Behind ‘Riot Island’: Filmmaker talks Singapore prison documentary

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Almost 60 years ago to the day, a Singaporean effort to create a model prison came to a burning halt. 

Once heralded as a potential blueprint for a more humane kind of incarceration, the penal colony on the island of Pulau Senang quickly became synonymous with chaos and bloodshed. In 1963, the detainees held on the island revolted, burning the structures they’d built themselves and murdering British Superintendent Daniel Stanley Dutton and three other warders. 

Though the riots garnered international coverage, the story quickly became muted, eclipsed in the wake of Singapore’s independence two years later. It was this slipping from collective memory that intrigued British director and producer Tom St John Gray, a long-time resident of the city-state who sought to unearth the story of Pulau Senang for modern audiences. The two-part documentary, Riot Island, devised and produced by award-winning Singapore-based Peddling Pictures, aired in October. It was commissioned by broadcaster CNA and is now available to watch on CNA Insider’s YouTube platform.

“[In the middle of] a well-told Singaporean narrative of  a nation emerging from colonial order was kind of an almost unknown story,” he told the Globe. “As a filmmaker, you’re really drawn to something that’s faded from history.”

In an interview, St John Gray shared more about the process of uncovering history and sharing the story of Pulau Senang with the world. 

What was it that drew you to the Pulau Senang prison island and inspired you to tell this story?
In the 1950s and 1960s, there’s this well-told Singaporean narrative of a nation emerging from colonial order, the end of empire, and Singapore’s road to self-rule and independence. And then, across that sort of decade, there was the merger [with Malaysia], separation, race riots, Konfrontasi, all seismic events. 

[And] the middle of all these, these very well-known events was [an] almost unknown story, very self-contained, happening on an island in Singapore. 

I felt as a filmmaker, as a storyteller, it always felt Shakespearean – this grand tragedy playing out on this sort of mysterious, almost mythical island. It was full of hope and ambition and ended in hubris and death.

When we started to make this documentary, at the beginning, I spoke to lots of people and the majority of people had never heard of it before. And so that’s obviously as a filmmaker, you’re really drawn to something which kind of feels very interesting and intriguing. Why has it faded from history? And it was a major event at the time, which is a curiosity in itself. Why did something which was always in the newspapers, always in the headlines, it was a coffee shop talking point that faded from consciousness.

Did you discover the answer? Why did the story of Pulau Senang fade from public consciousness? 
It kind of got moved out of the hierarchy of trauma, I guess, of  Singapore in the 1960s. But I also do think it’s really telling when you look at the pedigree of the island, in a sense, that it was spearheaded by a number of people, including (future third president of Singapore) Devan Nair. 

And later on, when it came to fruition, this island was visited by the VIPs, the great leaders of the time. Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, the president, all who at that time [were] young politicians, they’re coming to this full of hope. So I think the unmitigated disaster that erupted just two years later must have been a very deep cut. If you pay so much money and attention towards this project and it fails so cataclysmically it must have been very difficult at the time to reconcile that. It was a terrible disaster that smashed a lot of hopes and dreams. And so, in some sense, there’s an element of historical amnesia – why would you want to remember this story?

Do you think the attack on British Superintendent Dutton can be viewed as a microcosm of wider attitudes and resentment towards British colonial rule?
Dutton was a man of the colonial era of the British Empire, a system that believed in British rule. He’s obviously married to [Malay-Singaporean fashion designer] Vicky Dutton [so] had a connection to this Malay world and he also spoke Hokkien. So that was interesting, in a sense, as to how Dutton is seen. 

Certainly some people we spoke to said Dutton would have been a target because he was symbolised as Britain, British rule. But I think that’s a difficult one to know about ever finding any specific evidence. Very grisly ends were meted out to the other three men who died, so I certainly would advocate that maybe these are just people in positions of power. 

These are gang members who had their own power on the mainland, and they were taken to his island and were all pretty much rendered powerless. So you would look to those people who are wielding that power, who are calling the shots, and I think whoever would have been in that position would have been hated or reviled by a group within the island.

