Dr Goh Keng Swee's background

Family Matters:
Dr Goh Keng Swee was born in Malacca on 6 October 1918 into a middle-income Peranakan family. He was the fifth of six children. His father, Goh Leng Inn, was a manager of a rubber plantation, while his mother, Tan Swee Eng, was from the family that produced the Malaysian politicians Tun Tan Cheng Lock and his son Tun Tan Siew Sin.

When he was two years old, his family moved from Malacca to Singapore where his maternal grandparents owned several properties. The Gohs later relocated to the Pasir Panjang rubber estate when his father found work there and became manager in 1933. Like many Peranakan families, the Gohs spoke both English and Malay at home.

Academic Matters(1):
After studying at the Anglo-Chinese Primary School and the Anglo-Chinese Secondary School between 1927 and 1936 where he was second in his class in the Senior Cambridge Examinations, Goh went on to graduate from Raffles College in 1939 with a Class II Diploma in Arts with a special distinction in economics.

Early jobs:
He then joined the colonial Civil Service as a tax collector with the War Tax Department but, according to his superiors, was not very good at his job and was almost fired. Shortly after the start of World War II, he joined the Singapore Volunteer Corps, a local militia, but returned to his previous work after the fall of Singapore. Goh married Alice Woon, a secretary who was a colleague, in 1942 and they had their only child, Goh Kian Chee, two years later. In 1945 he relocated his young family to Malacca, but they returned to Singapore the following year after the Japanese occupation ended. That year, he joined the Department of Social Welfare, and was active in post-war administration. He became supervisor of the Department's Research Section six months later.

Academic Matters(2):
Goh won a scholarship which enabled him to further his studies at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). During his time in London, he met fellow students seeking independence for British Malaya, including Abdul Razak (later Malaysia's second Prime Minister), Maurice Baker (subsequently Singapore's High Commissioner to Malaysia), Lee Kuan Yew and Toh Chin Chye. A student discussion group, the Malayan Forum, was organized in 1948 with him as the founding chairman. He graduated with first class honours in economics in 1951 and won the William Farr Prize for achieving the highest marks in statistics. When he returned to the Department of Social Welfare, he was appointed assistant secretary of its Research Section. In 1952, together with fellow civil servant Kenneth M. Byrne, he formed the Council of Joint Action to lobby against salary and promotion policies that favoured Caucasians over Asians.

In 1954, Goh was able to return to LSE for doctoral studies with the help of a University of London scholarship. He completed his Ph.D. in Economics in 1956 and returned to the Department of Social Welfare, where he served as Assistant Director and then Director. In 1958 he was made Director of the Social and Economic Research Division in the Chief Minister's Office. He resigned from the civil service in August that year to work full-time for the People's Action Party (PAP).



Source: Wikipedia

Dr S.Rajaratnam's background

Family Matters:
Rajaratnam was born in Vattukottai, Jaffna, Sri Lanka. He was the second child of Sabapathy Pillai Sinnathamby and his wife both of Sri Lankan Tamil descent. His father had wanted him to be born in Sri Lanka for auspicious reasons after the premature death of his older brother. He was then brought back to Malaya and raised in Seremban and Selangor.

Academic Matters:
Rajaratnam studied in Convent of the Holy Infant Jesus, St Paul's boys' school, Victoria Institution in Kuala Lumpur and later in Raffles Institution in Singapore. In 1937, he went to King's College London to pursue a law degree. However, because of World War II, he wasn't able to receive any funding from his family to continue his studies.

Early job:
Instead, he turned to journalism to earn a living. He met his wife, Piroska Feher,while in London. He returned to Singapore in 1948 when he joined the Malayan Tribune. In 1954, he joined The Straits Times as a journalist. He was bold in writing about the way Singapore was governed by the British. This incurred the displeasure of the colonial government. His column, "I write as I please", attracted so much attention that he was called for questioning by the government.


Source: Wikipedia

Dr Goh Keng Swee's contributions to Singapore

He was a key member of the PAP's Central Executive Committee and later became its vice-chairman. He successfully contested the Kreta Ayer seat in the 1959 general election, was elected to the Legislative Assembly on 30 May, and joined the first government of Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew as Minister for Finance. In this role, he assumed stewardship of Singapore's economy.

He initiated the setting up of the Economic Development Board which was established in August 1961 to attract foreign multinational corporations to invest in Singapore. The year after that, he started the development of the Jurong industrial estate which was then a swamp, offering incentives to local and foreign business to locate there.

The Singaporean government won approval from Tunku Abdul Rahman for a merger in 1961, with the Tunku being motivated by a desire to stabilize the security situation in Singapore and notably to neutralize the perceived communist threat. Singapore merged with Malaya and the British Borneo states in 1963 to form the Federation of Malaysia. Merger however proved to be problematic for the Singaporean leaders. There was a clash of fundamental principles notably on the issue of Malay dominance. Communitarian violence in 1964 was inflamed in Singapore by Malay and Chinese activists. According to Lee Kuan Yew, Goh fought to protect Singapore's interests against the Federal Minister of Finance, Tan Siew Tin. Goh played a crucial role in orchestrating the subsequent secession of Singapore from the Federation on 9 August 1965. After two difficult years, Lee asked him to negotiate with the Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister Tun Abdul Razak and Minister for External Affairs Tun Dr. Ismail Abdul Rahman in July 1965 for Singapore to have a looser arrangement with Malaysia within the Federation. However, following the discussions, Goh decided on his own that it would be better for Malaysia and Singapore to have a clean break.




