At a special memorial mass for Mr Lee Kuan Yew yesterday (27 Mar), Catholic Church’s Archbishop William Goh called for the people to forgive and move on from the ‘Marxist Conspiracy’.
“I think it is important for us to move on and to forgive and, most of all, to continue to build the country,” Archbishop Goh said.
“There’s no point to go back to the past, trying to lick our wounds because it will not help in nation-building… And, as Christians, all the more we should forgive and forget.”
Organized by the Catholic Church, the special memorial mass was held at the St Joseph’s Church in Victoria Street. The mass was packed and the congregation even spilled out of the church into its surrounding carpark grounds.
The archbishop said that the 1987 Marxist conspiracy was a “dark period” in the Church’s history in Singapore.
Operation Spectrum, also known as the 1987 “Marxist Conspiracy”, was the code name for a covert security operation that took place in Singapore on 21 May 1987. 16 people were arrested and detained without trial under ISA for their alleged involvement in “a Marxist conspiracy to subvert the existing social and political system in Singapore, using communist united front tactics, with a view to establishing a Marxist state.”
On 20 June 1987, 6 more people were arrested, bringing the total number of detainees to 22. The mostly English-educated group was a mix of Catholic lay workers, social workers, overseas-educated graduates, theatre practitioners and professionals.
According to the PAP government, Operation Spectrum was conducted to “nip Communist problem(s) in the bud”. Of the 22 detained, the government pointed to Vincent Cheng, a full-time Catholic Church worker in the Justice and Peace Commission, as the key person. His role was said to use the Catholic church as a “ready cover” to organise the infiltration of disparate groups of influence including the Law Society, the opposition Workers’ Party and various student bodies. These would then become pressure groups that would eventually come into open confrontation with the government, the PAP government asserted.
By December 1987, all the detainees had been released except for Cheng. However, in April 1988, nine of the released detainees issued a joint statement denying involvement in any conspiracy and alleged that they were pressured into making confessions. Eight of the nine were re-arrested and detained for a second time. They were eventually released after they signed statutory declarations denying everything they had said in their press statement.
“We can disagree with him (Mr Lee) but the point remains… If he had been harsh with his political opponents, I gathered (this was) because this man would do everything to protect the existence of Singapore and the people,” said Archbishop Goh at the special memorial mass.
Archbishop Goh later told the media that many people were “wounded and hurt” by the 1987 incident.
Archbishop Goh also said that Mr Lee was a dedicated father who cared for the country as if the people were part of his own family. Still, while he was a leader who helped to give Singaporeans education, medical care and jobs, the archbishop said there are many people who do not agree with certain policies that Mr Lee introduced.
These included family planning policies such as the “Stop At Two” programme and the legalisation of abortion, the legalisation of casinos and his eugenics theory, which supports the idea that educated Singaporeans marry in order to produce brighter offspring.
Nevertheless, the archbishop said Mr Lee was a man who stood by his beliefs and had the vision and wisdom to turn Singapore into what it is today.
“He has left behind all those fundamental values that are necessary for the governance of Singapore: integrity, honesty, equality, justice,” Archbishop Goh said.
The archbishop said the church would not be canonising Mr Lee, “We are not canonising Mr Lee because although he was a man of many achievements… he had his flaws.”
During the mass, the congregation prayed for Mr Lee’s soul and for his family as well. Worshippers penned about 1,000 prayer messages in his memory.
Allegations in ‘Marxist Conspiracy’ questioned
The truth of the ‘Marxist Conspiracy’ allegations has been questioned in recent years.
Historians C M Turnbull and Michael D Barr have described the conspiracy as “myths” and a “fanciful narrative”, arguing that the arrests were politically motivated.
ESM Goh Chok Tong revealed in his interviews for Men in White: The Untold Stories of the PAP that former National Development Minister S. Dhanabalan left the Cabinet in 1992 because he was not comfortable with the way the PAP had dealt with the 1987 Marxist conspiracy. “At that time, given the information, he was not fully comfortable with the action we took…he felt uncomfortable and thought there could be more of such episodes in future. So he thought since he was uncomfortable, he’d better leave the Cabinet. I respected him for his view,” Mr Goh said.
Law lecturer Walter Woon, who would later assume the post of Attorney-General, said in a 1991 interview with the Straits Times that “As far as I am concerned, the government’s case is still not proven. I would not say those fellows were Red, not from the stuff they presented. I think a lot of people have this skepticism.”
And in an interview with the Straits Times on 14 December 2001, even DPM Tharman commented that “although I had no access to state intelligence, from what I knew of them, most were social activists but were not out to subvert the system.”