What do you think it was that ultimately triggered his death?
The fact that he lived on the island in the early days in a tent alongside the men and the fact he seemed to have the respect for the men at the beginning shows that perhaps the problem was the corruption that happened later on, the corruption of the guards, maybe the corruption of his mind as accolades and honours grew up around him. It was already a gold star prison [and] rehabilitation centre, but Dutton was driven to overreach. And I think that’s what triggered his demise.

You spoke to some of the last surviving detainees of Pulau Senang. What did they share and what did you learn from their stories and experiences? 
What’s really fascinating is that when you talk to these people who’ve been there, they are very matter-of-fact, they had witnessed all of this, but it was something that was very much of their experience. But what I also noticed was that the trauma that lingers from this was very much alive. Lots of people we spoke to, who would not talk on camera, [this is] still very heavy for them, this is something that was within them and their families today. 

People felt worried about talking about secret society members or the events that might have happened and no matter if those threats exist now or not, it just shows that they were lingering. There was something that was so seared into their memory, seared into their psyche.

Tell me a little bit about the process of sharing those stories and making the documentary. 
Peddling Pictures wanted to make a series that was research-heavy and rich in historical detail. The team had this whiteboard where we wrote down the names of all 18 men who were executed, but also alongside that other key men who were part of the group – obviously Dutton and some of the officers – and we really put that as a marker of who we could find, who still exists today. So that became our motivation: there must be people around who are willing to talk to us who can give us a new perspective on this.

We set out to track down these people and that took months of everything from going into the traditional routes, like going into libraries, looking at files, reading books, to trawling through social media and genealogy sites. And that’s how we found Michael [Dutton], through a genealogy site, and we found other members of the Dutton family on a Facebook post.

Episode One is more complimentary about Dutton and his achievements and Episode Two shows the darker side emerging. And that was important, layering in historical documents, historical facts and events, kind of getting a sense of the story but also not letting it be bogged down by too much history.

How did you approach the reenactments of the riots? 
Peddling Pictures filmed the drama reenactments in Thailand with a large cast and crew, and with locations, props and wardrobe that needed to look historically accurate. There were many team discussions about how to correctly depict the terrible death and destruction that later ensued. I think what was really important for us was to say this was an island with a name that translates to “Island of Ease”. There was this tranquillity which was then jolted into this absolute carnage, this sort of eruption. People met their end and in a very grisly way. 

But also there were scores and scores of guards and people around who were very badly injured, who survived but had terrible injuries. So I think it was really important for us to show this kind of jolting violence to take the audience into why it was so shocking. And I think if you don’t have those moments of carnage, it’s hard to understand why down the line 58 men would face potential death penalty and why 18 men were sent to the gallows.

The documentary was a three-time winner at the recent New York Festivals TV & Film Awards 2023 in April. How have you felt about the reception of the “Riot Island’ documentary?
What was really heartening was that when you make history documentaries, you try and make it for a broad audience. You don’t just want history buffs, you want to attract people from across the gamut. And I think [it reached] people who weren’t normally interested in 1960s Singapore history, people from across different generations. It felt like a fresh take on the era, something they hadn’t heard before. 

And getting these accolades, it was really heartening to realise that something very local can be recognised on a global level. It showed there are so many interesting facets out there about Singapore that have not been told, it’s a really rich history with lots of themes and stories that need to be shared. It wasn’t just a Singapore story, it was a story relatable to everyone, a story of great promise, great tragedy and with this very bloody retribution at the end. 

What, with decades of hindsight, would you say is the main lesson learnt from the Pulau Senang riot? 
You could learn about law and order, about having the right people in the right job. But for me, the reason it’s so tragic is there’s this question: “What if?”

In the first year, we see there’s a huge success rate, detainees who were rehabilitated. And obviously we now know with hindsight, that that’s not so rosy, because these men were detained without trial and they were essentially used as workhorses. But, with that in mind, what if? What if Dutton hadn’t pushed them too hard? What if he had set in motion this incredible infrastructure, where men could work on the island and be able to really contribute something meaningful to society? And my final feeling is: would the Singapore system be different today because of that? 

