Tharman Shanmugaratnam

Tharman Shanmugaratnam 尚达曼
தர்மன் சண்முகரத்தினம்
Deputy Prime Minister of Singapore
Incumbent
Assumed office 21 May 2011 Serving with Teo Chee Hean (2009)
Prime Minister	Lee Hsien Loong
Preceded by	Wong Kan Seng
Co-ordinating Minister for Economic & Social Policies
Incumbent
Assumed office 1 October 2015
Prime Minister	Lee Hsien Loong
Preceded by	Position established
Chairman of the Monetary Authority of Singapore
Incumbent
Assumed office 1 May 2011
Deputy	Lim Hng Kiang
Preceded by	Goh Chok Tong
Minister for Finance
In office 1 December 2007 – 30 September 2015 Acting: 12 May 2016 - 22 August 2016
Prime Minister	Lee Hsien Loong
Preceded by	Lee Hsien Loong
Succeeded by	Heng Swee Keat
Minister for Manpower
In office 21 May 2011 – 31 July 2012
Prime Minister	Lee Hsien Loong
Preceded by	Gan Kim Yong
Succeeded by	Tan Chuan-Jin
Second Minister for Finance
In office 2005 – 1 December 2007
Prime Minister	Lee Hsien Loong
Minister for Education
In office 1 August 2003 – 1 April 2008
Prime Minister	Goh Chok Tong Lee Hsien Loong
Preceded by	Teo Chee Hean
Succeeded by	Ng Eng Hen
Member of Parliament for Jurong GRC (Taman Jurong)
Incumbent
Assumed office 3 November 2001
Preceded by	Ravindran Ramasamy (Bukit Timah GRC – Jurong)
Constituency	Jurong GRC (Taman Jurong) (2001)
Personal details
Born	(1957-02-25) 25 February 1957 Singapore
Political party	People's Action Party (2001)
Spouse(s)	Jane Yumiko Ittogi
Alma mater	Anglo-Chinese School, London School of Economics, Wolfson College, Cambridge, Harvard University
Signature

Tharman Shanmugaratnam (Chinese: 尚达曼; pinyin: Shàng Dámàn; Tamil: தர்மன் சண்முகரத்தினம்; born 25 February 1957) is a Singaporean politician and economist. He is currently Deputy Prime Minister and Coordinating Minister for Economic and Social Policies. He is also Chairman of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), Singapore's central bank and financial regulator. In April 2017, Tharman was appointed to chair a G20 Eminent Persons Group on Global Financial Governance, which was set up to review the system of multilateral financial institutions. He also succeeded Jean-Claude Trichet as Chairman of the Group of Thirty, an independent global council of leading economic and financial policy-makers from January 1, 2017.

He has spent his working life in public service, in roles related to economic policy and education. He served as Minister for Finance from 2007 to 2015,^[1] and as Minister for Education from 2003 to 2008.^[2]

Early life and education

Tharman attended the Anglo-Chinese School. He went on to the London School of Economics (LSE), where he earned a bachelor's degree in economics; LSE later honored him with an Honorary Fellowship in 2011.^[3] He subsequently obtained a master's degree in economics from Wolfson College, Cambridge,^[4] and a Master in Public Administration from Harvard University, where he received a Lucius N. Littauer Fellow award for outstanding performance and potential. Tharman was a student activist while studying in the United Kingdom during the 1970s.^[5] He originally held socialist beliefs, but his views on economics changed over the course of his working career.^[5]

Career before politics

Tharman started his career at the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). He later joined the Singapore Administrative Service and served briefly in the Ministry of Education as a Senior Deputy Secretary for Policy,^[6] before returning to the MAS where he rose to become its Managing Director.^[7] He resigned from this position to contest in the 2001 general election as a candidate for the People's Action Party.

Political career

Following the 2001 general election, Tharman was appointed Senior Minister of State at the Ministry of Trade and Industry and the Ministry of Education. He then served as the Minister for Education from 2003 to 2008.

In May 2006, Tharman was also appointed Second Minister for Finance^[8] before becoming Minister for Finance ^[9] in December 2007.

Following the 2011 general election, Tharman was appointed Deputy Prime Minister, while remaining as Minister for Finance. He served concurrently as the Minister for Manpower between May 2011 to July 2012. He stepped down as Minister for Finance in September 2015 after 9 years. After the 2015 general election, Tharman remained Deputy Prime Minister and was also appointed as the Coordinating Minister for Economic and Social Policies in October 2015.^[1]

Tharman was first elected Member of Parliament in Nov 2001 in Jurong GRC^[10], and has been re-elected three times since. At the 2015 general elections, Jurong GRC, helmed by Tharman, garnered a vote share of 79.3 per cent against a Singaporeans First (SingFirst) team. Tharman has been elected to the Central Executive Committee of the People’s Action Party since Dec 2002, and was appointed 2nd Assistant Secretary-General in May 2011.

In May 2017, the National Trades Union Congress (NTUC) conferred on Tharman the Medal of Honour, the highest award of its May Day Awards. NTUC cited amongst other things “his deep commitment to building an inclusive society”^[11].

