The New Nation - Internet Edition

Md. Abu Abdullah

When the aeroplane touched the Changi Airport of Singapore, I was realizing a mixed feeling as a passenger. Coming out of the plane, a very clean and beautiful airport with eye catching shopping malls, coffee shop, and many more awaited are. Beyond the airport a majestic looking Singapore with its beautifully constructed roads flyovers built with state of the art technology welcomed me in the centre of excellence.

A mere fishing village of early nineteenth century had come up at this stage through the concerted efforts of all. Work of establishing a commercial port started following arrival of Thomas Stamford Raffles here in 1819. It was also the beginning of British rule at Singapore. During the Second World War Singapore was under the Japanese control from 1943-45. After the departure of Japanese from Singapore in 1945, Singapore came again under the British colonial rule which continued upto 1963 when Malaysia-Singapore Federation become independent in 1963. Singapore became independent on 09 August 1965 seceding from Malaysia.

A new cabinet took oath wearing white dress under the leadership of Lee Kuan Yew to rebuild the country. But only after few months investigation started against a minister on charge of corruption and the alleged minister committed suicide. Family members of that minister left the country later on, due to social pressure. The Peoples Action Party is leading the country since 1959.

With only 707 square kilometer of area having 43 kilometer in length and 23 kilometer in wide Singapore also has acute shortage of land and natural resources, forcing the country to rely heavily on her import for almost everything. They have gathered the knowledge of creating crisis into the opportunity. They practiced birth control in sixties, but sharply they realize the shortage of manpower. Now they are giving six thousand dollar 'Baby Bonus' for every new born. Different measures have been taken to discourage migration. But workers from different countries are working there for rapid development. One hundred thousand Bangladeshi skilled and semi skilled workers, including banker, university teacher and polytechnic diploma holders are working there. On holidays Bangladeshis meet near the premises of Angulia mosque and adjoining areas. Little India and Mostafa center are the common place for shopping and eating of the Indo-Pak subcontinent people.

The biggest mosques of Singapore are in Arab quarters area. Quality silk goods, sarang and caps are available in the area. While China town is famous for ceramics, plastics goods, food court and various chinese goods. Santosa island, Jurong birds park, music show, cultural museum are great attractions for the tourist. The country having 4.6 million populations welcome more than double of tourist every year.

Housing sector has been evolved in phases under the supervision of housing development board. More than 90 percent family has own houses. To meet the increasing demand high rise buildings along with community halls, libraries, gymnasium, swimming pools and restaurants on small pieces of land have been constructed. The acute water shortage is met by imports, harvesting rain water, desalinating sea water and reuse of water etc.

Elected town council and community development council look into these community facilities in a competitive price. They also provide and social services. Industrial, commercial and residential area has been developed according to the needs and aspirations of the citizens. Coordinated living, working and shopping facilities developed at the new city centre.

People from every parts of the world are coming to Singapore for better treatment facilities. Mount Elizabeth Hospital is one of the best available around. Singapore airport follow open sky policy, while Singapore airlines compete with open market policy. Physical communication with excellent surface transport system and Mass Rapid Transport (MRT) are among the best in the world. Transshipment is another area Singapore showed the way. With skilled manpower and state of the art system transshipment in Singapore is one of the quickest and prompt in the world. Mutual understanding and cooperation among trade union, entrepreneurs and government are the secrets of this success.

They have changed the colonial administrative rules according to their need. One can easily mark the administrative efficiency by visiting any government office. 63000 officers and staff working in the government for providing civil services to the people. Forward looking, effective, impartial and above all service oriented civil servants are always there to accommodate forward looking changes to cater to the need of the hours. They anticipate change, welcome change and execute change even with risky ideas. Every office meets weekly to review their work and inovate new ideas and suggestions to ensure better services. Respecting people and upholding the truth are their main objectives.

Cheap popularity always takes back seat to encourage effective team work, motivation to achieve excellence, radical innovations, and reward for best performance. Leadership is key, anticipate change and stay relevant, Reward for work and work for reward, a stake for everyone and opportunities for all are the unique four guiding principles of the governance in Singapore. The country is very successful in implementing e-governance. Their slogan is "government services - A click Away". E-services are ranked high by any standard.

Officers from Bangladesh, Vietnam, China, Australia, Qatar, United Arab Emirates and African countries are being imparting training at the Singapore civil service college. They are learning the secrets of administrative success of Singapore. Problems and prospects of any two societies or state are not same always, but still there are scopes to imitate the success experience of one state for another. Singapore has constructed her many big infrastructure and establishments according to their need, taking idea from others. They took the idea from Boston airport for Changi airport, gardening of city idea from Hanoi and Saigon, metro rail idea from New York, disaster preparedness idea from Japan, and human resource development plan form Royal Dutch Company. In every step, they followed the principle of think ahead, think again, and think beyond.

There are also problems in Singapore society. Because of income disparity, lot of new social issues is emerging there. Government is now providing some support to lower income people. Despite all odds an import dependent country has jumped from third world to first world in one generation succeed beyond expectations.

Nearly five hundred Deputy Secretaries and above ranking officers of Bangladesh undertook training from Singapore civil service college in the last two years. Another 1500 officers will be trained under this program by next five years. Main thrust of this training was to see ongoing development activities of Singapore, specially its seaport, housing, anticorruption, health along with academic class at the civil service college. It is expected that utilizing the experience of this training these officers will be able to bring effective and positive change in the administrative system of Bangladesh.

This training is financed by the DFID of British government under the title "Managing at the Top-2". Four weeks of this training are held at the Bangladesh Public Administration Training Centre and two weeks at Singapore. Administration Training expert Roger Fernando, John Wallace, John Dagnall, Mosharraf Hossain, Nazma Ahmed, Mohammad Iqbal and Motiur Rahman are organizing this course.

We have lots of examples of individual success of our countrymen both at home and abroad. But now we need to achieve collective success with team spirit. Government administration is a 'team work'. Moreover we need to continuation of the implementation of our development activities. Total administration of Bangladesh should be reorganized according to the need of the twenty first century. Singapore has reached this stage by virtue of their perseverance, we can take lesson from them for marching ahead < mdabuabdullah @ yahoo.com>