Mr Goh Chok Tong, Emeritus Senior Minister

Mr Eric Chua, Senior Parliamentary Secretary for Social and Family Development, and Culture, Community and Youth

Mr Moses Lee, Chairman, SG Enable

Distinguished Guests

Ladies and Gentlemen

It is a real pleasure to join you in recognising an inspiring group of individuals today. Individuals who show us how, when we put our heart to something, we can stretch our potential and achieve goals that people often didn’t expect us to achieve.

The Goh Chok Tong Enable Fund (GCTEF) is a community fund, that ESM Goh started in 2016. It seeks to build a society where persons with disabilities are recognised for their abilities, and a society where they can lead a fulfilling and socially integrated life.

The Fund has supported many people with disabilities in 3As – financial Aid, Aspirations and Awards. The last ‘A’ is the reason why we are gathered here today - the Goh Chok Tong Enable Awards (GCTEA) – to recognise the achievements of persons with disabilities who show us that why grit and passion count for so much in life.

Today, we will see two types of Awards being presented to 14 individuals. The first is the Achievement Award, which recognises and celebrates persons with disabilities who have reached great heights, and also recognises the institutions which have supported them. The second, the Promise Award, as the name implies, encourages those with potential to take their talents further.  

Living purposeful lives

Let me highlight why those getting this year’s Achievement awards inspire.  Mdm Aisah Binte Ibrahim was diagnosed with polio at the age of two. Over the years, her muscles have been deteriorating, and she has had to use a wheelchair to get around. Despite these challenges, Aisah has been remarkably active in the community. She joined the Bedok Youth Society for the Disabled, where she has been President and has spearheaded several programmes. She is also a talented singer and keyboardist, and is into wheelchair racing, competitive bowling (in which she has a few international awards under her belt), tailoring, and even hiking Mount Kinabalu for charity.

Next, let me talk about Ms Judy Anne Wee – a strong advocate of accessibility in the built environment and public transport system. Judy knows how critical this is as she was born with a condition that affected all of her limbs. In the 1990s, she led a team to work with the Building and Construction Authority to revise the Code of Barrier-Free Accessibility. Today, Judy is still actively contributing to the taskforce in keeping the code up-to-date and in tune with the needs of persons from all sectors of disabilities.

Our third Achievement Awardee is Ms Laurentia Tan Yen-Yi. Most of us know her for winning Singapore’s first Paralympic medal at the 2008 Beijing Paralympic Games. That was quite a while ago, but Laurentia is still going strong. In fact, as we speak now she is in Netherlands for the last qualifier for the Paris Paralympics 2024. She was born with cerebral palsy and profound deafness, so Laurentia took up horse riding as a form of physiotherapy. She has gone on to be a top dressage athlete, controlling her horse by sensing its rhythms with great skill.

All our awardees today share a few traits. First, they strive for excellence in what they do, and pursue their dreams with gusto.

Second, they are leaders and role models. Whether it is volunteering or mentoring, they have been nurturing and inspiring others around them.

And finally, they are each champions for greater inclusion. They have been doing this through community initiatives, and highlighting how everyone has abilities to be discovered and developed.

Similarly, our Promise Awardees are not only emerging talents but also active in serving the community.

For example, Ms Weng Jiaying is the co-founding member of the Diverse Abilities Dance Collective and a performing artist with the Maya Dance Theatre. My wife and I were truly impressed by her grace and composure when she performed at President’s Star Charity 2023. Jiaying has also been active in conducting dance programmes for children, students with special needs and the elderly.

Mr Mohamed Ismail Bin Hussain is a bowling para-sportsman and advocate. He gives motivational talks to students to inspire them to take up the sport and excel in it.

More to be done to change mindsets

What shines through all the journeys of the Awardees today, is that they are individuals who are determined to live purposeful lives, just like all of us.

That’s what we all have to understand and help everyone understand. Which brings me to a point I wanted to make. As the message on the tissue packets on our tables says, “Wipe away Bias.” It is still an issue. And I do want to highlight here that there is still much more to be done in changing mindsets among the general public.

There was a thoughtful commentary piece in The Straits Times two months ago by the mother of an autistic daughter. She wrote about something all parents of children with autism, and indeed many other disabilities, are familiar with - their children are routinely stared at in public. She wrote, “My daughter is not a freak. She has autism….What some of us consider to be ‘different’ people are our children, our parents, our siblings, and they are an everyday part of our community”.

In response to the commentary, another mother shared similar experiences in the Forum Page.  She recalled how she sometimes received kind remarks when she explained to people that her son was autistic. But some others just keep staring. She had to tell one of them that staring did not change a person’s autism.

Most do not mean to be unkind, do not mean any harm, when they stare at persons with autism or other disabilities. But we do need to help everyone understand, especially as we grow up in school, that some among us will naturally be differently abled. Some will naturally express themselves in ways that are not typical, including whey express joy. And help everyone understand that we must embrace all, typical and untypical, in our everyday lives and make them feel fully at home in the community.     

Conclusion

To conclude, let me thank Mediacorp, SG Enable and Tote Board for contributing to today’s Awards ceremony. I extend our gratitude to the families, caregivers and institutions which nominated those receiving the Awards, for your unwavering love and support.

Above all, to all our awardees this afternoon, congratulations. We look forward to more your inspiring stories from each of you, and others, in time to come.