FEB 12 1999

Habibie's pot shots

INDONESIA'S President Jusuf Habibie, in office for nine months now, has developed a penchant for taking pot shots at Singapore, and has been at it again -- this time telling Taiwanese journalists that Singapore is a racist country where Malays can never become military officers. Anyone who is reasonably informed knows this is not true. So it is hardly surprising that Singapore's Malay MPs were among the first to react angrily to his provocative remarks. Good for them. Indeed, all Singaporeans are right to feel offended, but there is no need to over-react. After all, as his own Education Minister, Professor Juwono Sudarsono, describes him, he is "bubbly" and has "a lot of learning and unlearning to do about Singapore". Still, one certainly hopes Dr Habibie will check his facts before he next decides to talk about Singapore because he is not just any ordinary Indonesian. As Indonesia's leader, he should know better and he must want to be taken seriously.

Of course, he has been rather unhappy ever since Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew talked about how financial markets would react to a decision by former president Suharto to pick him as vice-president. He also complained that Singapore was late in congratulating him when he became President.

His personal feelings aside, his latest outburst does raise the question of whether the almost reflex antipathy towards Singapore is symptomatic of a deeper malaise that is souring bilateral relations. Indeed, he himself said he felt Singapore, "just a little red dot on the map", had not been a friendly neighbour.

The strange thing is that he, of all people, should know how Singapore works and how it has every intention to prosper its neighbours. During his long years as a technology minister, he had worked closely with Singapore to develop Batam as a manufacturing centre.

Thus, the worry must be that what he said was the result of visceral feelings against Singapore and that these are shared by many other Indonesians, not a few of whom are in high places.

It is tempting, though no more comforting, to speculate that given the devastation wreaked on almost all of this region's economies, Dr Habibie, in finding fault with Singapore, was trying merely to divert domestic attention away from his country's own problems. Lately, he and some of his ministers have raised a spate of bilateral issues -- trade statistics, extradition, children of Indonesian permanent residents performing national service in Singapore. If all these were also aimed at testing Singapore, then the only response they can expect is that, small as it is, this country is certainly not going to be pushed around.

Good relations demand effort from both sides. Singapore, which will never yield when it comes to issues touching on its independence and sovereignty, has worked hard to maintain friendly ties with all its neighbours, big or small. But this must never be misread as a sign of weakness.

Clearly, the two countries have much to do to remove prejudices that hinder better bilateral relations. In a way, it is just as well that Dr Habibie has vented his openly, because this gives Singapore an opportunity to set the record straight. It is important for Singapore to get across the facts and the right perspective, not just for misinformed Indonesians, but also all its other friends in Asean as well. It can be exasperating work, but it has to be done -- again and again, if necessary.