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The unpalatable necessity of engaging with the Taliban

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One would be hard pressed to find someone as diametrically opposed to the Taliban’s ideology as Mahbouba Seraj.

A distinguished human-rights advocate and Nobel Peace Prize nominee, Seraj, 75, resides in Afghanistan and is executive director of the Afghan Women Skills Development Center and manages domestic-violence shelters for women and children. And yet she has called for dialogue with the regime as her country is mired in a humanitarian crisis.

“After 18 months of brutality, it’s time to hear their side of the story too. We really have to come up with some agreement. Talks have to start with the Taliban.”

Her call for engagement with the Taliban is not despite its odious treatment of women, but because of it. Seraj is among a growing chorus of voices that have said not engaging with the Taliban is going to make life much worse for those segments of Afghan society that are suffering the most. 

Last year Deborah Lyons, then head of the UN Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), called for the international community to work directly with the Taliban. Hinting at US sanctions that had shut Afghanistan off from the global financial system, Lyons said Afghan businesses were closing, unemployment increasing and poverty rising.

Afghanistan continues to face unprecedented humanitarian, economic and climate-related challenges. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) has reported that 28.8 million people, out of the 38 million population, urgently need humanitarian assistance, 17 million face acute hunger, and 60% of the population faces difficulty accessing water.

Of an estimated US$3.2 billion required to fund humanitarian assistance in 2023, UNOCHA has received just $742.3 million. 

US role

The road to mitigating the Afghan people’s suffering, however, goes through Washington.

A retired Central Intelligence Agency official recently suggested the US maintain a presence in Kabul for counterterrorism purposes against Islamic State (ISIS). As one-dimensional as this suggestion is, the Taliban might welcome it, as they consider ISIS’ Afghan franchise, ISIS-Khorasan Province (ISKP), their mortal enemy.

Such an engagement could provide an opportunity for the international community to influence the regime’s policies. As some reports have pointed out, the Taliban’s oppression of women may be born of a political choice rather than ideology, or could be due to internal power struggles.

Through strategic engagement and incentives, the international community could exploit the regime’s internal divisions to benefit ordinary Afghans.

Since the Taliban’s takeover in 2021, civilian casualties have continued due to violence by non-state actors, with 1,095 killed and 2,679 wounded, the UN has said. This is, however, a decrease from 2020, when there were 8,820 civilian casualties, including 3,035 deaths. The latest UN report accuses ISKP of most attacks.

Last December, ISKP claimed responsibility for an attack on a Chinese-owned hotel in Kabul, prompting China to advise its citizens to leave Afghanistan. The group has openly threatened to assassinate the leaders of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan and has increased recruitment propaganda in the region’s languages.

This perhaps explains why Afghanistan’s neighbors are ready to maintain working relationships with the Taliban.

Why is the US dithering? It could be a matter of imperial hubris. Historically, the US has not reacted well to strategic defeats that hinder its global influence.

Three strategic defeats of the 20th century come to mind – Vietnam, where a guerrilla army defeated a superpower; Cuba – where a communist regime in America’s back yard defeated a CIA-backed “regime change” operation; and Iran – where a popular uprising toppled a pro-US regime that upheld Iran as one of the twin pillars of Washington’s Middle East policy.

By contrast, the US has mostly showcased the Taliban’s coming to power as a tactical defeat – poorly designed reconstruction strategies and, as US President Joe Biden put it, Afghanistan’s pre-Taliban leadership are to blame.

This cynical political packaging of the fiasco ought to insulate the Biden administration from political blowback should it decide to engage with the Taliban.

Even Russia is gradually pursuing engagement with the Taliban, despite the fact that many in the Taliban leadership fought alongside the Afghan mujahideen in the 1980s against the Soviet occupation, a catastrophic defeat for the USSR that catalyzed its eventual disintegration.

