Are Singaporeans turning their backs on expats?

Singapore is known as one of the key business hubs in the Asia-Pacific region, attracting millions of high-profile expats… but this may be changing

The city-state’s economy has traditionally relied on foreigners who live and work in the region, but there is growing anger amongst Singaporeans towards overseas workers.

This has been fuelled by the pandemic, which has caused a higher than normal unemployment rate, with some locals saying they have little to no job prospects because the large expat community is taking them.

Although some say they are being deprived of better job prospects, others say they are fed up with cultural differences.

Meanwhile, expats are also increasingly reporting incidents of xenophobia… saying they don’t feel welcome in the nation.

Singapore’s PM says his citizens “must not turn their backs” on foreigners as this would “gravely damage the city-state’s reputation as an international hub”.

But these comments may be too little too late, with recent statistics showing that the total number of workers from overseas declined by almost 14% in 2020 alone.

Experts believe this is also filled by varying border restrictions as Covid outbreaks flared up, as well as non-residents being put to the back of the vaccination queue.

Singapore has a tough job ahead to maintain its business hub reputation and lure more foreigners back to the once-bustling city-state.