Singapore begins its political transition from founding family

Singapore: Singapore's ruling party will Friday set in motion a carefully orchestrated political succession that will see the powerful founding family hand over the premiership, a key moment in the city-state's short history. Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat will be unveiled as the second in command of the People's Action Party (PAP), which has ruled Singapore since it gained self-rule from Britain in 1959, putting him on course to become premier, pro-government media reported.

The 57-year-old is expected to take over in the coming years from Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, the son of late founding premier Lee Kuan Yew, who oversaw the country's rapid economic development during three-decades of sometimes authoritarian rule.

The power transfer is in line with the current premier's plan to hand power to a broadly younger generation of leaders.

Heng would be the country's fourth prime minister and the second from outside the Lee family.

But it is a sensitive moment for the financial hub of 5.6 million people, with the country's transformation into one of the world's wealthiest and most stable societies inextricably linked in many people's minds to the rule of the Lee family. With Lee Hsien Loong, 66, having insisted he harbours no political ambitions for his own son, the looming power transfer may signal the end of members of the founding family holding the country's top job.