Professor Xu Jia Lu,

Vice Chairman of the Standing Committee,

National People's Congress, Peoples’ Republic of China,

Professor Su Guaning,

President, Nanyang Technological University,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

It gives me great pleasure to be with you this evening to open the Confucius Institute at Nanyang Technological University (NTU).  This Institute was set up by the Nanyang Technological University, in collaboration with Shandong University, China and the Office of Chinese Language Council International, China.  It marks another milestone in the co-operation between China and Singapore, and can help Singapore to better teach the Chinese language and culture.

Nanyang University, the predecessor of NTU, was a Chinese language university established in 1955 by contributions from all strata of society.  Today, Nanyang Technological University is ranked 15^th in the world in Technology, according to the Times Higher Educational Supplement world rankings of Universities.  

The Chinese in Singapore used to speak in more than eight different dialects, but after the May 4 movement, our Chinese schools have always taught in Mandarin.  In the colonial period, we had four different language stream schools, in Mandarin, the largest numbers (all managed by clan associations), in English (some run by Christian missions) and Malay (run by the government) and in Tamil (managed by the Tamil associations).

Independent Singapore adopted English as the common language for our multi-ethnic multi-cultural society, since August 1965.  We are a cosmopolitan city, sited in Southeast Asia, with English as the dominant language for regional intercourse.  However, we also emphasized that students learn their mother tongue as their second language, i.e. Mandarin Chinese for Chinese Singaporeans.

As Prime Minister, I had encouraged our Chinese children to learn their mother tongue and Confucian values as ballast against the increasing influence of western values and culture because English is the first language in our schools and workplaces.

We regularly review how we teach Chinese in schools so as to ensure that students who come from different home languages, and are of different language abilities are taught appropriately, otherwise students will lose interest and give up.  After forty years, nearly all Chinese Singaporeans have become bilingual in English and Mandarin with varying degrees of proficiency in the second language.  This has turned out to be an advantage in a globalised world.  Singapore teachers have skills in teaching the Chinese language as a second language using English appropriately to help comprehension. 

With the rise of China as an economic powerhouse, the mastery of the Chinese language and our understanding of Chinese culture are sought by many people across the world.    We have the unique experience of teaching Chinese, first as the first language until the 1980s, and then over the last 40 years teaching it as a second language.     

Within two years of its commencement of operations, the Confucius Institute at NTU has conducted a wide range of courses and activities to promote Chinese language and culture.  These events were very well received both by our schools and the public.  Local grassroot organisations and Confucius Institutes around the world have given positive feedback.   

Every society strives to be harmonious.  Five aspects of human relationship, known in Confucianism as the 'Five Moral Principles', are important values in building a harmonious society.

These 'Five Moral Principles' of Confucianism prescribe moral behaviour towards each other in five kinds of relationships.  The principles are: Righteousness between Leader and Subordinate, Love between Parent and Child, Respect between Husband and Wife, Precedence between Senior and Junior, and Faithfulness between Friends.  These principles spell out the moral relationship between individuals, the family, society and nation; they exemplify the importance of relationships we share with our nation, parents, children, colleagues, spouses, siblings and friends. 

These values, that place the interests of the community above that of the individual have helped the rapid economic development of Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore, and at present also of China and Vietnam.  All these countries received Confucianist values when they accepted the Chinese language and its ideographic script. 

It may be useful when teaching foreigners the Chinese language to incorporate some of these Confucian text and values in their textbooks.

I wish the Institute every success.

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