Despite the US withdrawal, the fate of Afghans remains tied to Washington’s decisions. The Biden administration’s Afghanistan policy remains undecided, with a preference thus far for piecemeal humanitarian interventions.

Some experts have called for the US to distinguish between the Taliban regime and the Afghan state, that is, continue targeted sanctions on Taliban leaders while funding specific functions of the Afghan state, knowing full well that a Taliban-ruled Afghanistan is not going to win awards for democracy or women’s rights any time soon.

With Washington focused on Ukraine and China, one hopes that if not for humanitarian reasons, then at least the mounds of mineral resources in Afghanistan may make US policymakers consider engaging with the regime.

If this improves the lives of Afghan people, particularly women and minorities, that would be a fortunate and welcome byproduct. And true to form, future American presidents may just find it politically convenient to claim they did it all for the women of Afghanistan.

This article was provided by Syndication Bureau, which holds copyright.

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How a US soldier made a mad dash into North Korea

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SEOUL/WASHINGTON: US Army Private Travis T King had finished serving time in detention in South Korea and was being escorted to the airport to fly home and likely face disciplinary action. But he never made it to his plane. Instead, he passed alone through security to his departure gate andContinue Reading

Jacky Cheung wows Singapore concert crowd with the same perfect split he did in Macao

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2. HE IS PROBABLY THE ONLY 62-YEAR-OLD WHO LOOKS SO GOOD IN SKINTIGHT LEATHER PANTS 

Jacky Cheung turned 62 on Jul 10. As he launched into his song Another 10 Years, an AI video montage played, starting with a young Cheung morphing into an old man with the rhetorical question: “How many more decades will there be?”

It was a sobering thought for everyone in the house, though Cheung gave the crowd a timely reminder by sharing: “Age is just a number. For example, I wanted to hold a concert (at my age). So I did.”

He didn’t just hold a standard issue concert, though. While some 60-something folks we know are wearing 3XL-sized clothing from Uniqlo, Cheung is dancing, gyrating and singing on stage in well-fitted suits and skintight leather pants that look like they have been spray-painted on him. And he’s going to do this for 11 nights. If the fashion police gave out public service awards, Cheung would be the first to receive one.

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Deng and ‘Gee, whiz’: the 1st PRC-based US reporters

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The deterioration in Sino-American relations in recent years has led, among many other consequences, to a dramatic drop in the size of the American press corps based in China.  For reasons that include expulsions and visa denials, the number of American journalists on the ground in China is lower than at any time in decades. It’s an appropriate time to look back on the pioneering generation of reporters who opened the first US news bureaus in China after the establishment of diplomatic relations in 1979. Their stories are recounted in this excerpt from Assignment China: An Oral History of American Journalists in the People’s Republic, a new book by Mike Chinoy, who served as CNN’s first Beijing bureau chief. –Editors

With the establishment of diplomatic relations, the Chinese government agreed to allow American news organizations to open bureaus in Beijing, and the Carter administration welcomed Chinese journalists to be based in Washington. For the newly arrived American reporters, Deng Xiaoping’s policies of economic reform and opening China to the world up after the isolation of the Mao years was the major story.

Sandy Gilmour had been the NBC News Houston correspondent when asked by the network to open its bureau in Beijing.

Sandy Gilmour, NBC News, reporting from Shenzhen, Photo courtesy of Sandy Gilmoour

Sandy Gilmour, NBC News:

Clearly the primary story was the economic opening to the West, China beginning to develop some semblance of private enterprise, to reform this socialist command economy. I tried to do as many stories along those lines as I could. And slice-of-life. Those kinds of stories were always very popular. You could go out on the street, and you could shoot street scenes, bicycles, people walking, the cabbage piled up on the sidewalks in the wintertime for storage, stores and shops and so forth. You could go up to people and ask them questions, although many didn’t want to answer because they were afraid of the potential consequences, even if it was a nonpolitical question such as “How do you enjoy life?” But to get into a Chinese enterprise, to go to a collective farm, a factory, those kinds of things took weeks and weeks of preparation, of phone calls, of begging and pleading and wheedling with the office in the Foreign Ministry that permitted correspondents to get out and do their business. It was extremely frustrating.

