuan Yew’s death”, said analyst Terence Lee.
“The public nature of the Lee family’s quarrels is a shameful episode of Lee Hsien Loong’s reign, and should never have been allowed to consume parliamentary energies and time. This had the effect of equating the Lee family with Singapore, the nation, which gave bad press to Singapore overall, and uninspiring political education for Singaporeans.”
In a recent interview with national broadsheet The Straits Times, senior minister Teo Chee Hean cited the saga as “very difficult” for Lee.
“I’ve known him for a very long time and he was able to separate the personal from what is right for the country. And so he recused himself. He asked me to oversee the matter,” said Teo, referring to the ministerial committee formed to look into what to do with the colonial bungalow.
Nydia Ngiow, managing director of BowerGroupAsia in Singapore, told This Week in Asia that such knotty issues never weighed too heavily on Lee’s prime minister tenure, pointing out Lee shared similar traits and work ethic with his father.
“Similar to his father, it is clear that he had always prioritised Singapore above all else. By the time he was diagnosed with lymphoma in 1992, he had played a big role as the trade and industry minister in convincing foreign businesses to invest in Singapore,” Ngiow said.
“Even when he was undergoing treatment, he continued to work as deputy prime minister and economic adviser to then-PM Goh Chok Tong, although he had given up the trade and industry ministerial portfolio.”
In terms of work ethic and personal qualities, Lee “is his father’s son”, said Graham Allison, who had been Lee’s adviser at the Harvard Kennedy School back when he was a student.
“My memory of him, from the first encounters through many conversations while he was a student here, and continuing conversations every year or two since, has been of a powerful mind that has a very sharp analytic focus,” he said in a Straits Times interview.
“Moreover, like his father, he has had a relentless focus on performance, doing whatever was required to make Singapore everything it can be.”
Political observers noted that the family name was ultimately a double-edged sword for Lee.
“Living under the shadow of Lee Kuan Yew, who is widely feted as ‘founding father’ and the original writer of the ‘Singapore story’ is an impossible role. At the same time, the authority he has because of his ‘pedigree’ gave him some licence and autonomy to make radical changes,” Terence Lee said.
One example of this was a decision to create integrated resorts and introduce casinos, which Lee pushed through despite his father having previously denounced gambling and casinos as a vice Singapore would avoid for moral reasons, according to the analyst.
The younger Lee had also departed from previous administrations’ “minimalist approach to welfare”, Ngiow pointed out.
He and his team recognised the need for such an approach as income inequality had widened as the economy grew.
“Compared to his predecessors, Lee placed even greater emphasis on social policies and inclusivity as he took on the task of fostering an open and inclusive society.
“As a young nation, Singapore started out with a ‘minimalist’ approach to welfare given its strong focus on self-reliance, but as Singapore continued its focus on economic growth, the country was able to progress financial packages to support each generation of Singaporeans,” she said.
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Singapore’s Lee Hsien Loong will hand over power to deputy Lawrence Wong on May 15
Singapore’s Lee Hsien Loong will hand over power to deputy Lawrence Wong on May 15
‘Nobody will blame Lawrence’
Ngiow noted Lee had seen the country through many historical crises, most notably the choppy economic waters of the 1980s, the global financial crisis in 2008 and through the ever-tricker geopolitical landscape of Southeast Asia amid the US-China power struggle.
“He ably handled Singapore’s foreign affairs, highlighting Singapore’s commitment to a rules-based economic and security order. This allowed Singapore to be more equipped with balancing US-China tensions, allowing it to have trade arrangements and military agreements with both countries,” she said.
Studies had shown that Lee was among some of the most admired men in the country, Ngiow noted, adding that he continued to score well in general elections, with 71 per cent of the votes in the last 2020 polls.
Tan from NUS said: “I think that many of these [Lee family] quarrels, while providing plenty of fodder for commentaries both in mainstream and social media, did not have a significant effect on his tenure.”
But, even after his departure as head of state, Lee may still continue to bear the cross for Singapore’s performance, according to political scientist Bilveer Singh.
“I don’t think Singaporeans have made up their minds about Lawrence Wong yet. It might take up to five years before they decide if he is fit to be prime minister. Just because the PAP points their fingers at someone and names him the anointed leader, it doesn’t make him one to the public,” he said.
Though Lee might be relinquishing his title as prime minister, his role in politics was still far from over, Singh said, noting Wong’s shorter-than-usual runway and delayed handover timeline could prompt citizens to point their fingers at Lee if things went south.
“Lee Hsien Loong said that he will be around [as senior minister even after stepping down]. If anything goes wrong, nobody will blame Lawrence, they’ll blame Lee Hsien Loong.”
He may have been Lee Kuan Yew’s son, inheriting the privilege and perils of such pedigree. But Lee Hsien Loong’s own legacy is still a work in progress.