SPEECH BY MR THARMAN SHANMUGARATNAM, MINISTER FOR EDUCATION, AT HARMONYWORKS! CONFERENCE 2005 ON TUESDAY, 22 NOVEMBER 2005, 9.00 A.M. AT JURONG JUNIOR COLLEGE

SPEECH BY MR THARMAN SHANMUGARATNAM, MINISTER FOR EDUCATION, AT HARMONYWORKS! CONFERENCE 2005 ON TUESDAY, 22 NOVEMBER 2005, 9.00 A.M. AT JURONG JUNIOR COLLEGE

Mr Zainudin Nordin,

Chairman, Central Singapore Joint Social Service Centre,

Members of the Central Singapore JSSC Management Committee,

Mr Steven Koh,

Principal, Jurong Junior College,

Distinguished speakers,

Students,

Good morning.

I am delighted to be here this morning. I was glad to know that we have an especially diverse group of young participants among the nearly 600 or so who are involved in this year’s HarmonyWorks! Conference. Besides students from our schools and post-secondary institutions, we have some 40 plus students from madrasahs and international schools. It’s an indication that the HarmonyWorks! brand of seminars and workshops is breaking new ground in reaching youth of all backgrounds and experiences.

Making Diversity an Advantage

2. Our young are the key to continued peace and harmony in Singapore. The values of multiracialism that they learn and practise in school, and in the community, are critical in securing Singapore’s future. They are how we prevent racial intolerance and strife, such as what we experienced in our own history and see elsewhere in the world.

3. But multiracialism is not just a defensive set of beliefs. It is also how we secure a bright future for Singapore, as a diverse society and global city, open to people from all over Asia and the world. Diversity is a strategic advantage for Singapore, not just a source of potential cleavages or frictions. It is how we distinguish ourselves from most other Asian cities, and what attracts people to Singapore.

4. For the generations of young Singaporeans now going through our schools, for whom the racial riots four decades ago are learnt through textbooks and accounts handed down from earlier generations, there is always a vivid, real-time reminder in the world around us.

5. Following the deaths of two French teenagers of ethnic minority descent on Oct 27^th, thousands of disaffected youth in France have taken to the streets, torching some 6,000 vehicles in nearly 300 towns. The French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin has been forced to declare a state of emergency, invoking a 1955 law that allows a curfew to be imposed in troubled areas.

6. Roger Cohen, a journalist writing for International Herald Tribune[1] drew comparison between France and Singapore in a recent commentary on the French unrest. He noted that the two countries have significant ethnic minorities, but pointed out the differences in our approaches to integrating ethnic minorities, which have made the difference. Both countries embrace secularism. Both countries also pride themselves on meritocracy. The difference is that policies in Singapore have prevented ethnic segregation of the type seen in France from forming here, and has actively encouraged and spurred the minorities to do well in education and get good jobs. In France’s ethnic ghettoes, youth are scarcely encouraged to apply for jobs at all.

7. We have avoided the segregated ghettoes seen in France and several other countries. But we do not get multiracialism by that virtue alone. We have to work at multiracialism continually, in our integrated schools and neighbourhoods, in the media, and in all spheres of public life. When we say ‘HarmonyWorks!’ in this conference, I think we not only mean that Harmony works in Singapore, but that it is itself work. We work at it. We try, in each generation, to make diversity as an advantage for Singapore, not a source of vulnerability. And we try to entrench the gains we make in each generation, and expand the common space that all communities share in Singapore - in our schools and in the community. That way, the next generation doesn’t start off from a blank sheet of paper. Each generation must start off on a stronger foundation of understanding and shared experience.

DEEPENING MULTI-RACIALISM

8. The Government is committed to ensuring that every Singaporean has the opportunity to realise his full promise in life, regardless of race, language or religion. And to providing, through our housing policies and schools, ample opportunity for Singaporeans to grow up together, live together and play together.

