Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 1, 1994 TAG: 9405010003
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: B6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DENIS D. GRAY ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: SINGAPORE LENGTH: Medium
In a strictly run city-state where 1,000 people are flogged every year and 78 were sentenced to hang in 1993 for drug trafficking alone, he says: "I have always felt that brutality is not the answer to crime. It demeans us. It demeans human dignity."
David Marshall, his eyesight failing at 86 but his mind still razor-sharp, is the toughest critic of a government that has developed political control and social engineering to a fine art. There are virtually no others like him in Singapore.
"What I have said is true. I don't think they can pin anything on me," Marshall said in an interview, by way of explaining why he has not been silenced like other opposition figures who were "squashed like flies."
The answer more likely lies in his past, his age and his simultaneous praise of Singapore's undeniable successes.
Like Lee, Marshall was a founding father of Singapore. He led the fight against British colonial rule and, as head of a transition government in the mid-1950s, had his first clash with the ambitious young lawyer who became prime minister in 1959.
Lee, who stepped down as premier in 1990 but remains the most formidable figure in Singapore, went on to turn an impoverished, conflict-ridden backwater into a clockwork "economic miracle."
Marshall never had the instincts for political infighting. Instead, the son of Iraqi Jewish immigrants - the family name was Anglicized - became a star defense lawyer and civil libertarian. One historian has called him "a leonine presence whose brilliance is matched only by his great oratorical power."
In 1978, Lee sent Marshall to France as ambassador - in order, some said, to muzzle an outspoken critic. Marshall returned late last year and soon was ridiculing Singapore's cowed journalists and citizens more concerned with their bank accounts than with participation.
But the "conscience" and "maverick" of Singapore, as he has been called, also is a booster.
"I stand in awe, genuine awe, of what they have achieved pragmatically," Marshall told The Associated Press. "It is fantastic. In all sincerity, I keep saying that, although we have pimples on our face, we have an Olympic athlete's body.
"There is no unemployment, there is no homelessness, there is an overflowing rice bowl. There is a government that is totally honest, very able, totally dedicated."
Had Marshall won the political battles of long ago, Singapore would have a more human, relaxed face, he said. But he admits to lacking the Lee government's "extraordinary administrative ability and technological expertise."
"Nor would I have been capable of the powerful control that Lee has exercised," he added, "because I am a democrat. He is at base a fascist." Singapore's greatest defect, he said, is lack of respect for the individual. He attributes this to the Confucian tradition of a society that is nearly 80 percent ethnic Chinese.
He described the probable lashing of American Michael Fay for spray-painting cars as "grossly excessive" punishment, but does not expect the government to soften its politics or laws.
Marshall intends to crusade as long as he is able. "I think it is very necessary that there should be a light, some light, a different light, no matter how small, in a gathering darkness."
by CNB