A Chinese film has landed like a grenade in Singapore’s sensitive identity debate. The movie, which portrays the city-state as a product of Chinese diaspora resilience, has angered Malay and Indian communities. The message from Beijing is clear: Singapore is culturally Chinese.
This is a narrative that Whitehall has long sought to counter. Britain’s soft power has been quietly deployed here for years. The British Council, the BBC World Service, and even the occasional trade delegation have all made the case for a pluralistic Singaporean identity.
One built on the legacy of Raffles, not the Middle Kingdom. But the film’s success – it topped the Singapore box office – shows that the Chinese narrative is gaining traction. Backbenchers are getting nervous.
They see this as a test case for wider influence in Southeast Asia. The Foreign Office is scrambling. Internal memos suggest a new cultural diplomacy push is being planned.
But will it be enough? Sources in the Singaporean ministry of culture tell me that the film has ‘opened old wounds’. And that the British position, while welcome, is seen as ‘too little, too late’.
The game is on.
