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Last night was the annual NWCDC workplan and budget presentations and lo hei.

This time they did it at Novotel at Stevens. Good central location, expensive car park and the catered food wasn’t great.

Still it very good catching up with the Mayor and other grassroots advisors and councillors.

The presentations were good and there are many new programmes planned that will be more targeted and effective in reaching out to our residents. Quite a bit of time was spent talking about Jobs Nearby, the latest CDC initiative. It is a good programme and the government is pouring lots of money and effort into this. With the finances in place, now to plan with the team and make it work well for the residents.

Last night was my first lo hei for this year. And it was on the occasion of the NWCDC Mayor’s Network session.

This time it was held at the Houne at Clark Quay and was very well attended. I saw many new and young faces with many more women represented at the grassroots level.

This event is an opportunity for the CDC to inform the grassroot leaders on what has happened last year as a form of a report card and what to expect this current year. I have to say that there is so much funding available to the grassroots to plan meaningful activities for their residents.

And there is also so much money going to support the less well off, especially those living in the rental flats by way of rations, vouchers and precooked meals. I sometimes worry that this pool will only continue to grow bigger with an ageing population and that those in this pool continue to remain dependent on such help continuing ad infinitum. There has to be a way found to break this vicious cycle of poverty and poor education.

Am now en route to Singapore. I left KLCC at 830am. I will arrive at Changi airport at about 1230pm. Home probably at about 1pm. Clearly driving is faster.

Anyway interestingly, on my way to the airport, the grab driver told me he stays in Semenyih. Without traffic he says it will take about 45 to 50 minutes to KLCC but with traffic, it can get bad. That’s because of the single lane roads there and unmanned traffic junctions. And he was very excited when he heard about the new bypass road. He wanted to know how soon it will be up and running.

But he also said that that area is a peaceful and quiet area with many malay kampongs around. I do wonder how life for people in that whole area will change after this.

This afternoon was the launch event for this new 4.3 km by pass road that will connect Semenyih, where Anyara is, to the main highways. With this connection, the travel time from Anyara to KLCC will be about 25 minutes.

This is expected to substantially increase the value of the land prices in Semenyih, much of which are malay kampongs.

The launch event, which was originally scheduled for 22 January, was well attended and KHK had clearly put in a lot of effort in preparing for this event, especially the setting up of the huge tentage for hosting the event.

The Malaysian PM, Selangor CM, Hannah Yeo, another minister in the PMO, the Chief Cabinet Secretary and several other dignatories were present.

The program started off with a malay dance performed by young children. This was then followed by a short speech by a KHK representative and then there was the PM’s speech.

With the official segment of the event over, tea then commenced in the nearby tentage. I managed to get near the PM but couldn’t get close enough to take a picture with him or get him to autograph his book.

But still I managed to meet several owners who have purchased land in Anyara. They seem very nice and I think Anyara will turn out to be a nice community.

I was just walking around KLCC at about 130pm when I realized that I was hungry and needed to eat. Surprisingly the restaurants there were all quite busy during lunch time and so I decided that I shall have the set lunch at Nobu nearby.

The service at Nobu is always good. The section where I was seated was cold and they kindly switched off the air-conditioning for that area.

They have different set lunches but I picked the one costing RM 190. The starter was the yellowtail jalapeno, main course was sashimi and sushi with a miso soup. Fresh and nice! The dessert was really good.

I am off to KL now on the 705am flight . I was actually supposed to leave yesterday but because of an unexpected event, I couldn’t go. I also couldn’t visit the Art SG, which I religiously visit every year at MBS. And I have also decided to come back a day earlier. So this is a rather short trip.

The reason I am going is because have an event in KL tomorrow, which I have been looking forward to for some time. It was originally scheduled for 22 January but it was postponed to 27 at short notice.

I am hoping that the event works out well and that this short trip is well worth the effort!

For the record, my pick up from home was a 510am, reached airport at 525am, flight at 705am, reached KL at 810am, without luggage walked out of airport at 840am, took a grab at 845am and arrived at KLCC at 10am. So it looks like driving is probably slightly faster? Even with a short coffee break, I leave home about 6 to 615am and arrive in KL at about 1015am.

I have now completed my reading of this book. I started with the oral interviews and then went back to the documents. I thought I should set out my immediate thoughts since they are still fresh in my mind.

