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Singapore govt says New York Times video featuring Li Shengwu draws 'misleading analogies'
Li Shengwu featured in a video by the New York Times on Jan 22.
PHOTO: YouTube/New York Times
PUBLISHED ON January 27, 2025 9:45 PMByDana Leong
The Singapore government has said that the New York Times (NYT) drew "misleading analogies" between the United States and Singapore.
In a Jan 26 letter addressed to NYT's editor, Singapore's ambassador to the US Lui Tuck Yew responded to what Li Shengwu had said in the publication's opinion video How Tyranny Begins: It Can Happen Here In America released on Jan 22.
Li, an economics professor at Harvard University, appeared in the video featuring four individuals who claim to have been repressed in their home countries — the other three people spoke about oppression in Russia, Hungary and Nicaragua.
In the video, Li, who is also a grandson of the country's founding prime minister Lee Kuan Yew, accused his uncle and former prime minister Lee Hsien Loong of having a "pattern of using police investigations and criminal prosecutions to dispose of or exile his opponents".
The 39-year-old also referred to a private Facebook post he had made in 2017 that was found to be in contempt of court.
After that, Li said, "the Singapore government went after [him] with a criminal prosecution".
"I fled the country as soon as I could," he added.
In his letter, Lui refuted the claims Li made in the video, saying that the latter "has never been exiled from Singapore, jailed or stripped of his possessions, as might some of the others in the publication's feature".
No one, including Li, is above the law in Singapore, the ambassador emphasised.
Li paid a $15,000 fine in 2020 and has not been under investigation for anything else since then. He remains a Singapore citizen and is free to return to Singapore any time he wishes, Lui said.
Addressing Li's claim that it is "better to fight... rather than to give in and hope that somebody else will be the check and balance for you", the ambassador called on him to contest in the upcoming General Election, which will be held by November.
"It is not for us to comment on US domestic politics. But we must object when you use a false portrayal of Singapore to advance your own agenda," Lui said.
"It is deeply regrettable that Li has chosen to denigrate the very country his grandfather had a pivotal role building."
The ambassador also responded to a separate NYT article published on Jan 11, refuting the publication's labelling of the Lee family as "Singapore's first family" as well as its description of Lee Kuan Yew as "authoritarian".
