He also asked the film-makers to donate to a charitable foundation set up in Ms Ong's name, include a credit for Ms Ong and put a statement on its website and DVD release making it clear that the Ong family did not endorse torture, which is depicted in the film.

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Desdemona, Ong's interpretation of Othello, got similarly mixed reviews when it opened the Singapore Arts Festival last month.

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Others point out that Ong's parting diatribe about the lack of top-level coordination leaves little doubt that he wanted out of the presidency.

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Chew, 69, isn't a dynamic public figure either, but he is seen as something of a Lee Kuan Yew man, less likely to display the occasional flashes of independence that marked Ong's six years in office.

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When I wrote about Ong Beng Seng's battle on behalf of Vickers Ballas shareholders, I pointed to all sorts of ironies.

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It was the standing of one of Singapore's most seasoned corporate players, Mr. Ong, who controls about 20% of the Vickers Ballas shares, and one of the island-republic's most powerful woman, Madam Ho, whose Singapore Technologies owns 40% of the firm.

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Ong, whose family owns and runs Singapore's First Engineering, a component company.

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Like most organizers, Ong believes funding remains the greatest constraint to Singapore's burgeoning arts scene.

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Ong cites Lear, his avant-garde interpretation of Shakespeare's tragedy flavored with elements of Indonesian martial arts, Noh drama and Beijing opera -- and performed in different languages by a multi-national cast, half Singaporean, a good part Japanese, with a sprinkling of other Asians.

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