They interviewed Ismail Ibrahim, CEO of IRDA. Ismail's quest to win over support in Johor during the early days even saw him go down to the Kampungs to tell the villagers how they would benefit from the Iskandar Malaysia project. "We had to dismantle and change the mindset of how they saw themselves and Singapore," he says.
He emphasised that Singapore offered the best examples of things such as broadband services, energy management, public sector administration and fiscal planning. And, he kept making the point that south Johor had to benchmark itself against the best in the world, instead of against Kuala Lumpur as it had traditionally done. "For south Johor to grow, we must open up and take advantage of our geographic and strategic position," says Ismail, who hails from Johor hinself.
Ismail is a Colombo Plan scholar with a town-planning degree from Heriot-Watt University, and a master's degree in planning law from University of Newcastle.
