Quotes from Lee Kuan Yew

I can feel the gradual decline of energy and vitality. And I mean generally, every year, when you know you are not on the same level as last year. But that's life.

You need a certain standard of literacy, moral and ethical values, to be able to run a one man, one vote system.

The big nest was in Afghanistan, thats not quite cleared, then there are nests in the Philippines, there are nests in Indonesia, the Malaysians are clearing up their nests.

From 1945 to 1991, China was engaged in a series of wars that nearly broke them. This generation has been through hell: the Great Leap Forward, hunger, starvation, near collision with the Russians - the Cultural Revolution gone mad. I have no doubt that this generation wants a peaceful rise.

One-man-one-vote is a most difficult form of government.. Results can be erratic.

I knew that my niece was working nearby with some bank, so my wife rang up the mother and the mother called back to say that shes just called up to say she was alright.

If you want to reach your goals and dreams, you cannot do it without discipline

As you solve one set of problems, new ones appear. That is part of the nature of life.

I feel sanguine enough to say that there has never been a better set of conditions for open democratic politics because there is no need for unified front politics.

Please do not assume that you can change governments. Young people don't understand this.

I'm not guided by what Human Rights Watch says.

Well if done a lot of hard work to try and get people to act rationally, the fact that weve had 15 deviant Muslims, plus 5 or 8 others that got away does not mean that all Muslims are deviant or extremists.

How do I comfort myself? Well, I say, 'Life is just like that.'

Peace and security both in Europe and in the Pacific still depend on a balance of power.

The original communitarianism of Chinese Confucian society has degenerated into nepotism, a system of family linkages, and corruption, on the mainland. And remnants of the evils of the original system are still found in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and even Singapore.

A leader without the vision, to strive to improve things, is no good. Then you will just stay put, you won't progress.

Life is not just eating, drinking, television and cinema...The human mind must be creative, must be self-generating ; it cannot depend on just gadgets to amuse itself.

I've got one grandson gone to MIT. Another grandson had been in the American school here. Because he was dyslexic, and we then didn't have the teachers to teach him how to overcome or cope with his dyslexia, so he was given exemption to go to the American school. He speaks like an American. He's going to Wharton.

At the end of the day, what have I got? A successful Singapore. What have I given up? My life.

Peace and security in the Asia-Pacific will turn on whether China emerges as a xenophobic, chauvinistic force, bitter and hostile to the West because it tried to slow down or abort its development, or whether it is educated and involved in the ways of the world - more cosmopolitan, more internationalized and outward looking.

Those who believe that after I have left the government as prime minister, I will go into a permanent retirement, really should have their heads examined.

Anybody who decides to take me on needs to put on knuckle-dusters. If you think you can hurt me more than I can hurt you, try. There is no way you can govern a Chinese society.

Usually I read biographies of interesting people. I am not attracted to novels - make-believe, or recreations of what people think life should be.

The acid test of any legal system is not the greatness or the grandeur of its ideal concepts, but whether, in fact, it is able to produce order and justice.