Netizens recirculate Ho Ching’s post that there are “lots of folks” who donate ‘quietly, without public announcement’ after Tan See Leng’s personal contribution of $1m to support women pursuing Stem careers

Following the public revelation that women pursuing careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (Stem) will get a boost with a $1 million gift from Manpower Minister Tan See Leng, netizens took to social media having dug up a Facebook post of Ho Ching, wife of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, in which she noted that there are “lots of folks” who donate “quietly, without making any public announcement”.

In her post, Mdm Ho wrote: “There are lots of folks who donated and continue to donate quietly, without making any public announcement.

Mdm Ho’s post was written back in July 2020, not long after Leader of the Opposition Pritam Singh made the announcement that he would donate half of his increment (about $8,000 a month) to low-income residents and community programmes in WP’s constituencies, charities or worthy causes and Workers’ Party specific needs.

While Mdm Ho eventually apologised to Mr Singh and said that she did not “mean to criticise his generosity”, netizens shared her post after April 7, when Dr Tan announced the million-dollar contribution and said that the endowment was inspired by knowing and working with many talented and capable women from fields such as medicine, pharmacy and chemical engineering.