§

CBS sent Bruce Dunning, who had spent years covering the war in Vietnam.

Bruce Dunning (1940-2013). Photo: the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan

Bruce Dunning, CBS News:

A lot of us were trying to counteract the years of “Red China Menace” kind of stories and say, “These are people.” It’s the largest country in the world. What are they really like? There was generally a lot of good feeling. Early on, you could get almost anything on the air. There was just that novelty, you know: We have a bureau in Beijing. We have a presence in China. They were willing to put almost anything on the air.

§

Jim Laurie, who arrived for ABC News, also had covered Vietnam and had been one of the few American journalists to stay in Saigon after the Communist victory.

L-R, Frank Ching, Wall Street Journal, and Jim Laurie, ABC News, with Deng Xiaoping, Beijing, January 1979. Photo courtesy of Jim Laurie

Jim Laurie, ABC News:

In the early days, the opening of China to the West, there was a “gee whiz” mentality. If you go back and look at the programming on ABC, NBC and CBS in 1979, that is very much reflected. China opening up. Every little innovation that was part of the reform program that Deng was outlining was seized upon. The first private restaurant. The first private car. It was all a series of firsts. There was an insatiable appetite for slice-of- life stories, particularly if you could get good images. It’s hard to understand now, but you’ve got to realize that in this period, ’79 to ’83, this was “coming out” for China. Very little had been seen of China, especially by American TV viewers. So almost anything that was visually interesting went.

§

Bruce Dunning, CBS News:

We did stories on private restaurants. People would set up restaurants in their homes and those were some of the first examples of private enterprise.

I remember when free markets began to show up on the outskirts of Beijing, just a few farmers setting up primitive benches and selling produce, but it was such an improvement over the state stores and the quality of produce just increased remarkably.

§

Linda Mathews, who had been working in Hong Kong for the Asian Wall Street Journal, opened the Los Angeles Times bureau.

Linda Mathews, Los Angeles Times:

On Good Friday 1980, some of the churches were just being reopened after being shut down during the Cultural Revolution. We walked into a church and met this bishop named Moses Xie. There was a choir practicing for Sunday services, and they had hand-lettered hymnals because the real hymnals had been burned during the Cultural Revolution. They were singing in Chinese, “Rise up, you men of God.” It was a magical moment to be in a Chinese church, which had been a factory for years and years, and here was a choir and a couple of Jesuits.

Linda’s husband Jay, who had studied Chinese at Harvard, became the Washington Post bureau chief.  They faced a special problem, as neither of their papers was happy having its correspondent married to the competition.

Jay Mathews, Washington Post, and Linda Mathews, Los Angeles Times, at the Ming Tombs, Beijing, Photo courtesy of Jay and Linda Mathews

Jay Mathews, Washington Post:

The Washington Post had a tradition of correspondents signing a letter of understanding before they went overseas. There was a paragraph in my letter which said, Don’t you dare ever be beaten by your wife on any kind of story, and if you can beat her as often as possible, that’s fine. And I signed that very happily. But we’ve learned, as correspondents go overseas, that they do team up.

§

As part of his reforms, Deng Xiaoping authorized the establishment of four special zones along the country’s southeastern coast as laboratories to experiment with market-style economics, and, he hoped, spearhead economic growth. For the first time since the Communist revolution, capitalist activities such as private enterprise and foreign investment were not only permitted but actively encouraged. The first zone was Shenzhen, at the time just a small fishing community directly across the border from Hong Kong.

Frank Ching, born in Hong Kong, edited China stories for several years for the New York Times. In 1974, he returned to the territory to join the Asian Wall Street Journal before being assigned to Beijing.

Frank Ching, Wall Street Journal:

Shenzhen was nothing. A little village, very few people. When you first went down, there was nothing to see. They hadn’t done anything yet. But they talked about their plans. Now there are millions of people. It’s incredible that China could build up a city like this almost overnight.

