The bombshell of a public denunciation made early this morning by the siblings of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong prompted Singaporeans to pull up their chairs, whip out some popcorn and watch as the highfalutin’ elite family drama unfold.
You can read Dr Lee Wei Ling and Lee Hsien Yang’s public statement against their brother in its full six-page glory here. TL;DR: The siblings allege that the dear brother is misusing his power to ensure that their father’s house at 38 Oxley Road remains preserved (against the wishes of Lee Kuan Yew himself) because PM Lee wants to milk their father’s legacy.
In the statement, Lee Hsien Yang — chairman of the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore — stated that it’s come to a point where he feels the urgent need to emigrate.
“It is with a very heavy heart that I will leave Singapore for the foreseeable future. This is the country that my father, Lee Kuan Yew, loved and built. It has been home for my entire life,” Hsien Yang was quoted as saying.
“Singapore is and remains my country. I have no desire to leave. Hsien Loong is the only reason for my departure.”
Sounds like a simple statement simply exaggerated to highlight the impact of PM Lee’s alleged shenanigans — he doesn’t really mean it does he? Apparently, he does, according to his wife, Lee Suet Fern. Speaking to The Straits Times, she noted that her family is already in the midst of making plans to leave the country.
Though she hasn’t made clear where exactly they’ll be heading or when they’ll up and leave, their tiff with PM Lee seems bad enough for them to seriously consider relocating to another country.
“I have a long record of public service. It is heart-wrenching for me to leave this country,” Hsien Yang told the Financial Times. “It’s not something I would do lightly, if I didn’t have reasons to do it”.
Their son, Harvard junior fellow Dr Li Shengwu, backed up his dad’s statement on Facebook as well, proving just how deep the family troubles have gone.
“In the last few years, my immediate family has become increasingly worried about the lack of checks on abuse of power,” Dr Li wrote. “The situation is now such that my parents have made plans to relocate to another country, a painful decision that they have not made lightly.”
Now of course, these are all simply accusations — it’s all just a case of they-said-he-said. PM Lee (who’s currently on leave with his family) has already denied everything and expressed his sadness and disappointment with his sibling’s actions. But you gotta admit, it is kind of concerning when such a public airing of dirty laundry about the country’s most powerful family actually transpired. If the younger brother of the country’s prime minister is already making plans to jump ship over an alleged “abuse of power”, shouldn’t we rando normies be a wee bit worried too?
