Scholarship launched in honour of founding SMRT chair Fock Siew Wah

SINGAPORE: A scholarship was recently launched in honour of Fock Siew Wah, the founding chairman of the Land Transport Authority (LTA) and SMRT. Mr Fock passed away earlier this year at the age of 84.

The launch of the Fock Siew Wah SMU Grace Scholarship at Keppel Club at Sime Road was attended by Acting Transport Minister Jeffrey Siow.

“Many in the audience, including me, were deeply moved by the heartfelt tributes to Mr Fock, who was exemplified by grace and loved by all who knew him. As a junior public officer, I had only met Mr Fock once while staffing an event he hosted. But I will always remember how he struck up a conversation with me, and made me feel that I was as much a participant in the event as he was,” he wrote in a September 8 Facebook post.

The scholarship will go towards deserving undergraduates from the Lee Kong Chian School of Business who are in need. This will open “doors for future generations to be uplifted as I was”, Mr Siow added.

To be eligible for the scholarship, a student must be a Singapore citizen, a full-time undergraduate from the Lee Kong Chian School of Business, have a minimum cumulative GPA of 3.00, and have demonstrated evidence of family household income.

The scholarship recipients will be given S$8,000 per year towards their subsidised tuition fees, tenable for one year of study. More information may be found about the scholarship here.

The scholarship was made possible with the blessing of Mr Fock’s family and the following donors: Pavilion Capital, PSA, Temasek, Dilhan Pillay, Tan Chong Meng, and Tow Heng Tan.

“This collective gift stands as a living tribute to Mr Fock’s extraordinary influence. It affirms the values he embodied – excellence, stewardship, and service – and channels them into the education of young people who will carry those same ideals into the future. Through this scholarship, Mr Fock’s impact endures: in the organisations he strengthened, the leaders he formed, and now, in the lives of students whose horizons will be expanded through his name, in perpetuity,” reads SMU’s website.

Fock Siew Wah

When Mr Fock died on January 6, many paid tribute to him, including Senior Minister Lee Hsien Loong, who described him as a pioneer leader and thanked him for his “eye for talent and heart for service”. He also wrote that Mr Fock would be deeply missed.

The first chairman of SMRT, initially known as Singapore Mass Rapid Transit Limited, was born in 1940. He served as SMRT chairman for nine years and LTA chair for seven years. He was also a Special Advisor to the Singapore Minister of Finance for four years

He became chairman of PSA International in 2005, a position he held until 2019. The company is a leading global port operator and supply chain partner that manages deep-sea, rail, and inland terminals in over 180 locations across the globe.

Mr Fock also served on the Board of Temasek Holdings, DBS, and Singapore Airlines.

Among his many awards and distinctions are the National Day Award’s Meritorious Service Medal (1997), the Land Transport Authority’s Distinguished Contribution Award (2008), and the National Trades Union Congress’ Medal of Commendation (2012). In 2009, the President of Singapore conferred upon him the Distinguished Service Order, and in 2014, he was conferred the national distinction Commander of the Order of the Crown by King Philippe of Belgium for the services he rendered to that country. /TISG

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