Singapore’s most powerful political dynasty has been torn apart by a bitter feud over a decaying colonial-era house once owned by the late Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew — the revered founder of modern Singapore.
At the centre of the rift lies 38 Oxley Road, a modest two-storey colonial-era bungalow in central Singapore where Lee lived for over 70 years. Despite its modest appearance — overgrown garden, empty rooms, and boxes wrapped in bubble wrap — the property carries enormous symbolic weight. It was here, as legend has it, that Lee Kuan Yew founded the People’s Action Party (PAP), which has ruled uninterrupted since independence in 1965.
But what should have been a private matter of inheritance has spiralled into a public constitutional drama, exposing deep fractures in the Lee family — and raising questions about legacy, power, and democracy in the tightly controlled city-state.
A House Divided
Before his death in 2015, Lee Kuan Yew stated in his will that 38 Oxley Road should be demolished. His younger son, Lee Hsien Yang, and the late daughter, Lee Wei Ling, have campaigned to honour that wish.
Standing in opposition is Lee Hsien Loong, the eldest son and Singapore’s prime minister until he stepped down in 2024. Now serving as “senior minister,” he supports preserving the house as a monument to Singapore’s political heritage — a move his siblings argue twists their father’s legacy for political ends.
“I always felt it was never just about the will,” said Singaporean journalist and activist Kirsten Han, “but about who controls the national narrative around Lee Kuan Yew and Singapore.”
Exile and Asylum
The family feud has spilled beyond Singapore’s borders. Hsien Yang, 67, and his wife, lawyer Lee Suet Fern, were granted political asylum in the UK in 2024, after facing legal action in Singapore. Authorities accuse the couple of perjury in relation to the late patriarch’s will. In 2020, Suet Fern was temporarily suspended from legal practice over the same allegations.
Their son, Li Shengwu, a Harvard economics professor, also lives abroad after being convicted in absentia of contempt of court for a 2017 Facebook post criticizing Singapore’s judicial system. He was fined S$15,000, reinforcing what critics call Singapore’s low tolerance for dissent — even within the most prominent family.
In Shengwu’s words: “Imagine an American presidential candidate who lived in George Washington’s home and descended directly from him. That kind of national myth gives a politician a unique, unearned power.” His warning was aimed at his cousin Li Hongyi, Hsien Loong’s son, whom critics fear could emerge as a third-generation Lee leader — a charge Hongyi and his parents have repeatedly denied.
Monument or Myth?
While the state has delayed making a decision on the bungalow’s fate, Hsien Yang — its legal owner — has formally applied for demolition, as per his father’s will. But the government has hinted it may gazette the building as a national monument, effectively blocking demolition.
The official line from the government, now led by Prime Minister Lawrence Wong, a known Hsien Loong loyalist, is that Singaporeans should decide in time: “Options remain open, including demolition or preservation of all or part of the property.”
But Shengwu believes the delay is political. “Demolishing the house would be an admission that Lee Hsien Loong was wrong,” he said. “That’s too damaging to his personal standing for the party to allow.”
A Legacy in Question
Lee Kuan Yew’s image as a principled, incorruptible leader who lifted Singapore from post-colonial poverty to First World prosperity remains largely intact in the public memory. But the family feud threatens to reshape how that legacy is interpreted — especially in a younger generation less enthralled by dynastic authority.
The personal has turned political. In 2020, Hsien Yang publicly broke ranks and joined the opposition Progress Singapore Party, declaring that the PAP had “lost its way.” His family’s exile, lawsuits, and political defiance signal that the Lee name — once a symbol of unity and strength — is now the centrepiece of a national identity struggle.
For now, 38 Oxley Road sits quietly in limbo, guarded, aging, and overgrown — a symbolic battleground for a nation grappling with its past and uncertain about its political future.
