You take a poll of any people. What is it they want? The right to write an editorial as you like? They want homes, medicine, jobs, schools.

If you are a troublemaker, it’s our job to politically destroy you. Put it this way. As long as JB Jeyaretnam stands for what he stands for – a thoroughly destructive force – we will knock him. Everybody knows that in my bag I have a hatchet, and a very sharp one. You take me on, I take my hatchet, we meet in the cul-de-sac.

We have to lock up people, without trial, whether they are communists, whether they are language chauvinists, whether they are religious extremists. If you don’t do that, the country would be in ruins.

I have been accused of many things in my life, but not even my worst enemy has ever accused me of being afraid to speak my mind.

You begin your journey not knowing where it will take you. You have plans, you have dreams, but every now and again you have to take uncharted roads, face impassable mountains, cross treacherous rivers, be blocked by landslides and earthquakes. That's the way my life has been.

If Singapore is a nanny state, then I am proud to have fostered one.

Whoever governs Singapore must have that iron in him. Or give it up. This is not a game of cards.