09/10/2018

Singaporean Artists poke fun at Ho Ching and Rosmah


Update 23 Oct 2020: Fortune Names Ho Ching 20th Most Powerful Woman Outside Of US – Only S’porean To Make The Cut
© Provided by Vulcan Post Fortune Names Ho Ching 20th Most Powerful Woman Outside Of US - Only S'porean To Make The Cut

Fortune has released the 2020 edition of its Most Powerful Women Outside the United States, where a total of 50 women were shortlisted.

The top three on the list are: Emma Walmsley from the United Kingdom, who is also the CEO of GlaxoSmithKline, Jessica Tan, CEO of China’s Ping An Group, and Ana Botín, Executive Chairman of Spain’s Banco Santander.

According to Fortune, it “scans the globe” every year, to highlight the most powerful women in business based outside the United States. The list was created 20 years ago, and takes into consideration the size and health of a woman’s business, the arc of her career, as well as her societal and cultural influence.


#23 Ho Ching
Executive Director and CEO, Temasek

Ho Ching has been at Singaporean sovereign wealth fund Temasek for 17 years and has helped its portfolio grow to over $313 billion.

Temasek was one of the main investors in a $14 billion dollar fundraising round by Ant Financial, an affiliate of Alibaba.

Ho opened offices in San Francisco in 2018 and poured over a quarter of Temasek's money into sectors like life sciences, tech and agribusiness.

Ho is also the wife of Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.


“Ho Ching is watching all of us” – Temasek CEO skirts question on the company’s plans for leadership succession
Instead of giving a direct answer as to what Temasek's leadership succession plans are, when he was asked to give details on these plans and on Mdm Ho's role at the company, Mr Pillay would only say that Mdm Ho is "very much now involved in the stewardship aspects of Temasek…she still keeps a watchful eye over all of us to make sure we continue to do the right thing"

 Temasek International CEO Dilhan Pillay appeared to skirt questions on Ho Ching’s role at Temasek and the organisation’s plans for leadership succession, at a recent press briefing.

 Temasek International is the investment arm of Singapore sovereign wealth fund, Temasek, which is led by Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s wife, Ho Ching. Instead of giving a direct answer as to what Temasek’s leadership succession plans are, when he was asked to give details on these plans and on Mdm Ho’s role at the company, Mr Pillay would only say that Mdm Ho is “very much now involved in the stewardship aspects of Temasek…she still keeps a watchful eye over all of us to make sure we continue to do the right thing.”

 The South China Morning Post noted that Mr Pillay also quipped, “Right now, she’s watching all of us,” and that this remark was met with laughter.

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Where are my Sandals?
Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and Mrs Lee (far left) were among the foreign leaders and their spouses hosted to a welcome banquet by Chinese President Xi Jinping and his wife Peng Liyuan

 During a Fund raising Dinner
Heng who was playing Ho Ching was dressed in a blue blouse and pink silk pants that matches the outfit worn by Ho Ching when she and her husband visited Malaysian’s PM Mahathir soon after their election

 A video has been circulating online showcasing a snippet of a skit by local Singaporean actors Ivan Heng and Siti Khalijah Zainal. The satirical duo was portraying Ho Ching, wide of PM Lee Hsien Loong, and Rosmah Mansor, wife of former Malaysian PM Najib Razak in the wake of Rosmah’s recent arrest.

 Though the two political figures are no longer close friends in real life, the satirist put on a skit of what it might be like if Rosmah and Ho Ching were still buddies. Performed at a fundraising even for local charity, Wild Rice, the skit received uproarious laughter from the crowd.

 Before the Malaysian 14th General Elections when Najib was still in power, comedians and satirists were cautious about poking fun at the PM and his wife. Malaysian cartoonist Zunar was famously prosecuted for his unsavoury cartoons about the pair while artist Fahmi Reza was taken to court for while wildly popular drawing of Najib’s face in clown makeup. Even Singaporean comedians have been forced to apologise for making fun of Najib. The ex-PM had no tolerance for any kind of political satire during his reign.

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 Tan Wah-Piow 17 hrs

 And now, for Sunday entertainment: Lee Ching and Rosmah

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 Malaysia’s Rosmah Mansor, Singapore’s Ho Ching: BFFs? You must be kidding!
Satirical skit by actors Ivan Heng and Siti Khalijah Zainal underlines the fall from grace of the wife of Malaysia’s former leader Najib Razak – someone whom, just months ago, few would have dared to lampoon

 Rosmah Mansor, the wife of the disgraced former Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak, and Ho Ching, the wife of the Singaporean leader Lee Hsien Loong, may no longer be so close in real life, but that has not stopped satirists in the Lion City from imagining them to be the best of friends.

 Tickling Singaporeans’ funny bone on Sunday was a video clip circulating online of a skit by popular local actors Ivan Heng and Siti Khalijah Zainal assuming the role of the two political spouses.

 The skit underlined once again Rosmah’s fall from grace since the May 9 general election that dethroned her husband.

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 From ‘first lady of Malaysia’ to bag lady: Rosmah in Singapore satire spotlight
Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor is providing much fodder for satirists across the Causeway now that a new government is in power in Malaysia

 A video clip of a recent skit in Singapore starring local actors Siti Khalijah Zainal as the wife of former Malaysian prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak and Ivan Heng as Ho Ching, the spouse to Singapore PM Lee Hsien Loong has been posted on the Internet by Singapore Incidents, drawing thousands of views and comment from Hong Kong paper, South China Morning Post (SCMP).

 The skit underlined Rosmah’s fall from from the “first lady of Malaysia” since the May 9 general election that dethroned her husband, even as it continued to lampoon her love for luxury handbags, especially those by fashion house Hermes and its Birkin range.

