Celebrating the successes of women

Mr Roland Ng
President of SCCCI

Dr Hwang Yee Cheau
Chairperson of the Career Women's Group

Excellencies

Ladies and gentlemen

1. I am honoured to join in this celebration of International Women's Day. Many thanks to SCCCI's Career Women's Group for inviting me, and congratulations on your 25th anniversary!

2. This is also the year we commemorate the Singapore Bicentennial. It is an opportunity for us to reflect on the longer historical evolution of women in Singapore, and impact they made on our nation.

Women in the history of Singapore

3. Women and women's organisations have played a pivotal role in Singapore since pre-independence. However, they have not always featured strongly in the historical narrative. The first wave of immigrants who arrived on our shores were mostly male. By the 1900s, we had flourished as a trading centre under the British, but only about 20% of the population were women.¹

4. It was only in the 1920s that more women started coming to Singapore. The colonial authorities had placed restrictions on the number of male immigrants to balance the gender ratio, and control the unemployment level. This opened the door for female immigrants. Among these were the samsui women and amahs, who left their native homelands to carve out a life for themselves.

5. These women were illiterate but broke new ground for Chinese women, economically and socially. They achieved financial independence and would remit money home, like the men before them, to provide for their families. They were an exception, ahead of their time in a patriarchal society. Our migrant communities were from cultures that constrained women within the limited roles of being wives and mothers after marriage. Even in the 1950s, many Singapore women were still disadvantaged, uneducated and financially dependent on men. Very few women received an education, and those who did were usually from wealthy families.

6. This started to change as women galvanised to contribute to war rehabilitation efforts, and set up associations and mutual help groups. A movement began to lobby for legislation to protect women, and give them equal rights. These early trailblazers, like Shirin Fozdar, Elizabeth Choy, Vilasini Menon, Amy Laycock, and Mrs Robert Eu were of different races. But they united in a common cause, to give women a voice and empower them. Women were recognised as a political force. In fact, the PAP launched its Women's League in 1956 and organised a rally on International Women's Day, which was attended by ten thousand women.

7. The enactment of the Women's Charter in 1961 was a watershed event. It gave official recognition to women as individuals, and as equals to their husbands. This sent a strong message that our social systems, culture and values towards women had to evolve. It was right for women to be accorded the same respect as men.

Celebrating the successes of women

8. The rights that women enjoy in Singapore are hard-won. Even after the enactment of the Women's Charter, it took the next few decades to address other burning issues. Things like citizenship for children born to Singapore women overseas; medical benefits to civil servants; the quota on female students in medical school; the perception that women were unsuited for technical jobs. Cultural bias against females still persisted and had to be overcome incrementally.

9. We should remember and celebrate the women in our history who pushed the frontiers at a time when social norms set limits on what they could do. In the field of sports, Madam Tang Pui Wah was our first female Olympian, who represented us in the 1952 Summer Olympics when she was only nineteen. Our first female police inspector, was Mary Quintal. She was among the first ten women in Singapore to begin police training, and rose through the ranks to become the first female assistant superintendent in 1961. Some years later, Jenny Lau became the first women to be appointed a district judge. In the field of social work, Daisy Vaithilingam pioneered many new initiatives, including Singapore's first fostering scheme for children, and helped set up the medical social work department at NUH.

10. There are many more such women in multiple sectors, like health, politics, philanthropy and entrepreneurship, with too many to name. We can look to them for inspiration, as we continue the endeavour of equality and empowerment for women.

11. The Government is committed to supporting women. Women now have more opportunities, but struggle with playing multiple roles in life. Many of us have the desire to balance both family and work, and to excel at both. So we introduced paternity leave in 2013 to encourage shared parental responsibility, and enhanced it over the years to include shared parental leave. We are also encouraging more companies to change their mind-sets and offer flexible work arrangements for parents. Today, many Singaporeans believe that fathers and mothers are equally important as caregivers for children.²

Conclusion

12. The SCCCI's Career Women's Group (CWG) has been a strong advocate for women in the past 25 years. In the past, the Chambers was largely regarded as a place for businessmen, but this has changed. The CWG has created many opportunities for career women to come together, share knowledge and skills, and mentor younger women. We have grown as a community.

13. I encourage you to continue the good work that you are already doing in supporting women. We need everyone to be involved in striving towards a gender-equal society. While much has been accomplished, let us make Singapore even better for the next generation to come.

14. Have an enjoyable evening, and Happy International Women's Day!

¹ Yu-Lin Ooi, “Philanthropy in Transition: An Exploratory Study of Asian Women and Philanthropy in Singapore, 1900-1945”, in Philanthropy in Asia: Working Paper No. 2, 2016. Rounded from 23.3%

² Yu-Lin Ooi, “Philanthropy in Transition: An Exploratory Study of Asian Women and Philanthropy in Singapore, 1900-1945”, in Philanthropy in Asia: Working Paper No. 2, 2016. Rounded from 23.3%