However, the PAP government has continued to maintain its stand that the ex-detainees had involved themselves in subversive activities which posed a threat to national security. In a public statement issued in 2011, MHA said [Link]:
http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/03/28/archbishop-were-not-canonising-lee-kuan-yew/
“I think it is important for us to move on and to forgive and, most of all, to continue to build the country,” Archbishop Goh said.
“There’s no point to go back to the past, trying to lick our wounds because it will not help in nation-building… And, as Christians, all the more we should forgive and forget.”
Organized by the Catholic Church, the special memorial mass was held at the St Joseph’s Church in Victoria Street. The mass was packed and the congregation even spilled out of the church into its surrounding carpark grounds.
The archbishop said that the 1987 Marxist conspiracy was a “dark period” in the Church’s history in Singapore.
Operation Spectrum, also known as the 1987 “Marxist Conspiracy”, was the code name for a covert security operation that took place in Singapore on 21 May 1987. 16 people were arrested and detained without trial under ISA for their alleged involvement in “a Marxist conspiracy to subvert the existing social and political system in Singapore, using communist united front tactics, with a view to establishing a Marxist state.”
On 20 June 1987, 6 more people were arrested, bringing the total number of detainees to 22. The mostly English-educated group was a mix of Catholic lay workers, social workers, overseas-educated graduates, theatre practitioners and professionals.
According to the PAP government, Operation Spectrum was conducted to “nip Communist problem(s) in the bud”. Of the 22 detained, the government pointed to Vincent Cheng, a full-time Catholic Church worker in the Justice and Peace Commission, as the key person. His role was said to use the Catholic church as a “ready cover” to organise the infiltration of disparate groups of influence including the Law Society, the opposition Workers’ Party and various student bodies. These would then become pressure groups that would eventually come into open confrontation with the government, the PAP government asserted.
By December 1987, all the detainees had been released except for Cheng. However, in April 1988, nine of the released detainees issued a joint statement denying involvement in any conspiracy and alleged that they were pressured into making confessions. Eight of the nine were re-arrested and detained for a second time. They were eventually released after they signed statutory declarations denying everything they had said in their press statement.
“We can disagree with him (Mr Lee) but the point remains… If he had been harsh with his political opponents, I gathered (this was) because this man would do everything to protect the existence of Singapore and the people,” said Archbishop Goh at the special memorial mass.
Archbishop Goh later told the media that many people were “wounded and hurt” by the 1987 incident.
Archbishop Goh also said that Mr Lee was a dedicated father who cared for the country as if the people were part of his own family. Still, while he was a leader who helped to give Singaporeans education, medical care and jobs, the archbishop said there are many people who do not agree with certain policies that Mr Lee introduced.
These included family planning policies such as the “Stop At Two” programme and the legalisation of abortion, the legalisation of casinos and his eugenics theory, which supports the idea that educated Singaporeans marry in order to produce brighter offspring.
Nevertheless, the archbishop said Mr Lee was a man who stood by his beliefs and had the vision and wisdom to turn Singapore into what it is today.
“He has left behind all those fundamental values that are necessary for the governance of Singapore: integrity, honesty, equality, justice,” Archbishop Goh said.
The archbishop said the church would not be canonising Mr Lee, “We are not canonising Mr Lee because although he was a man of many achievements… he had his flaws.”
During the mass, the congregation prayed for Mr Lee’s soul and for his family as well. Worshippers penned about 1,000 prayer messages in his memory.
Allegations in ‘Marxist Conspiracy’ questioned
The truth of the ‘Marxist Conspiracy’ allegations has been questioned in recent years.
Historians C M Turnbull and Michael D Barr have described the conspiracy as “myths” and a “fanciful narrative”, arguing that the arrests were politically motivated.
ESM Goh Chok Tong revealed in his interviews for Men in White: The Untold Stories of the PAP that former National Development Minister S. Dhanabalan left the Cabinet in 1992 because he was not comfortable with the way the PAP had dealt with the 1987 Marxist conspiracy. “At that time, given the information, he was not fully comfortable with the action we took…he felt uncomfortable and thought there could be more of such episodes in future. So he thought since he was uncomfortable, he’d better leave the Cabinet. I respected him for his view,” Mr Goh said.
Law lecturer Walter Woon, who would later assume the post of Attorney-General, said in a 1991 interview with the Straits Times that “As far as I am concerned, the government’s case is still not proven. I would not say those fellows were Red, not from the stuff they presented. I think a lot of people have this skepticism.”
And in an interview with the Straits Times on 14 December 2001, even DPM Tharman commented that “although I had no access to state intelligence, from what I knew of them, most were social activists but were not out to subvert the system.”
However, the PAP government has continued to maintain its stand that the ex-detainees had involved themselves in subversive activities which posed a threat to national security. In a public statement issued in 2011, MHA said [Link]:
http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/03/28/archbishop-were-not-canonising-lee-kuan-yew/