 “Before the poll, satirists in Malaysia and neighbouring were extremely cautious about lampooning her,” SCMP said in an article published last night.

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Singaporeans’ impersonation of Ho Ching and Rosmah’s friendship goes viral

 The former friendship between Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s wife Ho Ching and ex-Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak’s wife Rosmah Mansor was the butt of jokes at a recent fundraising event for non-profit arts charity W!ld Rice.

 Performed by Singaporean actors Ivan Heng (who serves as W!ld Rice’s Founding Artistic Director) and Siti Khalijah Zainal, the skit was based on the writers’ imagination of what the relationship between Ho Ching and Rosmah might be like if they were still friends today.

 Ho Ching and Rosmah always seemed to be on good terms with one another during official visits to Singapore and Malaysia, when their husbands met. They’ve even been on a shopping trip without their husbands, that the media covered, and have participated in meetings with the wives of other regional leaders in ASEAN.

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 W!LD RICE
Founding Artistic Director, Ivan Heng

 W!LD RICE was founded in 2000 by Ivan Heng, an internationally acclaimed and award-winning theatre practitioner, and is recognised today as one of Singapore’s leading professional theatre companies.

 Our mission is to provide an open forum for the shared experience of theatre; celebrating our diversity, reflecting on the problems and possibilities of our times, and presenting productions that inspire, challenge and entertain.

 A commitment to the highest standards informs every aspect of W!LD RICE’s creative work, which is first and foremost a celebration of Singapore theatrical talent. By producing and touring productions that are distinctively local in flavour and yet universal in vision and concerns, the company creates memorable experiences for audiences in Singapore and the world.

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 I asked Ho Ching to enter politics: Goh Chok Tong
Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and wife Ho Ching leave after an audience with Brunei’s Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah at Nurul Iman Palace in Bandar Seri Begawan October 5, 2017. (PHOTO: Reuters)

Emeritus Senior Minister (ESM) Goh Chok Tong has revealed that in the early 1980s, he approached Ho Ching to enter politics – but was told that the timing was wrong.

In the first volume of his newly-released memoirs entitled Tall Order: The Goh Chok Tong Story, Goh, who was Prime Minister of Singapore from 1990 to 2004, recalled that he had spotted Ho in the Ministry of Defence and thought that “she had the intellect and the attributes we were looking for”. “She would have made a good minister, a different kind of minister.”

Ho, who is now chief executive of Singapore sovereign wealth fund Temasek Holdings, was in her late 20s at the time. “She did not say no. She said not at this stage. She was still young.”

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Do you agree with ESM Goh that Ho Ching would have made a good minister?

A book about Emeritus Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong is making waves lately with its many revelations about various prominent figures.

One such revelation was that Goh, in the early ’80s, had approached Ho Ching – while she was working in the Ministry of Defence, and before she married current Prime Minister Lee Hsien Long – to join politics. Ho Ching is currently CEO of Temasek Holdings.

Goh had thought “she had the intellect and the attributes we were looking for”, adding that “she would have made a good minister, a different kind of minister”. She did not say no, but rather, not at [that] stage.

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In approaching Ho Ching for politics, has Goh breached his duties as cabinet minister?

To me, the aspiration to hold political office should be a calling. As such, I never really understood or agreed with the ruling Peoples' Action Party's (PAP) practice of handpicking people who have not been involved in politics to join the party and run for office. If you want to get people who have hitherto not been involved in politics to join the political scene, you would have to entice them to join. They may have to leave their existing jobs and to get them to do that - wouldn't you have to sweeten the deal? This is perhaps why our current Members of Parliament (MPs) and ministers are paid so well. Arguably, some were not really interested in political office to begin with and only joined the fray because they were invited to and perhaps made attractive offers? Are these the right type of candidates?

I don't query the intellect of those who have been handpicked. That said, having a high intellect does not necessitate to being a good MP or minister. A good MP or minister needs to have more than intellect, he or she needs to have empathy, desire and passion to be involved in public service. My concern is that the system of handpicking people not involved in politics to join the party may attract candidates who are only in it for the money or prestige. This, in turn, means that the government has to constantly offer high remuneration as an incentive to otherwise uninterested people. Is this the best use of public money?

Former Prime Minister and current Emeritus Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong (Goh), has in his newly-released memoirs entitled Tall Order: The Goh Chok Tong Story, confirmed that this practice of inviting suitable candidates to join the firm. He revealed that "in the early 1980s, he approached Ho Ching to enter politics – but was told that the timing was wrong." He further said that Ho Ching "had the intellect and the attributes we were looking for”. This begs the question - What attributes are they looking for? It sounds rather vague doesn't it? We are left to speculate what exactly those attributes are. Is it a safe pair of hands that will toe the party line part of the desired attributes? Is what is best for PAP always what is best for Singapore as a country?

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ESM Goh reveals Ho Ching didn’t say no when first approached to join politics

In the book, ESM Goh revealed that he did try to ask Ho Ching, presently the second wife of PM Lee, to join politics. But that was before she was married to PM Lee, after Lee's first wife Wong Ming Yang died shortly after giving birth to their first son, who was born with Albinism.

Goh said, "I did approach Ho Ching and ask her if she would be interested in politics. It was quite early on. She was about 28, 29 or 30, before she married Lee Hsien Loong." Goh said he spotted her in Mindef and thought that she had the necessary "intellect and attributes". "I knew she was a President's Scholar, but I didn't know her well - only superficially because she was in the science part of Mindef," he added.

"Through briefings and so on, I could see that she had a lot of substance. She would have made a good minister, a different kind of minister." Apparently, Ho Ching did not say no right away.

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