A journalist from The New Paper has emailed me about my earlier post here. She would like to interview me and write an article about the matter.
Sorry, Pei Shan, I decline. But do feel free to quote my blog. Anyway, the key facts speak for themselves. You can also call up the Law Faculty or the NUS Admissions Office to ask more questions.
As a matter of fact, why limit yourself to the NUS Law Faculty? Go ask some harder (and wider) questions, about how much of Singapore's taxpayers' money is spent each year, to pay school fees for students from China, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam .... anywhere but Singapore.
I'll just say a little more about why I had been interested in doing a Masters in Law at NUS. I am a Singapore-qualified lawyer, which means that I've been formally trained and educated in the laws of Singapore. However, nowadays my work is quite international. It is therefore very useful for me to understand more about the laws in other countries, especially the Asian ones.
The best university in the world to study Asian laws is probably NUS. Not Harvard, not Cambridge, not Stanford. It's NUS, because it's right here in Asia, and it has dedicated itself towards building expertise in Asian legal systems. For example, the NUS Law Faculty offers subjects such as:
The Contemporary Indian Legal System
Chinese Corporate and Securities Law
Foreign Investment Law in Vietnam
Japanese Corporate Law & Governance
Islamic Law
Introduction to Indian Business Law
International & Comparative Law of Sale in Asia
Chinese Legal Tradition and Legal Chinese
These are useful, practical subjects for lawyers in Singapore. Why? Because Singapore is always aiming to be a regional hub in this, or a regional hub in that. Therefore Singaporean lawyers frequently need to work on cross-border/foreign matters, and that's why they need to know more about laws in other Asian countries.
Unfortunately, when Singaporean lawyers want to apply for a scholarship to upgrade their skills at NUS, they will be discriminated against. Just for being Singaporean.
That's just too bad ... for Singapore.