\n<\/p>\n
Earlier on Saturday, Mr Shanmugam said reports that Air India was seeking fresh equity had triggered a new wave of “anti-Indian, racist ranting” online.<\/p>\n
He also said Temasek chief executive Dilhan Pillay Sandrasegara had been targeted because of his ethnicity.<\/p>\n
Regarding SIA\u2019s investment in Air India, he said it is SIA’s responsibility to assess its investments in Air India against the resources it has for its “long-term growth and profitability”.<\/p>\n
“Any decision to invest in Air India lies with SIA, and Temasek as a shareholder in SIA, along with other shareholders, will expect SIA to make its investment decisions responsibly.”<\/p>\n
While Temasek is accountable to the government for its overall portfolio and long-term performance, it is not accountable for individual investment decisions of its portfolio companies, Mr Shanmugam said.<\/p>\n
“Temasek and its subsidiaries decide how to invest across\u00a0a wide portfolio with investments of varied risks and varied time horizons. Once governments or politicians start directing individual investment decisions, commercial\u00a0discipline will be compromised,” he added.<\/p>\n
“Decisions will become politicised \u2013 shaped by political\u00a0considerations, rather than commercial judgment. In the end, Singaporeans will bear the cost.”<\/p>\n
On Mr Tiong\u2019s previous comments about SIA\u2019s investment in Air India, Mr Shanmugam said: \u201cMr Tiong is entitled to his views. He is entitled, like any other Singaporean, to ask questions about SIA and Temasek.\u201d<\/p>\n
“But neither his views, nor that of any minister, or any other MP, should substitute for the commercial judgment of SIA’s management and board of directors \u2013 boards which have knowledgeable and independent members, and management which has professionals whose primary responsibility is to consider and make these decisions.”<\/p>\n
Asked by a reporter whether Mr Tiong’s post had crossed racial or xenophobic lines, he said: “As regards to Mr Tiong and whether he was being xenophobic or racist, I think you’d best ask him. You’d have to ask him what he intended and what he meant.”<\/p>\n
On Mr Tiong’s previous statement that no one “owes Air India a living”, Mr Shanmugam said: “I think he ought to do his homework and look at SIA’s letter and the facts that I put out today, and ask if he is being responsible.”<\/p>\n
In his Facebook post on Saturday, Mr Tiong said that Singaporeans are best served when there is both zero tolerance for racism and hard questions about money.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe should not let the two get mixed up. If we do, both causes suffer.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n
Earlier on Saturday, Mr Shanmugam said reports that Air India was seeking fresh equity had triggered a new wave of “anti-Indian, racist ranting” online. He…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":82510,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/dam.mediacorp.sg\/image\/upload\/s--KJKw94uL--\/c_fill,g_auto,h_676,w_1200\/f_auto,q_auto\/v1\/mediacorp\/cna\/image\/2026\/08\/05\/1785907934-image.jpg?itok=Klcl1a-b","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[8885,2110,45,1390,26798,65,18689,29528,29529,22,2262],"class_list":["post-82509","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-buzz-news-sg-global","tag-commercial","tag-concerns","tag-deal","tag-india","tag-kenneth","tag-place","tag-purely","tag-racism","tag-siaair","tag-singapore","tag-tiong","wpcat-2-id"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82509","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=82509"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82509\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/82510"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=82509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=82509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=82509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}