Review: “If the Philippines had a Lee Kuan Yew”

Aside from its substance, the book is a triumph of journalism.

LEE Kuan Yew was a prime minister of Singapore from 1959 to 1990. AFP

If the Philippines Had a Lee Kuan Yew is a very likeable and readable odd book. Odd because it is an anthology of mostly bylined-journalistic pieces but the book is attributed to a single author — Jose P. Leviste Jr. — and the book, as all anthologies do, has an editor, the lifestyle journalist-turned-PR counselor Ivy Liza Mendoza.

Those are the only reasons the book is odd. Otherwise, it is very likeable for almost a myriad reasons. Foremost of these is the book is grandly informative about the greatness of the late statesman who should be unarguably known as the “Father and Builder of Singapore” — and not just the prime minister of that city-state for 30 years until 1990. Any dictator can reign that long. Someone we’re all familiar with was dictator for 20 years, and one thing he could be called is “Father of Corruption and Destruction.”

And that overstaying strongman is one of the reasons for the book If the Philippines Had a Lee Kuan Yew. Only his son believes his father could have turned the Philippines into another Singapore. But, happily, that’s not mentioned in the book at all. Had it been mentioned, it’s likely to rouse anger that may prevent some people from reading the whole book, which is actually worth reading if one doesn’t know enough about how Singapore began and how it was completely transformed by Mr. Lee.

Aside from its substance, the book is a triumph of journalism. Only a few pieces in it were not originally written for a newspaper, a news magazine or an online publication. Practically all the journalists admired by Filipinos who were still alive in 2015 and were still actively beating deadlines have an essay (columns are very personal essays, of course) in the book which was conceived as a reaction to the passing of Mr. Lee on 23 March 2015. There’s one exception and exceptional piece, though, written in 2001 by the venerable and rambunctious, Max V. Soliven, the grand old man of The Philippine Star.

In writing style, Soliven’s “The Way They Were” is most ‘unjournalistic.’ He violates the prime journalism rule of writing almost thoroughly only short sentences (10 words) and medium length (20 words) sentences so that even high school students can comprehend the news story, features or column they are voluntarily reading or are required by their teachers to read. Soliven has a lot of sentences that go beyond five lines of the book’s page and they are mostly sentences with parenthetical details which could have been written as separate short or medium sentences for better comprehension.

But Soliven’s piece is the most delightful one in the anthology because it is actually a travel memoir: the only one that recalls with vivid details the gross streets of Singapore in the 60s, before Mr. Lee took over what he would transform into a glossy city-state. Soliven had a chance to revisit the country in the early 2000s and, thus, could very credibly compare scenes between those decades.

Some of the column pieces were not crafted by working journalists but by a number of specialists in some scholarly topics, such as economics, finance, sociology and religions. Among the writing scholars and professionals in the book are Gérardo Sicat, Randy David, Mahar Mangahas, the banker Valentin A. Araneta (the only one with two essays in the book), research director Kevin H. R. Villanueva and religious leader Apolonio Quiboloy.

It’s Pastor Quiboloy who yielded an engaging description of Mr. Lee’s seeming quirks that enabled him to transform a backwater village into a First World country. The pastor’s “LKY’s Governing Tool Kit” opens, thus: “Off Lee Kuan Yew’s many traits which are being hailed in the torrent of eulogies on his passing, two caught my attention: his focus on details and his disinterest in surveys.”

Quiboloy goes on to quote LKY as saying: “I ignore polling as a method of government. I think that shows a certain weakness of mind…” Though he doesn’t document his sources, the pastor cites a string of anecdotes about LKY’s passion for seemingly inconsequential details, such as an ailing tree he saw on the road, a pothole, a fading road sign, trash flowing on Singapore River, a tenement unit owner dragging a pig up his flat. He writes memo to the official in charge, or calls the official himself, or asks his staff at the Prime Minister’s office to do either.

The pastor sharply concludes with a comparison between the leader and officials of Singapore and ours: “We have a management culture enamored with big visions and grand mandates. But it is in the details that we flounder. To us, crafting the plan is the mission itself. If there’s an Olympic for putting dreams into paper, we can win the gold…”

PERFECT book for journalism and communication.

The 242-page book has 34 titles divided into five chapters, namely, The Statesman with a Vision; The Singapore Built by LKY; His Legacy; Singapore and the Philippines; and Up Close and Personal.

The average length of each article is four pages. The lead article by Jullie Yap Daza is only two pages. Teddy Locsin Jr. has four. That of Soliven is eight. Quiboloy’s has six. The longest is that of Maria Ressa: 11 pages.

Mr. Leviste has a seven-page prologue and a six-page epilogue. There’s a postscript of four pages by J. Albert Gamboa. The book was launched in September 2015.

The book may be perfect for journalism and communication students as it offers them a variety of samples of the many ways one can write about/cover a historic figure. To stretch a cliche, there are so many ways to skin a cat.

It’s a very fair and democratic book. While all the writers directly say, or indirectly admit, that Marcos as a dictator hardly contributed any good to the country compared to LKY’s contribution to Singapore’s undeniable transformation, some of the writers in the book were once known to be Marcos promoters, or even protectors, themselves. That includes, say, Ramon Farolan, Francisco Tatad and Leviste himself who was secretary general of the office of the prime minister and the cabinet thru Prime Minister Cesar Virata and President Ferdinand Marcos. It is a tough and brave book even as no one dared to name a potent LKY for the Philippines.