Singapore\u2019s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on Tuesday defended an exclusive deal his city-state struck with Taylor Swift that prevents the pop star from taking her current Eras Tour anywhere else in Southeast Asia. Swift is performing six concerts from March 2 to 9 in Singapore under an exclusive deal that has been criticised by some Southeast Asian neighbours who complain they have been deprived of the tourist boom that her concerts have brought elsewhere.<\/p>\n
Lee confirmed that Swift was provided with \u201ccertain incentives\u201d from a government fund established to rebuild the tourism industry after COVID-19 disruptions to make Singapore her only Southeast Asian destination. He did not say how much the deal cost. He said he did not regard the deal as unfriendly toward his neighbours in the 10-country Association of Southeast Asian Nations.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt has turned out to be a very successful arrangement. I don\u2019t see that as being unfriendly,\u201d Lee said in the Australian city of Melbourne where he is attending an ASEAN leaders\u2019 summit. Lee did not directly answer when asked if he had encountered \u201cbad blood\u201d among other leaders due to the deal. Lees suggested that if Singapore hadn\u2019t struck an exclusive deal, a neighbouring country might have done so.<\/p>\n
\u201cSometimes one country makes a deal, sometimes another country does. I don\u2019t explicitly say you will come here only on condition that you\u2019ll not go to other places,'\u201d Lee said. Swift\u2019s representative did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Lee said he expected that Australia similarly made \u201cmutually acceptable, sensible arrangements\u201d with Swift when she performed in Sydney and Melbourne before flying to Singapore. Lee said he didn\u2019t know what Australia\u2019s arrangements were.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf that\u2019s what\u2019s needed to be done to get an outcome which is mutually beneficial and which, from Singapore\u2019s point of view, serves not just to grow the economy but also to bring in visitors and goodwill from all over the region, I don\u2019t see why not,\u201d Lee said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we had not made such an arrangement, would she have come to someplace else in Southeast Asia or more places in Southeast Asia? Maybe, maybe not. These are things that she will decide,\u201d Lee added. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who is hosting the ASEAN summit, attended one of Swift\u2019s Sydney concerts last month.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Singapore\u2019s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on Tuesday defended an exclusive deal his city-state struck with Taylor Swift that prevents\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":33118,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[186],"tags":[495,10727,139,10725,10724,8470,3357,10641,138,10726],"class_list":["post-33117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world","tag-asean","tag-economic-boost","tag-eras-tour","tag-exclusive-deal","tag-neighboring-countries","tag-prime-minister-lee-hsien-loong","tag-singapore","tag-south-east-asia","tag-taylor-swift","tag-tourism-revival"],"reading_time":"2 min read","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33117"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33117\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33118"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/usa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}