Compulsory National Service was initiated by Goh when he was Singapore's first Minister for the Interior and Defence.Upon independence in 1965, Goh relinquished his finance portfolio and became Minister for the Interior and Defence until 16 August 1967, assuming responsibilities for strengthening Singapore's military and domestic security capabilities.

He was again Finance Minister between 17 August 1967 and 10 August 1970, during which he declined to allow the central bank to issue currency. Subsequently, in 1981, he expressed the view that the central bank need not hold large amounts of cash in reserve to defend the currency, proposing that the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation (GIC) be established to invest excess reserves.




Goh encouraged the establishment of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in 1968, and on 11 August 1970 he was reappointed Minister for Defence. In 1971, he put together the Electronic Warfare Study Group, a team of newly graduated engineers who had excelled in their university studies which was headed by Dr. Tay Eng Soon, a university lecturer. The group worked on Project Magpie, a secret project to develop Singapore's defence technology capabilities. In 1977, the group was renamed the Defence Science Organisation (DSO).


He was also responsible for projects such as the Jurong Bird Park, the Singapore Zoo and the Singapore Symphony Orchestra. He backed the construction of the Kreta Ayer People's Theatre in his constituency as a venue for Chinese opera performances.He was impressed by an oceanarium in the Bahamas so he contacted the Sentosa Development Corporation and convinced them to have one. Underwater World Singapore opened in 1991.


He also introduced rugby to the Singapore Armed Forces and later in schools. In recognition of his role in promoting the sport, the Schools "C" Division Cup is named after him.


On 1 March 1973, he was appointed Deputy Prime Minister of Singapore concurrently with his other Cabinet portfolio. On 12 February 1979, Goh moved on from the Defence Ministry to the Ministry of Education, where his Goh Report greatly influenced the development of Singapore's education system. He set up the Curriculum Development Institute, and introduced key policies such as religious education (subsequently discontinued) and, in 1980, the channelling of students into different programmes of study according to their learning abilities, known as "streaming".




Source: Wikipedia
Pictures: Google search

Dr S.Rajaratnam's contributions to Singapore

In 1954, Rajaratnam cofounded the People's Action Party together with Lee Kuan Yew, Goh Keng Swee and others. He became popular among his supporters for being able to effectively follow the 'mood of the people'. He thought of a multiracial Singapore and envisioned her to be a 'global city'. He was also actively involved in organising major political campaigns against Singaporean groups. During his years in parliament, he served as Minister for Culture (1959), Minister for Foreign Affairs (1965-1980), Minister for Labour (1968-1971), and Second Deputy Prime Minister (1980-1985) and was later appointed as Senior Minister until his retirement in 1988. Rajaratnam is remembered for writing the Singapore National Pledge in 1966.

Rajaratnam was Singapore's first foreign minister and during his time as a foreign minister, he helped Singapore gain entry into the United Nations and later the Non-Aligned Movement in 1970. He built up the Foreign Service and helped to establish diplomatic links with other countries and secure international recognition of the new nation's sovereignty. He carried out the foreign policy of international self-assertion to establish Singapore's independence during the period when the country faced significant challenges including the Konfrontasi conflict in the 1960s and the withdrawal of British troops in the early 1970s. Rajaratnam was one of the five "founding fathers" of ASEAN in 1967 and helped to draw international attention to Vietnam's invasion of Cambodia in 1978.

During his term as Minister of Labour, he implemented tough labour laws to attempt to restore stability in the Singaporean economy and attracted multinational corporations to invest in Singapore. This important appointment emphasised the trust that the government had in him in overcoming the challenges Singapore faced.

Throughout his political career, he played a key role in the successive pragmatic and technocratic People's Action Party governments that radically improved Singapore's economic situation, alongside huge developments in social development on the island with massive expansion of healthcare programmes, pensions, state housing and extremely low unemployment.

Rajaratnam was a strong believer in multi-racialism in Singapore. In the 1980s and 1990s, when the government began implementing several policies to promote the use of mother tongue languages and ethnic-based self-help groups such as Chinese Development Assistance Council (CDAC) and Mendaki, Rajaratnam expressed his opposition to these policies which, in his view, ran counter to the vision of establishing a common Singaporean identity where "when race, religion, language does not matter". He advocated for greater racial integration which he felt was still lacking in the country.




Sources: Wikipedia
Pictures: Google Search

Who I think contributed more to Singapore's progress

In my opinion, it would be Dr Goh Keng Swee.
He was responsible for numerous projects, such as the Jurong Industrial Estate, Jurong Birdpark, Singapore Zoo, Underwater World Sentosa and much, much more.
He also establishes Naional Service and created streaming.
All his work has benefited the people during that time and now.

For Dr S. Rajaratnam, he wrote the Singapore Pledge, but it was for the racial harmony of people in Singapore.
That's what his work is all concepted under: harmony, racial rights and fairness.

Dr Goh's work is diverse, he has done work for the leisure of Singapore, the military of Singapore, the education system of Singapore, etc.