Singapore water deal: why Malaysia should stop playing the victim

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The Malaysian state of Johor as seen from Singapore, with the causeway linking either side. Singapore buys raw untreated water from Malaysia at 3 sen per 1,000 gallons, and sells back treated water at a highly subsidised rate to Johor out of good neighbourliness. Photo: AFP

Published: 8:00am, 8 Sep 2018Updated: 12:29pm, 8 Sep 2018

I refer to former Malaysian finance minister Daim Zainuddin’s gratuitous suggestion that it “must have been easy” for Singapore to gain from its partnership with a “kleptocratic” Malaysia under former prime minister Najib Razak, especially given that the financial integrity of the city state’s major projects with the former Barisan Nasional government was based on an open tender bidding system.

Where Malaysia’s 1962 water agreement with Singapore is concerned, he can certainly do better than take the high moral ground of rehashing his country’s tired stereotype of the city state as a “legalistic” counter-party (“Water war brews as Malaysia’s Mahathir wants Singapore to cough up more”, September 2).

While it is true that Singapore buys raw untreated water from Malaysia at 3 sen per 1,000 gallons according to the deal, it also sells back treated water at a highly subsidised rate to the Johor state government out of good neighbourliness.

In addition, Singapore has also reportedly spent over S$1 billion (US$726 million) on water management infrastructure in the Malaysian state over the last couple of decades, with Malaysia not footing a single cent.

These are facts that several Malaysian governments under Dr Mahathir Mohamad have continued to ignore, to paint Singapore as a callous and unreasonable “legalistic” partner.

Yet Daim insinuates that the republic is incapable of seeing the big picture of sustainable long-term relations without due consideration to the interests and feelings of both countries.

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