Singapore: Founding PM Lee Kuan Yew’s daughter dies

Lee Wei Ling, the daughter of Singapore’s founding Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, died on Wednesday, her brother announced. She was 69.

Lee Wei Ling. Photo courtesy: Screengrab from YouTube and Facebook
Lee Wei Ling. Photo courtesy: Screengrab from YouTube and Facebook

In a Facebook post on Wednesday morning, Lee Hsien Yang, the brother of Ling, also the younger sister of the city state’s third Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, announced her death.

Ling, known to have lived at 38 Oxley Road, the family home of Lee Kuan Yew, died at her home, the post said.

“I will deeply miss Ling. May she rest in peace,” said Yang.

Ling, the second of three children, was a paediatric neurologist, specialising in epilepsy but was diagnosed some years ago with a rare, degenerative brain disease.

Ling and Yang were the joint administrators and executors of the will of Yew, who died in 2015.

In 2017, they made public their dispute with their elder brother and then Prime Minister Loong over the will execution concerning 38 Oxley Road.

Lee Hsien Loong speaks at the HarmonyWorks! Conference on August 3, 2024
Singapore Senior Minister and former Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong speaks at the HarmonyWorks! Conference on August 3, 2024. With him on the stage is session moderator and conference organising committee chairman Sarabjeet Singh. Photo courtesy: X/@leehsienloong

The differences have strained relations between the two brothers.

“Sadly, after he (Lee Kuan Yew) passed away in 2015, a shadow fell between my siblings and me, and I was unable to fulfil his wish,” Channel News Asia quoted Loong as saying.

“But I held nothing against Ling, and continued to do whatever I could to ensure her welfare,” said Loong.

Ling revealed in 2020 that she had progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), describing the brain disease as a “Parkinson’s-like illness that slows physical movements, impairs fast eye movements and balance”, eventually resulting in death.