§

Liu Heung-shing, who had also been born in Hong Kong, joined the Associated Press bureau in Beijing.

Coca-Cola’s entry into the China market was a huge story. Here’s is a famous shot by Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Liu Heung-Shing. Source: YouTube

Liu Heung-Shing, Time, Associated Press:

They were laying out their blueprints and telling us where they’re going to build a highway and where they’re going to build a Holiday Inn hotel and convention center, where they’re going to build the port. And the reaction from my colleagues on that trip was that, “Yeah, right.”

§

Like Jay Mathews, Richard Bernstein had studied Chinese at Harvard. He had been serving as Time magazine’s Hong Kong correspondent.

Richard Bernstein, (Time,) on a train, Photo courtesy Liu Heung-Shing

Richard Bernstein, Time:

I think what we got wrong was, we totally underestimated the ability of China to change rapidly. Nobody could have predicted. We certainly didn’t predict the extent to which China would become a country like a lot of others.

§

Some of the most dramatic changes began to unfold in the countryside, where Deng Xiaoping authorized the breakup of that symbol of radical Maoism, the people’s communes. The collective farms, set up during the Great Leap Forward in the late 1950s, were replaced by a system of household family farming that sharply boosted rural incomes.

Melinda Liu, a Chinese American from Ohio, opened the Newsweek bureau.

Melinda Liu, Newsweek:

The People’s Commune system was such an icon of Maoism. The fact that it was being broken up into family-based farms, which turned out to be much more productive than the big collectives, was very telling. On the group visits, the challenge was, how do you get anything out of it that’s not the same as everyone else? There was one of these group visits to Anhui where a People’s Commune was being literally parceled out. I kind of infiltrated a family and they were so excited and really happy. One farmer was like, “Yeah, I got such and such a plot, [of land].” They had even divided up the wheelbarrow so that someone had half, and someone had the other half. “My neighbor got the wheel, and I got the rest of it.” And I’m like, “How is that going to work?” But they were so happy.

§

Indeed, as the Mao years faded into memory, the dominant theme in the China of Deng Xiaoping was hope.

Jay Mathews, Washington Post:

We were fairly hopeful. This very strong culture was coming back, was building businesses, was creating a government that was more responsive to the people’s needs, was letting people talk more freely, if not in the public press. That was unleashing all kinds of interesting and hopeful changes in the way Chinese were going about their lives – and producing flashes of humor, creative art, filmmaking, things they hadn’t had before and were going in interesting directions. I am an optimist, so I was always looking to see the glass half full, and I thought the glass was really getting much fuller.

###

Mike Chinoy, a non-resident senior fellow at the University of Southern California’s US-China Institute, spent 24 years as a foreign correspondent for CNN, serving as the network’s first Beijing bureau chief and senior Asia correspondent. He won Emmy, Dupont and Peabody Awards for his coverage of Tiananmen Square. He is the author of five books including China Live: People Power and the Television Revolution; Meltdown: The Inside Story of the North Korean Nuclear Crisis; The Last POW; and Are You With Me: Kevin Boyle and the Rise of the Human Rights Movement. This excerpt adapted from his Assignment China: An Oral History of American Journalists in the People’s Republlic, is copyright © 2023 Columbia University Press. Used by arrangement with the publisher. All rights reserved.

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Watch the video: K-pop supergroup BTS’ Jungkook releases solo single Seven

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Jungkook, a member of K-Pop supergroup BTS, officially launched on Friday (Jul 14) his solo career with the release of single Seven, a track also featuring American rapper Latto.

BTS is on temporary break as a group with two of its seven members currently doing mandatory military service in South Korea, but other members are continuing to carry out solo projects and concerts.

The group have gained a huge international following after breaking ground for K-pop’s global success including in the US music charts and industry awards.

The video for Seven – described by his music label as an invigorating summer song – was also revealed on Friday and includes an appearance by South Korean actress Han So-hee.

His label BigHit is part of South Korean entertainment company HYBE and also manages BTS.

Ahead of his official solo debut, Jungkook previously released two free singles.