9. We will guard the common spaces, in our schools and neighbourhoods, that are essential for a multiracial and multireligious society to work. We will also continue to respond firmly to any attempt to stir up racial or religious discord. But multiracialism is not just a matter of having the right policies, whether in education or housing. It is not just Government policies that makes us a multiracial society.

10. Multiracialism only comes about when each generation takes advantage of the common spaces in our schools and communities, to interact with each other, develop a sense of comfort and friendships with each other. Multiracialism has to be experienced first hand, to be real and deep in the collective psyche of each new generation of Singaporeans.

11. Our schools today start off on a very different footing from where we were just a few decades ago. It is a real achievement that we have all our students in the same schools, in the same classes, not feeling any great discomfort with each other. Our schools also give students a good basic understanding of our different cultures, and respect for each of our culture, through the curriculum that we teach and the informal events like Racial Harmony Day that all students participate in.

12. It is a good foundation for us to build on. We can and must do more to foster multiracialism, and our schools are keen to do so. We have to do more, beyond inculcating an understanding and respect for our diverse cultures. We have to provide more opportunities for our students to intermingle more often and more freely, to go through common experiences outside the classroom, and to find themselves developing the natural friendships that come from doing things together and taking on challenges together as they grow up. We can deepen the experience of multiracialism as children go through their school years, and that way make us more assured of the strengths that come from Singapore’s diversity.

Using CCA

13. How do we provide more opportunities for students of different races to mix with each other? In all my conversations with school leaders, CCA comes up as a major opportunity. We can do a lot more to exploit the potential of CCA.

14. If we leave things alone, a number of our CCAs will end up in ethnic moulds. For example, we all know that our school football and sepak takraw teams have a strong representation of Malay youth, and that basketball and volleyball is very largely Chinese. After a while, people think it quite natural that the majority of footballers are Malay and some 95% of basketball players Chinese, and the moulds reproduce themselves.

15. But anyone following the sports scene in China will know that football is one of the most popular sports among young people there. Now even hockey is catching on in China and it is making its mark in Asian competitions.

16. Basketball and volleyball are played by a large number of nationalities around the world. They are not Chinese sports. On a visit to India recently, I found that basketball and volleyball were amongst the most popular sports even in Indian schools. Cricket is of course the national passion in India, but most schools did not have their own facilities for cricket. So the students play basketball and volleyball and take it very seriously as a competitive sport.

17. And sepak takraw a Malay sport? Sepak takraw is now a hit in Tamil Nadu and several other Indian states, as it is in Vietnam. I met a group of students in Chennai during a visit a few months ago. They were totally dedicated, practising sepak takraw in school several days a week, late into the evenings.

18. So the ethnic moulds that we see in CCAs in our schools cannot be a given. We must encourage more students to break the mould in CCAs.

19. There’s nothing like a sport or a dance group to breed friendships amongst students of different backgrounds, nothing like sweating it out a few days a week through the year together, winning or losing together in competitions, and shedding tears of joy or pain together. And nothing like the memories we have when adults, of friendships formed on the playing field when young.

20. Some people put a finger on the fact that we have foreign coaches and instructors who do not speak English, to explain why we do not see many non-Chinese playing basketball or volleyball for example. But should we see it as an opportunity or an obstacle? Why not pick up a bit of language through CCA? It is not so difficult to pick up a coach’s instructions on the court – and not so difficult for the rest of a team or dance troupe to help with translation.

21. Zaobao recently featured a boy who saw the opportunity, and not the obstacle. Hariharan Subramaniam plays volleyball for Nanyang Junior College, and has helped his school clinch the top spot for the ‘A’ Division National Volleyball Competition for the past two years. He’s been playing for the Combined Schools team since Sec 2, is completely at ease and confident amongst his Chinese peers. Hariharan has never attended any Chinese lessons, nor does he read or write in Chinese. But because of his interactions with his coach from China and his teammates from the age of 14, he understands and speaks Mandarin well. That is his reward.

