Singapore sting

Singapore sting

President Abdurrahman Wahid may have his personal reasons for
making such stinging attacks on Singapore at the weekend, but he
could have put them less bluntly and more diplomatically to avoid
undermining ties between the two countries. Instead, he may have
done some irreparable damage to existing bilateral relations
which have been built and nurtured for over three decades.

Some of his remarks, such as his suggestion that Indonesia
gang up with Malaysia to punish Singapore by cutting its water
supplies, were totally uncalled for. Others, like his accusation
that Singapore "has underestimated the Malays" were in no wise
sufficiently substantiated so as to be taken seriously. He may
have been offended by the failure of the summit of ASEAN plus
three (Japan, China and South Korea) to address the problems of
developing countries, but that in itself was no excuse for him to
hurl insults at Singapore, who, after all, was playing host to a
meeting whose agenda was worked out by the participants,
including Indonesia.

Going by the President's remarks which he made before the
Indonesian community in Singapore on Saturday, he appeared to be
most irritated by his encounter with Singapore Senior Minister
Lee Kuan Yew earlier in the week, and not by the summit. The
President recalled how the elderly statesman had turned down his
proposal to bring East Timor and Papua New Guinea into the ASEAN
fold. But what really riled him the most was Lee's recent public
remarks that he thought the President would soon resign.

Senior Minister Lee, whom Abdurrahman has named among his
impressive board of international advisors, has somehow touched a
sufficiently raw nerve for the President to launch such a crude
tirade. This is an abrupt change from the way Abdurrahman has
treated Singapore since the early days of his presidency.

President Abdurrahman made Singapore his first overseas stop
shortly after his election to the presidency in October 1999. He
has met Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong and Senior Minister Lee Kuan
Yew on several occasions. One would have thought that their
relations would be warm and cordial by now so that every problem
could be addressed one at a time by them.

Admittedly, Abdurrahman's tireless campaign to woo Singaporean
investors to Indonesia has not paid dividends. The administration
had assumed that once Singaporeans start investing in Indonesia,
the rest of the world would follow. This is attaching too much
hope and importance to the role that Singapore could play in his
economic strategy, certainly more so than the Singaporeans could
ever hope to deliver. Singapore was never counted as being among
the largest sources of foreign investment in Indonesia.

With most investors, Singaporeans or anyone else for that
matter, sitting on the sidelines waiting for the return of some
semblance of stability in Indonesia, the President has come under
attack at home. His claims that his extensive foreign trips were
needed to bolster investor confidence have started to ring hollow
and make him prey to criticisms. Undoubtedly, this lack of
foreign investment, particularly from Singapore, influenced the
President in making his scathing attacks at the weekend.

What is not clear is where the relationship between the two
countries is headed after this episode. We would like to think
that this was simply another one of the President's emotional
outbursts, something which he is now famous for, and does not
hail a new approach in the way Indonesia deals with Singapore.

Neither country can afford to let relations deteriorate. The
experience of the last three decades has shown that the two
countries have mutually profited from building harmonious
relations. Precisely because of the warm and close ties which we
have enjoyed, leaders of both countries, particularly President
Wahid and Senior Minister Lee, must show greater sensitivity and
exercise caution when commenting on the state of affairs of the
other country.