Fans have been camping out for days to get a chance to see the K-pop star perform his new song in New York’s Central Park on Friday.

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FinanceAsia Volume Two 2023 | FinanceAsia

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By now, most of our subscribers will have received print editions of the latest FinanceAsia Magazine: Volume Two 2023. 

Over the course of the summer, we look forward to sharing online our in-depth magazine features, including the detailed rationale behind our jury’s selection of winners across our recent flagship FA Awards process.

You can access the full online edition here.

To whet your appetite, read on for our editor’s note.

Positive predictions

As a snake (according to the Chinese zodiac), I have so far fulfilled my Year of the Rabbit prophecy in securing opportunity for career growth within the Haymarket Asia business. A successor will soon have the good fortune to step up as editor in my place, as I become content and business director and oversee the editorial strategy of our finance publications: FinanceAsia, CorporateTreasurer and AsianInvestor.

It is said that those born in 2023 will be blessed with vigilance and quick-mindedness. Very useful personality traits, I would think, as artificial intelligence (AI) advances globally, at pace. We are witnessing great development in this field in Hong Kong – and across the wider Asian economy, as emerging tech becomes the next positive disruptor and the capital markets work to respond through evolving regulation and new listing regimes.

In this summer issue, Christopher Chu delves into the value disruption put forward by generative AI, with consultants estimating its worth to breach $16 trillion by 2030. He explores its sophistication and how its potential is interwoven with political factors, while questions are posed around data ownership.

Also intertwined within the realm of transformative technology, is this edition’s flagship interview with BNP Paribas’ CEO for Asia Pacific, Paul Yang. He shares his journey navigating a career path that has taken him from IT coding in Paris, to leadership of the bank’s Asia Pacific business. He offers insights around his accomplishments to date and details plans to progress the bank’s 2025 Growth, Technology and Sustainability (GTS) strategy.

Reviewing activity across Southeast Asia, Liza Tan inspects the market’s prominent position in the ongoing start-up story, through assessment of the current venture capital (VC) fundraising landscape. Her discussion with experts asserts that fintech is inherently fused with human approach and that quality conversations and connections are key to future success.

Indeed, as FinanceAsia’s recent in-person awards celebration underlined, we have much to look forward to in the second half of the year and it is the human elements involved in dealmaking that have capacity to shape the road ahead. I think we all agree that recognising and nurturing talent is vital and so I hope you enjoy reading our evaluation of market resourcefulness, ingenuity and skill that informed the jury’s selection of award winners, amongst truly outstanding competition.

Finally, Sara Velezmoro and I explore the outlook for Asia’s debt capital markets – investigating what opportunity is on offer alongside the changing environment; and whether the momentum surrounding Japanese equities can be sustained, if the government were to reverse yield curve control.

Amid uncertainty we must focus on potential, so please join me in acknowledging the positive strides being taken by Asia’s market movers.

Ella Arwyn Jones

(Please feel free to send feedback or suggestions to [email protected])

 

¬ Haymarket Media Limited. All rights reserved.

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Coco Lee: The pioneering singer who charmed the world

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Coco Lee at Hainan Island International Film Festival in 2020Getty Images
By Kelly Ng & Tessa Wong
BBC News

Millions of Asians tuned in on their television and mobile screens on what a Monday in March 2001 to watch Coco Lee sing A Love Before Time – the stirring theme from the acclaimed film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon – at the 73rd Academy Awards.

Donning a red qipao, a traditional Chinese outfit, and golden chandelier earrings, Lee sang alongside a group of kungfu dancers, becoming the first Chinese-American to perform at the Oscars. The song was also nominated for best original song that year.

The then 26-year-old spoke of her ambition to leave an Asian footprint, literally, on the international stage. “I could sing for 30 years and never get the chance to perform like this,” Lee had said of the ground-breaking performance.

Lee died in Hong Kong on Wednesday at the age of 48. Her sisters, who broke the news on social media, said she had been suffering from depression for a few years and tried to take her own life on Sunday.