22. When I visited Kheng Cheng Primary last Saturday for the opening of their new school building, I learnt that their Malay students are settling in well. The school started taking Malay students in two years ago when they began offering Malay as second language. Basketball is Kheng Cheng’s niche. The Malay boys are in Primary 2 now, and are playing basketball with their friends during recess as eagerly as any Chinese boy. Over at Kranji Primary School, the basketball club is now about 40 per cent non-Chinese. These schools are starting the kids off young - getting them into CCAs together when they are young so that the stereotypes do not even get a chance to set in.

23. The friendships develop naturally. Let me give you another example, of three girls from Queensway Secondary School, Chia Ming, Haryani and Shahira. They were part of the school’s Girls Soccer Team which emerged as Champions in the 2004 Football Association of Singapore National Girls’ Soccer Tournament. I am told that Chia Ming, Haryani and Shahira have become the best of friends over the past 3 years. Besides studying and playing soccer together, the girls also celebrate each others’ cultural and religious festivals without fail.

24. We can do likewise in other CCAs like the performing arts. Pasir Ris Secondary’s Chinese Orchestra includes 7 Malay students. The orchestra did well at the Singapore Youth Festival (SYF) Central Judging this year, getting a silver. I was also glad to see that Gamelan, which used to have only Malay students participating at the SYF Central Judging, had many non-Malays join in during this year’s SYF.

25. Some schools have combined their dance groups, instead of having Chinese, Malay, Indian and International dance groups as most schools do. The Dance Club at Zhenghua Secondary is an example. Its members learn all the four categories of dance. The school found that it increases their understanding of the cultural uniqueness of each kind of dance. It was not at the expense of quality either. At the SYF Central Judging of Dance in April this year, the school received the highest award – Gold with Honours, for the Malay dance category. It was performed by 26 Zhenghua students – 16 Chinese, and 10 Malay.

26. Another example worth recounting. NJC has a Malay Dance Society. They too won Gold with Honours at the SYF this year for Malay Dance. But 16 of its 23 dancers were non-Malay. One of the judges shared how impressed she was to see the non-Malays perform with such feeling and intensity. I met the President of the Society, Lukman Akasyah, recently. He told me that none of the dancers had any previous experience in dancing before they joined the society. How did they do so well? They had wonderful team spirit, a team spirit formed as they went through exhausting training and shared trials together. But it wasn’t just the SYF Gold with Honours that they gained. Lukman told me how the students got to understand each other’s cultures better and even the languages. Through the regular meals and breaks together, the outings, the visits to each others’ homes, they got to speaking to each other freely in each others’ languages. Lukman now speaks conversational Chinese with ease. His Chinese friends in the dance troupe picked up Malay.

27. There are other ways in which schools can find ways to help students experience multiracialism through first hand interactions. Students at Hwa Chong Institution for example have taken the initiative to involve themselves with students of different races in other schools. Their Boys’ and Girls’ Soccer Teams, for example, have been conducting camps with Primary 4 pupils of neighbouring schools as part of their service-learning project. Students at the secondary level of HCI are doing reading sessions every week with young children of different races.

28. Each of these schools and examples I have cited show what is possible, to deepen the experience of multiracialism as children grow up. Our schools will try many ways. But there is no quick fix. We cannot contrive multiracialism, or require every CCA to have a perfect mix of races. But we can provide opportunity in schools, and encourage more students to get involved in activities which bring them together with their peers of other races. Our parents should support our schools in this, by encouraging their children to make the choices that allow them to develop the friendships across race and religion that you can really form as you grow up in Singapore. Like Chia Ying, Haryani and Shahira have done, and like Lukman and his fellow dancers.

CONCLUSION

29. To conclude, let me once again commend CSJSS for organising this conference. I look forward to seeing more activities under the HarmonyWorks! banner reaching out to our youth, and making an impact on the way they immerse themselves in Singapore’s cultural and religious diversity. I wish all the participants at today’s conference a fruitful and fun time.

[1] “Why Singapore hums as riots sweep France” by Roger Cohen, International Herald Tribune, 9 Nov 2005.