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Malaysia Minister of Housing and Local Government Nga Kor Ming ruffled some feathers with a speech eight years ago where he had rousingly asked Singaporeans to work in Malaysia.<\/p>\n
In an interview with Malaysian news site Oriental Daily published on Friday (June 26), Nga reflected on his statement, adding that it was not intended to be negative.<\/p>\n
He explained the speech was said during a time when Malaysia was in “dire need of rebuilding”, and that it was intended to incentivise and motivate Malaysia into striving for progress, so that Singaporeans would want to work in Malaysia.<\/p>\n
“This vision has gradually been turning into reality,” Nga said in Mandarin, citing H&M shifting its Southeast Asian headquarters<\/a> from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur, along with Gardenia moving its production to Malaysia<\/a> as two examples of this shift in movement.<\/p>\n Nonetheless, Nga reiterated that the current stance Malaysia holds is not to hire Singaporeans as foreign labour, but rather to focus on becoming friends with both Singapore and the rest of the world.<\/p>\n “Singapore and Malaysia will forever be good neighbours, good siblings and good friends,” Nga said, adding both countries heavily rely on each other.<\/p>\n “Next year, on Jan 1 when the RTS is done, the best situation is that we will have Malaysians who go to Singapore and earn Singapore dollars while spending Malaysian ringgit. This is currently the direction we are working towards \u2013 h<\/span>ow good is that?” Nga told reporters.<\/p>\n