Long before representation became a talking point in entertainment, Lee became one of the first Asian singers to shoot to fame on both sides of the Pacific.

Born Ferren Lee on January 17, 1975, in Hong Kong, she moved to the US with her family when she was a secondary school student. After graduating from a public high school in California, she returned to Hong Kong, and then moved to Taiwan to launch her singing career. She soon broke into the Mandopop scene in 1994 with two albums.

Within a few years, she released English-language albums and crossed over to American charts. Disney hired her to voice the lead character in the Mandarin version of its hit film Mulan, for which she also sang the theme song, Reflection.

Her hit Before I Fall in Love made it to the soundtrack of the Julia Roberts-and-Richard Gere film Runaway Bride; and Do You Want My Love soared to the fourth spot on the US Billboard in 2000.

Coco Lee performing with Johnny Legend in 2011 in Beijing

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Lee will be remembered for “laying the groundwork, culturally and musically,” in bridging the gap between East Asian and Western audiences, entertainment blogger Brandon Lewis told the BBC. Some fans likened her to Mariah Carey.

She holds a special spot among Chinese millennials who grew up listening to her music in Mandarin and English. It was a time when Mandopop flourished as economies like China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore boomed. Amid a sea of demure female singers crooning ballads, Li Wen – as she is known in the Chinese-speaking world – stood out with her confident image, sexy dance moves and brightly-coloured locks.

One of her songs Di Da Di, a Chinese cover of a Danish pop song, became an instant hit and a karaoke staple after it appeared in an advertisement in mainland China.

Behind the fame and flamboyance, Lee remained close with her mother and sisters.

In the early years of her career, her sister Nancy served as Lee’s wardrobe consultant, public relations officer and makeup artist – including on Oscar night – while her mother was manager and accountant. It was in fact Nancy who suggested the moniker Coco.

As a child, Lee had wanted to follow in her mother’s footsteps to become a doctor. She initially tried to juggle singing with pre-medical studies in university, but eventually left school to focus on her pop career.

In an Instagram post on Wednesday, Lee’s sisters Carol and Nancy spoke poignantly of how their younger sister “worked tirelessly to open up a new world for Chinese singers in the international music scene”.

Coco Lee performing with the Black Eyed Peas in 2011 in Beijing

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“She went all out to shine for the Chinese. We are proud of her,” they wrote.

Lee’s death came as a shock to fans and fellow artistes who remember her for her shiny smile and exuberance on stage. Inevitably, it sparked a discussion about mental health on social media.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon director Ang Lee said he was “very shocked” to hear the news, and star Jackie Chan said Lee had “such great talent and unique personal style” and was “born to be a star”. “There will be one more star in the sky from now on,” he added.

On YouTube, where fans are re-watching Lee’s music videos and leaving tributes, one comment read: “I hope Li Wen can continue singing up in heaven, far away from pain and illness. Your song will forever live in our hearts.”

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Taiwan celebrates linguistic diversity at annual music awards

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“My friend asked me, why don’t you sing good songs in Chinese?”, Peng said upon receiving the prize in Taipei. “I don’t think there should be language restrictions on singing.”

Cheng, speaking in Mandarin, thanked the Taiwanese language for “teaching me how to bow my head and slow down”.

In the indigenous language category, the Paiwan singers Kasiwa and Matzka rapped and sang in their native tongue, with Kasiwa getting the prestigious jury award.

While Taiwan has only 23 million people, its music scene has an outsized influence in the Chinese-speaking world, in part due to creativity unhindered by censorship.

Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen wrote on her Facebook and Instagram pages that at the show the love of music had “eliminated language boundaries between different ethnic groups”.

“Here, no matter what language everyone uses – Taiwanese, Hakka, indigenous languages, Mandarin, English and Japanese – they can all sing freely, which also brings us together.”

Disco queen Ouyang Fei Fei, one of two special contribution award winners and as famous for her big hair as her big voice, broke through in Japan in the 1970s singing in Japanese.

“Singing and performing have always been my dream. If I can, I will continue to sing and never give up,” Ouyang, now 73, told the audience.

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