1. Clearly the picture that now emerges is different from the narrative that has been told to Singaporeans till now. We were always told Malaysia decided to kick Singapore out of the Federation against our wishes and we had to suddenly learn to survive on our own. The truth is that from very early on Singapore wanted a looser coalition with Malaysia, which Malaysia was agreeable to, and discussions on how to implement this were at an advanced stage when they were stymied by the British and Australian leadership. Thereafter in July 1965, it was Goh, on behalf of Singapore, who suggested to Razak that the best way forward would be to have Singapore split from Malaysia. And so the idea to separate came from Singapore. Thereafter there were intense negotiations between both sides in utmost secrecy to give effect to this. Goh was the prime mover and negotiator of separation. Lee actually played did not play any role in the negotiations process. His role appears to have been limited to getting Barker to draft the separation agreements and persuading some of the reluctant Malaysian born Singapore ministers to sign the Agreement. Singapore was also the party which drafted the agreements. To their credit, the Malaysians trusted Singapore to draft these documents. So we were never thrown out. We wanted out.
2. No explanation has been offered as to why it has taken so long for the true story to be told. The existence and the contents of this file were known since the 1980s. Without that explanation, unfortunately one is therefore left to speculate.
3. Considering how vague the terms were on setting up the Federation of Malaysia, I am puzzled as why we would even have wanted to be a part of Malaysia. Singapore only controlled health and labour. The key matters of defence, internal security, finance, industrialization and taxation were all left to Malaysia. And this knowing that UMNO, which was the key member of the ruling party in Malaysia, firmly was of the view that Malaysia should be ruled by Malays. Why in the world did we even agree to such an arrangement?
4. Even after the racial riots in Singapore in 1964 and all the problems with the UMNO Ultras, Lee still never thought that Singapore could survive as an independent nation as it lacked a common market and a sizeable population and therefore had to be a part of Malaysia in some form.
5. The then Malaysian ministers were no fools. They were educated and politically savvy, perhaps not to the extent of the Singapore ministers, but they were no pushovers. And upon reading the interviews given by the Singapore ministers, it is clear that they had high regard for Tunku and some of his key ministers.
6. All the Malaysian ministers had a problem with Lee. They seemed to have been comfortable with all the other Singapore ministers.
7. When Lee’s wife said he almost had a nervous breakdown, it was not because of the worries about what would happen after separation. It was specifically because Lee was worried for Devan Nair, as he was the only PAP MP left behind in Malaysia to fend for himself.
8. It was quite clear to me, reading between the lines, that PAP saw itself as the alternative party for all the non Malays in Malaysia and wanted to replace the MCA and MIC. Which also explains why the Malaysian leadership was wary of PAP, as they could see that the PAP would be quite happy to be in a position to replace them.
9. The current DAP in Malaysia is the successor of the PAP in Malaysia. PAP had started setting up branches in Malaysia and contested the 1964 elections. After separation since the PAP could no longer operate in Malaysia, they were renamed DAP.
10. We owe a great deal to Goh. He took the lead in getting Singapore out of Malaysia. He also single handedly worked out the details of the separation with the Malaysians. They trusted him and could work with him.
11. One has to form their own conclusions as to what extent Lee and the PAP were responsible for the deterioration of relations between Singapore and Malaysia. But as the Tunku subsequently said of Lee..” the friend who had worked so hard to found Malaysia and even harder to break it up.”

A thoroughly interesting read. I do feel I learnt so much about what happened during that period but more importantly about all the people who were involved in that tumultuous 1964 to 1965 period.

Yesterday’s lunch was at Ah Yat seafood restaurant at Hotel Miramar.

Until recently I was always under the impression that the restaurant has closed for the period of the hotel refurbishment since everything is hoarded up. Till last week when the owner’s wife messaged me with their menus. Since then I have been there several times.

I was slated to meet U Zyn and his cousin, Yheu Shen, for lunch yesterday and since the restaurant was giving me a private room, I decided to host lunch there.

A simple but good lunch and the purpose of the lunch was to understand the process of building a house in Malaysia, since Yheu Shen is a Malaysian registered architect. A useful session and I told him it would be better if he saw that site for himself as it will give him a much better idea of what might be possible.

A spontaneous lunch yesterday. I wasn’t even planning to have lunch. I was just walking back from Raffles Place when Harish suggested lunch. When I came back to Marina One, Francis was there as well. A very pleasant surprise to have friends meet and share a meal, especially now when it is getting so much harder to meet.

So we had lunch at a Japanese restaurant at Level 1of Marina One. The food was decent and we chatted for about 2 hours. No topic of any significance with Francis doing most of the talking.

Last night was once again time for our ACS dinner and since it was to be hosted by Peng Tiam and he has just moved into his new house, we had our dinner at his place.

The house is very well thought through and nicely done. He had torn down the houses that were there and built 5 new houses to house his entire family of his brothers and sisters and children and grandchildren. A good way of ensuring a family stays close is by keeping them near and having regular sessions by meeting up and dining together. And he has facilitated that. Good for him.

He catered steak from Rubicon, which was nice. The garlic bread and soup were prepared inhouse, both of which were delicious. For desserts, there were 3 cakes, cherries and durians.

We did a tour of the house before starting dinner. We finished early. Somehow there wasn’t that much conversation last night. Most of it revolved around new furniture, cutlery sets, Trump and Guangzhou.

PS Victor was away and couldn’t make dinner.