Presidency
Up until Wee's second term as President, the selection of the presidential candidate was determined solely by the Parliament of Singapore. During Wee's second term, the Singapore Parliament amended the constitution in January 1991 to allow for the direct election of the President, who would have the right of veto over civil service appointments and the use of government reserves.
The creation of an elected presidency was a major constitutional and political change in Singapore's history as under the revision, the President is empowered to veto government budgets and appointments to public office. He can examine the Government's exercise of its powers under the Internal Security Act and religious harmony laws and investigate cases of corruption.
For the ensuing initial presidential election, the first in Singapore to be decided by popular poll, Wee decided not to enter his candidacy and went into retirement upon the completion of his second and final term as President.
In 1995, Nanyang Technological University renamed its School of Communication Studies after Wee, a former journalist, to the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information.
In 2004, Wee published his autobiography, Glimpses and Reflections. From the royalties and other donations, half a million Singapore dollars were donated to eight charities.
Wee is the first President of Peranakan descent in Singapore. He was fluent in Malay but did not speak Mandarin.
Read more about this topic: Wee Kim Wee
Famous quotes containing the word presidency:
“I once told Nixon that the Presidency is like being a jackass caught in a hail storm. You’ve got to just stand there and take it.”
—Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908–1973)
“... how often the Presidency has simply meant that a man shall be abused, distrusted, and worked to death while he is filling the great office, and that he should drop into unmerited oblivion when he has left the White House ...”
—M. E. W. Sherwood (1826–1903)
“Some of the offers that have come to me would never have come if I had not been President. That means these people are trying to hire not Calvin Coolidge, but a former President of the United States. I can’t make that kind of use of the office.... I can’t do anything that might take away from the Presidency any of its dignity, or any of the faith people have in it.”
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)