"What role would men and governments in new countries like the mass media to play?... The mass media can help to present Singapore's problems simply and clearly and then explain how if they support certain programmes and policies these problems can be solved. More important, we want the mass media to reinforce, not to undermine, the cultural values and social attitudes being inculcated in our schools and universities."

"Freedom of the press, freedom of the news media, must be subordinated to the overriding needs of the integrity of Singapore, and to the primacy of purpose of an elected government."

"I don't know why Amnesty International always picks on people who are not very popular with Communists."

"If all the 300 (top civil servants and political elite) were to crash in one jumbo jet, then Singapore will disintegrate."

"We have a reputation, which I hope is somewhat deserved, that we are a kind of little Switzerland in South-East Asia."

"Our unions are different: if we had British-style trade unionism we should be bankrupt, finished."

"Whoever governs Singapore must have that iron in him. Or give it up. This is not a game of cards! This is your life and mine! I've spent a whole lifetime building this and as long as I'm in charge, nobody is going to knock it down."

"Look, Jeyaretnam can't win the infighting. I'll tell you why. WE are in charge. Every government ministry and department is under our control. And in the infighting, he will go down for the count every time... I will make him crawl on his bended knees, and beg for mercy."

"Let us not deceive ourselves: our talent profile is nowhere near that of, say, the Jews or the Japanese in America. The exceptional number of Nobel Prize winners who are Jews is no accident. It is also no accident that a high percentage, sometimes 50%, of faculty members in the top American universities on both the east and west coasts are Jews. And the number of high calibre Japanese academics, professionals, and business executives is out of all proportion to the percentage of Japanese in the total American population"