The Grand Master of Singapore

One of the most interesting piece of news for this week must be the new title our ex-senior minister would be using after his beloved son took over the helm of governance and begin a "new dynasty... er.. I mean democracy" (To quote a line in the excellent cabaret "Revenge of the Dim Sum Dollies".)

Mr. Brown in his weekly satire column in yesterday's "Today" paper commented that at least the people who came up with the title had the sense to avoid the more imaginative names like: RSM: Really Senior Minister, SSM: Super Senior Minister, Overlord, Head of the Jedi Council or The One. Oh well, commendable.... but is the title so very important?

First let us think a bit deeper on why "Minister Mentor" (or is it Mentor Minister?? I have difficulties remembering the sequence for as a typical Singaporean, I have already shortened the whole title to read as MM following the practice of SM for Senior Minister) is not such a good idea after all too. For a start imagine how the abbreviation would look like, MM Lee?? Well, I don't know what you think, but the first thing that came to my mind is the M&M chocolate, hardly the thing you would want to be associated with our respectable "father of Singapore" right? Another issue is that the title is simply awkward, not many people would think that you still need someone to teach you what to do when you are already a minister of a country, after all, aren't you supposed to be a leader or something? I wonder if it means that the rest of the ministers are supposed to bow to MM Lee in the Chinese greeting of a teacher. Since the term Senior Minister already implies a kind of advisor to the government, I suppose the Minister Mentor would be the equivalent of the Grand Teacher of a pugilistic sect, the teacher of the teacher of the sect, you know, the grandfatherly old guy with a long white beard who resides at the top of the mountain meditating but who if provoked can blast you to smithereens with his Buddha Palm. Sounds a bit like Gordon Lau of "Kill Bill"? Yes, you got it. That is the second image conjured by the title of "Minister Mentor".

Alright, I sound like some smart aleck who think he has a better title in mind. Ok, honestly the fact is, I can't think of any better title and if I might be a bit egoistic, perhaps there really is no suitable title that would not raise some eyebrows. The question we should ask is: why do we need a separate title for LKY? So that there would not be 2 senior ministers and hence causing him to lose his status since he won't be unique anymore? Given the kind of respect he already commands and his international fame (the LKY brand is more famous than the Singapore brand overseas) he doesn't need any special title. Deng Xiaoping never did add any title on himself after his "retirement", he is just Deng Xiaoping and that name itself signifies power. Although the media always described him as "paramount leader Deng Xiaoping" in news report, that was never his official title. This therefore avoided the awkwardness of trying to force a title on him. I wonder if in the years to come Singapore would come to evolve a progressive title structure for prime ministers who retire but still continue to remain in the cabinet so that you have something like the following, Prime Minister, Senior Minister, Minister Mentor, Senior Minister Mentor, Grand Minister and so on and so forth. That should probably earn us a new Guiness Record, of the having the most number of ministerial titles

Whatever is the case, the dust has already settled and I guess Singaporeans would have to get used to MM Lee one way or another. Fortunately, Singaporeans are really adaptable and they have a short memory to go with it. I vaguely remembered that when LKY first took on the title of Senior Minister hence becoming SM Lee, there were a few rude jokes that SM = Sex Maniac, but after a decade plus of associating SM and LKY together, the "SM" concept already had a complete make-over so that the mere mention of the 2 alphabets together must cause people to tremble instead of snigger. Thus I am optimistic that in a few years time, I would stop associating MM with the chocolate....