The perils of mixing business and national identity
Amid the furore around SIA's potential new investment in Air India, Singapore must uphold its positioning as a country that is open to the world.
When does a legitimate debate about economics become an issue of identity politics and racial prejudice? In Singapore, the line was crossed when anonymous online pundits turned a national airline's stake in a foreign carrier into an indictment on executive ethnicity.
In late August, Reuters reported that Air India had asked Singapore Airlines (SIA), a 25.1% shareholder, for US$1.5 billion in funding to help cover losses. This prompted a challenge from the opposition Workers' Party MP, Kenneth Tiong, who asked whether it was right that state-backed funds should be used to prop up a loss-making carrier (state-owned Temasek Holdings owns 50% of SIA). Tiong argued that Singapore "does not owe Air India a living", a comment that stirred ire among netizens.
What began as a financial discussion soon descended into a xenophobic online backlash directed at Temasek chief executive Dilhan Pillay Sandrasegara. Anonymous social media users accused him without evidence of supporting Air India at Singapore's expense due to his Indian background. From there, comments broadened to the vilification of Indian and South Asian ethnicity and culture.
