People are generally concerned about the two election activities in 2024, one is the election of the leader of the Taiwan region, Lai Qingde, who is known as a "pragmatic Taiwan independence worker", comes to power, and the other is the US election, which understands that Wang Trump may make a comeback.
These two elections will undoubtedly bring great uncertainty to the international community, but people seem to be ignoring Southeast Asia, which also faces a change of leadership this year.
That country is Singapore.
Singapore's Prime Minister's Office announced on the 15th that Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong will resign on May 15. He will formally propose to the President that Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Lawrence Wong be the new Prime Minister.
This means that Singapore is about to start its fourth prime minister since Lee Kuan Yew, Goh Chok Tong and Lee Hsien Loong, and the 50-year-old Lawrence Wong will also be the second leader outside the Lee family in the nearly 60 years since the city-state was founded.
Singapore's founding Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew's People's Action Party (PAP) has been in power since it became an independent country in 1965.
Who is Huang Xuncai
Born in 1972, Lawrence Wong returned to China in 1997 after graduating with a master's degree in economics from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and joined the civil service in Singapore when the Asian financial crisis hit.
In 2005, Lawrence Wong was favored by Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and served as the Prime Minister's Principal Private Secretary for three years.
In 2011, Lee Hsien Loong was encouraged to enter politics and was elected as a Member of Parliament, having served in Singapore's Defence, Communications & Journalism, Culture, National Development, Education and Finance sectors. During this period, he developed a wealth of political experience and outstanding executive leadership skills.
In January 2020, he co-led the government's inter-departmental task force to tackle the epidemic with then-Health Minister Gan Kim Yong, and was subsequently elected secretary-general of Singapore's ruling People's Action Party (PAP) and was appointed by Lee Hsien Loong as Singapore's next prime minister.
Why Huang Xuncai
In Singapore, the news didn't actually cause an explosion, because the question of Lee Hsien Loong's successor has long been resolved.
Back in 2007, Lee Hsien Loong, then 55, said that Singapore should not have a "prime minister over 70 years old". At that time, it was estimated that Lee Hsien Loong would retire as prime minister by February 2022 at the latest.
But the arrival of the coronavirus pandemic disrupted that plan, and now that the pandemic has passed, his handover plan is back on track.
In a televised speech in August 2023, Lee Hsien Loong said that plans to hand over power to younger generation leaders were "back on track" and that more and more decision-making power had been delegated to the fourth generation of leadership teams.
Previously, Lee Hsien Loong had chosen then-Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat as the leader of Singapore's fourth-generation leadership team, but Heng Swee Keat voluntarily gave up the opportunity to compete after the "Waterloo incident" in the 2020 general election, citing the desire to give way to a younger candidate due to age and health reasons.
Lawrence Wong, who is now emerging in Singapore's political circles, is clearly a younger and more experienced political choice, especially with a background in economics, and even better in the context of the challenging international economic situation in recent years.
In addition, helping to coordinate Singapore's fight against COVID-19 when the pandemic hit also made Lawrence Wong famous. Due to his outstanding achievements in epidemic prevention, Lawrence Wong has become a "dark horse" in the political arena, winning the affirmation and support of the vast majority of cabinet members and the ruling People's Action Party, which is one of the reasons why he can take over from Lee Hsien Loong.
In addition, since the beginning of 2023, there have been frequent scandals among the core figures of the fourth-generation leadership team, such as peach news, corruption, and the "black and white house mansion" incident, which has brought shame to the Singapore government, which is based on "integrity and integrity".
However, Huang Xuncai is relatively low-key and cautious, less controversial, and is the most consensus candidate in the party. At the same time, in the eyes of the people, Huang Xuncai was born in an ordinary family and has a strong affinity, and he will know better what the people need by working hard all the way to become a leader.
At this time, a "grassroots" leader came to power, which undoubtedly made it easier to stabilize people's hearts, and these are the reasons why he was finally chosen as his successor.
What is the future of Singapore's foreign policy?
Singapore has changed between the old and new governments, and what is most worth looking forward to is how China-Singapore relations will develop after the fourth generation of leadership team takes office.
In fact, Huang Xuncai has some ties to China, his ancestral home is Hainan, China, and his father left Hainan in the 40s of the 20th century and came to Malaya at that time.
On the eve of Lee Hsien Loong's resignation, there has been a lot of interaction between China and Singapore: Singapore's Deputy Prime Minister and Coordinating Minister for Economic Policy Heng Swee Keat and Singapore's Senior Minister and Coordinating Minister for National Security Teo Chee Hean visited China, and the Minister of the International Liaison Department of the CPC Central Committee also visited Singapore.
In fact, the frequent interaction between the two sides has sent an important signal that both China and New Zealand hope to continue to maintain close exchanges with China, and the new government is also willing to promote greater development of China-New Zealand relations at a higher level.
And it is even more important to note that Lawrence Wong's statement as Singapore's prime minister after Lee Hsien Loong.
When Wang Yi met with Lawrence Wong on 11 August 2023, Lawrence Wong recognized the development of China-Singapore relations and practical cooperation between the two countries, saying that "Singapore-China relations are developing strongly and the Belt and Road Initiative has yielded fruitful results. Singapore will actively participate in China's modernization process and looks forward to co-chairing the meeting of the Singapore-China bilateral cooperation mechanism in China."
From December 5 to 8, 2023, Lawrence Wong led a delegation to China, and the lineup for this visit to China is also very strong, and he also bluntly said that "never bet on China's weakness".
All of this reveals the importance that the Singapore government and Lawrence Wong himself attach to China-New Zealand relations, and also shows that Singapore's foreign policy will not change in direction with Lee Hsien Loong's departure.
Wong Xuncai took over the challenges on the road
However, Wong's succession has not been easy, as he will not only lead the PAP and all Singaporeans to greater success, but will also face the pressure of the next general election.
According to Singapore's constitution, the next general election will be held in November 2025 at the latest, and if the ruling People's Action Party wins the next general election, Singapore's Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Lawrence Wong will succeed him as prime minister. Therefore, it is inevitable that the PAP will be tested in the next general election.
In the last general election, although the PAP won 83 of the 93 seats in Singapore's parliament, it received 61.24% of the vote, significantly lower than the previous 69.86%.
On the whole, as the successor of the prime minister, Lawrence Wong is also facing tests from the party and the Singaporean people on the one hand, and pressure from the opposition parties, especially the Singapore Workers' Party and the Move Forward Party, on the other hand.
Therefore, if he can achieve some achievements that are highly recognizable to Singaporean voters after becoming prime minister, the PAP will be able to lay a good foundation for staying in power.
For China, Singapore's leaders have always paid close attention to diplomatic issues such as multilateral relations, great power competition, and the situation in the South China Sea.
Given Singapore's unique role between China and the United States, and its strong diplomatic appeal across Southeast Asia, it is worth watching the impact of the transition of leadership in Singapore in 2024.