Elected officials serving in international bodies help Singapore to punch above its weight

AFTER his election as president in September, Tharman Shanmugaratnam said he would review his various international appointments now that he had become Singapore’s head of state. He would act on the Cabinet’s advice whether keeping the appointments would be in Singapore’s interest.

These include chairing the Group of Thirty (G30) board of trustees, co-chairing the OECD Global Commission on the Economics of Water (GCEW) and the advisory board of the UN Human Development Report (HDR), and being a trustee of the World Economic Forum.

It begs the questions: Should our leaders contribute some of their time, energy and expertise to foreign bodies? Should they focus more on domestic priorities and concerns? And how do such appointments serve the national interest?