By Mohamed Heebaan

Unlike the leaders of the western world almost all of whom are in the grip of the lobbyists, and the leaders of the developing countries who are mostly corrupt and incompetent, Lee Kuan Yew, the late Singaporean statesman was truly unique. He was visionary, decisive and very independent. Independent decision making, by the way, is the sine qua non of any leadership, without which there is really much of leadership to talk about. There are many examples of Mr. Lee’s independent decision making, but my favorite is the story of a young American named Michael Faye.

In the mid-1990s, Michael Faye vandalized some cars parked near a hotel in Singapore .The Singapore government, which takes any mischief of that kind very seriously, tried the teenager and sentenced him to 4 months in prison, and four lashes of corporal punishment. Then America literally and figuratively hit the roof! From New York Times, to Washington Post, from the President to the Congress and the Senate, the trial was condemned as savage, uncivilized and the Singapore government was demanded to back down and reverse the decision. Even president Clinton publicly appealed to the Singapore government on live TV, that the charges of caning be commuted to jail time. But despite all the pressure from media, from the influential Americans, and from the president himself, the Singapore government and its leaders stuck to their guns and refused to budge!

There is an important lesson here. Obviously, vandalizing cars is a minor incident. And confronting a powerful nation carries its own risks. Thus the Singapore government could have avoided all the negative publicity and the public quarrel with the most powerful nation on earth if it solved the matter quietly behind the scenes, commuting the caning into jail time, or letting the boy go home. But Singapore leaders did not do that. And the question is Why not?

The main reason was that Mr. Lee Kuan Yew and Singaporean leaders knew that in politics, as in life, all things are inter-connected. And if the Singaporeans do not defend the law of their country, and do not apply justice equally to the Americans just as they do to the citizens of the third world countries, they would lose credibility; but more importantly, they would end up opening Pandora’s box. That is, if they let the American teenager get away with vandalizing cars simply because he is an American, the next day Singapore would be forced to the let the American drug dealers get away with their crimes for the same reasons; and pretty soon they would be forced to let some American thugs to get away with murder because they Americans. Any country that travels down that road, needless to say, is doomed. Mr. Lee and his colleagues spent almost half a century of a hard work and created one of true wonders of this world in terms of stability, development and prosperity. Thus it is only natural that Mr. Lee and his colleagues were so determined not to squander their enormous achievements for the sake of an American teenager, or for anyone else.

From this story, we see the Singaporean leaders have done two things:

1) They did not discriminate against the American teenager. Rather he was given a fair trial, and treated like everybody else in the eyes of the Singaporean justice. But the American elites were not complaining about discrimination, they wanted preferential treatment!(I say the American elites because it was revealed later on that many ordinary Americans obviously tired of juvenile crimes have sided with the Singapore government, and expressed that in the many letters they reportedly wrote to the Singapore embassy.)

2) And when the US government pressured Singapore to drop the charges or commute them, the Singaporean leaders rejected it, and stuck to their guns!

In the Arab world and in the most Muslim countries we do things differently:

1) We treat the Americans, the British and the people from wealthy countries differently than we treat the people from poor countries; even though doing so is against Islamic law, and against every other law.

2) If it ever happens that some people from wealthy Western countries commit crimes in the Arab countries, or in the most of Muslim countries, they are usually charged according to the law of the land. But as soon as the leaders of western countries intervene on their citizens behalf, our leaders either drop the charges altogether, or commute them to a lesser punishment! And how do Arab and Muslim leaders treat the people from Arab, Muslim or the third world countries? Well, they give them the worst punishment possible.

Now compare how Singaporean leaders defend their laws, and thereby build their credibility; And how our leaders skew and trample on the laws of their lands, and thereby tarnish their own reputation. However, the most important point to be underlined here is that what works for Mr. Lee Kwan Yew and Singaporean leaders will work for any leader who applies them! Any country and any leader that treats all criminals, regardless of their nationality, equally before the law, and rejects any intervention to the decisions made by the courts of his country will be respected and admired universally, just as people throughout the world admire and respect Mr. Lee Kwan Yew! (Dr. Mahathir Mohamed of Malaysia, for instance, had done that in Malaysia.  And that is why he is admired throughout the Muslim world and as respected as any other leader throughout the world).

My favorite quote of Lee Kuan Yew is the one he reflected upon the discrimination and the racism that he faced in Britain when he was a young man studying there. He said, “When young people of London called me Chinaman or chink, it never troubled me. If they meant abuse, it was my business to make them think differently one day.”

His unparalleled, unrivaled success made not only the people in London but the entire humanity think about him and his people differently. His vision, tenacity and his monumental achievements will forever inspire anyone capable of being inspired.

In sum, the secrets of successful leadership are just like math and science: they don’t belong to the inventor. They are credit to humanity!

Mohamed Heebaan
Email:mohamed19456@hotmail.com