SINGAPORE: In a social media post on Monday morning (Apr 14), Workers’ Party (WP) Member of Parliament (MP) Jamus Lim (Sengkang GRC) noted that the house and coffee shop visits he and his team conducted last week were somewhat different, as some residents asked him about the implications of the global trade war.
He alluded to Prime Minister Lawrence Wong’s call for Singaporeans to unite, which the WP chief and Leader of the Opposition Pritam Singh echoed. Still, he added, “But does this unity translate into single-party leadership? In my view, such enforced narrow-mindedness would be disastrous. We cannot afford to go back the same old playbook, even if that approach had delivered the goods historically.”
Fears of a full-scale trade war were sparked earlier this month after US President Donald Trump announced tariffs that shook up the global trading system. Although he has put a 90-day pause on higher-band tariffs since then, as well as announced exemptions on some products, the impact has been undeniable and is expected to be far-reaching, as evidenced by the statements made by PM Wong since then.
When asked about how the US tariffs would affect Singaporeans, the Sengkang MP, who is an Associate Professor of Economics at École Supérieure des Sciences Economiques et Commerciales (ESSEC) Business School, said he put on his “economist hat” to answer. However, he acknowledged that most of his thoughts are already included in the WP’s official statement on the tariffs.
The party called for working within existing trade alliances to leverage Singapore’s negotiating position, helping Singaporean companies take advantage of the lower tariff terms imposed on the city-state and ensuring that the workers who may be affected by the tariffs are sufficiently protected.
“Importantly, these point to the risks—but also opportunities—that could emerge from this untoward development, prompting us to strengthen the internationalism of our firms and resilience of our workers,” Assoc Prof Lim wrote, underlining as well that the tariffs are not just the result of the current US President but part of a bigger picture of global trends over the past decade or so, which has led to a world fractured into economic blocs.
While he acknowledged that the growth strategies employed by Singapore thus far have been successful, the current situation is different and still evolving, and therefore calls for something new.
Assoc Prof Lim believes that Singapore’s future needs more regional, rather than global, trade and investment opportunities. To break away from reliance on foreign talent, Singapore needs to encourage out-of-the-box innovators instead of just “top-shelf operators” and develop homegrown capacity for knowledge production and productivity.
He ended his post by writing, “These will only emerge in a setting where alternative ideas—economic, social, and political—are welcomed and celebrated, where diverse viewpoints are seen as strengths rather than weaknesses, and where average Singaporean families are not just struggling to get by, but are able to succeed and flourish.”
Many netizens have since shown approval for Assoc Prof Lim’s post and also expressed support for him in light of the upcoming General Election. /TISG