-
Society
Gates upbeat Covid-19 may soon lose its venom
By Ivan Lim Former AJA President, Contributor to AsiaN SINGAPORE: Some good news out of Singapore: the raging Covid-19 pandemic may devolve next year into something like the flu. This optimistic assessment by Bill Gates, who warned the world of the coming pandemic in 2015, came during a virtual interview at…
Read More » -
South East Asia
Safeguard yourselves against Covid-19, government tells Singaporeans
By Ivan Lim Former AJA President, Contributor to AsiaN SINGAPORE: “YOU are on your own, lookout” That’s the new order of the day as Singapore pushes ahead as one of the first Covidean states to pivot towards living with the Coronavirus. Since late September, the city-state of 5.45 million has gone…
Read More » -
Politics
Covid deaths spike, but Singapore stick to re-opening plans
By Ivan Lim Former AJA President, Contributor to AsiaN SINGAPORE: The figures tell a staggering story that smacks of a runaway pandemic. However, the authorities are looking at the bigger picture and taking the explosion of the Delta mutant cases in stride. Since mid-September, new daily caseloads have hovered between…
Read More » -
East Asia
Rise of Eco-cities: An Asian model of sustainable development
By Ivan Lim Former AJA President, Contributor to AsiaN SINGAPORE: The search for an Asian eco-culture is in line with the international discourse on a new global ethical agenda for the New Millennium, focusing on religion, language, values and rights of minorities and indigenous people. It is marked by…
Read More » -
Politics
Singapore keeps an eye on Kabul after aiding refugee pull-out
By Ivan Lim Former AJA President, Contributor to AsiaN SINGAPORE: During the last acts of the United States’ precipitous retreat from Afghanistan in mid-August, Singapore got a piece of action -helping in the historic, if chaotic, airlift of thousands of Americans and Afghans fleeing the Taliban forces closing in on…
Read More » -
People
Funding-surge for blogger in Singapore PM’s defamation case
By Ivan Lim Former AJA President, Contributor to AsiaN SINGAPORE: Critics have decried the outcome of a defamation case in which a political blogger has been found to have impugned the reputation and integrity of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong in an article. Mr Terry Xu, chief editor of…
Read More » -
Politics
Singapore lifts quarantine for German and Brunei visitors
By Ivan Lim Former AJA President, Contributor to AsiaN SINGAPORE: From September 8, fully vaccinated travellers from Germany and Brunei will be able to visit Singapore for leisure without having to serve a 14-day quarantine. Under this Vaccinated Travel Lane (VTL) scheme, they will only be required to take four…
Read More » -
Business
Reincarnated Straits Times unlikely to see government grip easing
By Ivan Lim Former AJA President, Contributor to AsiaN SINGAPORE: A government-backed rescue exercise was mounted recently to save Singapore’s flagship English newspaper, The Straits Times, from possible demise as it found itself unable to reverse advertising revenue losses and a decline in readership subscription. And fortuitously, it took the unseen…
Read More » -
Business
Covid-19 upsurge derails Singapore’s normality push
By Ivan Lim Former AJA President, Contributor to AsiaN SINGAPORE: Just when things seemed to be looking up, a sudden surge in Covid-19 cases has pushed Singapore off course from the government’s much-heralded plan to move into an endemic phase of living with the presence of the virus as a form…
Read More » -
Culture
Run-ins with Lee Kuan Yew cut short young activist’s career
By Ivan Lim Former AJA President, Contributor to AsiaN SINGAPORE: On Sept. 27, 1957, a bright 26-year-old activist, Arun Mahadeva, Maha for short, was invited to meet Lee Kuan Yew,34, a United Kingdom-trained lawyer and up-and-coming politician who was soon to become Singapore’s Prime Minister. At the meeting in…
Read More »