On 2 March 2012, Tharman responded during the debate on the Singapore Budget to concerns expressed by non-constituency member of Parliament (NCMP) Gerald Giam about Singaporeans being unable to afford a flat in Singapore, "I would like to assure Mr Gerald Giam, who might not have caught up with all the developments, that our enhanced housing grants for lower income families are such that a family with a monthly income of as low as $1,000 can now purchase a small flat."^[12] He added that “98% of our younger cohorts, those who are below 35, earn at least $1,000 of income a month. A family that earns a bit more, say $1,500, can purchase a medium-sized flat. This is because the housing grants that have been given are more aggressive than what any other Government would give. For those who really cannot afford it, other schemes are available to help”. He was criticised for the statement by netizens who were not aware that the scheme had in fact led to many poor families being eligible and taking up the offer to own a new 2-room flat.^{[13][14][15][16]}

Other national and international appointments

In April 2017, Tharman was appointed to chair a G20 Eminent Persons Group on Global Financial Governance, which was set up to review the system of multilateral financial institutions. He also succeeded Jean-Claude Trichet as Chairman of the Group of Thirty, an independent global council of leading economic and financial policy-makers from January 1, 2017.^[17]

Tharman had previously been appointed by his international peers as Chairman of the International Monetary and Financial Committee (IMFC)^[18], the key policy forum of the IMF, for an extended period of four years from 2011; he was its first Asian chair. In announcing Tharman's selection, the IMF said that his "broad experience, deep knowledge of economic and financial issues, and active engagement with global policy makers will be highly valuable to the IMFC".^[18][19].

Tharman is the Chairman of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS).^[20] He also sits on the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation (GIC) Board, and chairs its Investment Strategy Committee.

Tharman led the SkillsFuture programme, which was launched in 2014 to provide broad-based and funded opportunities for lifelong learning among Singaporeans, aimed especially at developing the skills of the future. He subsequently chaired the tripartite Council for Skills, Innovation and Productivity (CSIP) until May 2017, which developed programmes to spur industry transformation and job upskilling across the economy.^[21]

He also chairs the International Advisory Council of the Singapore Economic Development Board,^[22] and the International Academic Advisory Panel that advises the Government on strategies for the university sector.^[23]

In addition, Tharman chairs the Ong Teng Cheong Labour Leadership Institute. He also chairs the Board of Trustees of the Singapore Indian Development Association (SINDA), which seeks to uplift educational performance and aspirations in the Indian Singapore community.^[24]

Legal charge and conviction

While serving as Director of the Economics Department of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) in 1993, Tharman was one of five persons charged under the Official Secrets Act (OSA) in a case involving the publication of Singapore's 1992 second-quarter flash projections in the Business Times newspaper. The others were a research director, Raymond Foo, and economist Manu Bhaskaran, of Crosby Securities, journalist Kenneth James and editor Patrick Daniel of the Business Times.^[25]

The OSA case, which stretched over more than a year, was reported extensively in the Singapore press.^[26] Tharman contested and was eventually acquitted of the charge of communicating the GDP growth flash projections.^[27] Senior District Judge Richard Magnus then introduced a lesser charge of negligence, because the prosecution's case was that the figures were seen on a document that he had with him in a meeting room during his meeting with the private sector economists together with one of his colleagues.^[28] Tharman also contested this lesser charge of negligence, and defended himself on the witness stand for a few days.^[29]

The Court nevertheless convicted him together with all the others in the case, including the editor of Business Times newspaper which published the figures.^[30] Tharman was fined S$1,500, and the others S$2,000.^[30] As there was no finding that he knowingly communicated any classified information, the case did not pose any hurdle to his subsequent appointment as the Managing Director of the MAS, or to his subsequent higher national responsibilities.

Personal life

Tharman is a Singaporean Indian of Ceylonese Tamil ancestry.^[31][32] One of three children, he is the son of Emeritus Professor K. Shanmugaratnam,^[32] a medical scientist known as the "father of pathology in Singapore", who founded the Singapore Cancer Registry and led a number of international organisations related to cancer research and pathology.^[33][34][35]

Tharman is married to Jane Yumiko Ittogi, a lawyer of Chinese-Japanese heritage.^[36] She is actively engaged in social enterprise and the non-profit arts sector. The couple have a daughter and three sons.

Tharman was an active sportsman in his youth, and has highlighted the way sports instills lessons for life. He spoke about sports as part of education in Game for Life: 25 Journeys^[37], published by the Singapore Sports Council in 2013, as "a huge deal for character. Children learn the value of teams. They learn the discipline of repeated practice, and how there is no other way to develop expertise. Plus, the ability to fall or lose in competition and pick oneself up and to with humility."

The Chinese translation of his name, Shàng Dámàn (尚达曼), was given to him by a leading language specialist in 1995.^[36]

References

External links

• Tharman Shanmugaratnam at cabinet.gov.sg
• Tharman Shanmugaratnam at parliament.gov.sg
• Taman Jurong Website
• Media related to Tharman Shanmugaratnam at Wikimedia Commons