Alan Chan Heng Loon (born 22 February 1953) is a former

Singaporean Singaporeans, or the Singaporean people, refers to citizens or people who identify with the sovereign island city-state of Singapore. Singapore is a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural and multi-lingual country. Singaporeans of Chinese, Malay, India ...

civil servant. He was the former chief executive of the

Singapore Press Holdings Singapore Press Holdings Limited (SPHL) was an organisation with businesses in property and aged care in Singapore. Since its takeover by Cuscaden Peak in 2022, it has been renamed Cuscaden Peak Investments. Prior to 1 December 2021, SPHL was i ...

Early life

Chan was born to a bilingual family fluent in English and Chinese. He studied in Haig Boys School,

Raffles Institution Raffles Institution (RI) is an independent educational institution in Singapore. Founded in 1823, it is the oldest school in the country. It provides secondary education for boys only from Year 1 to Year 4, and pre-university education for both ...

and

National Junior College National Junior College (NJC) is a government Junior college (Singapore), junior college located in Bukit Timah, Singapore. Established in 1969, it was the first government junior college in Singapore. NJC offers a two-year course for pre-univer ...

. He was awarded the

President's Scholarship A President's Scholar is a recipient of the academic scholarship awarded by the Government of Singapore annually, to pursue undergraduate education at a university, usually abroad. The scholarship is considered to be the most prestigious public ...

and French Government Scholarship, and graduated with a Dip Ingenieur from Ecole Nationale de L'Aviation Civile in 1978. He subsequently went to

INSEAD INSEAD, a contraction of "Institut Européen d'Administration des Affaires" () is a non-profit business school that maintains campuses in Europe ( Fontainebleau, France), Asia (Singapore), the Middle East (Abu Dhabi, UAE), and North America (San ...

and obtained an MBA in 1983.

Career

After studying in France, Chan worked as a

civil servant The civil service is a collective term for a sector of government composed mainly of career civil servants hired on professional merit rather than appointed or elected, whose institutional tenure typically survives transitions of political leaders ...

under various Singaporean government ministries. Chan served as the Ministry of Defence’s Director of Manpower. In 1994 Chan successfully applied to be the Principal Private Secretary of Senior Minister

Lee Kuan Yew Lee Kuan Yew (16 September 1923 – 23 March 2015), born Harry Lee Kuan Yew, often referred to by his initials LKY, was a Singaporean lawyer and statesman who served as Prime Minister of Singapore between 1959 and 1990, and Secretary-General o ...

(as he then was). Thereafter, Chan was appointed as Deputy Secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Strict on making his subordinates speak Chinese properly, he imposed a ten-cent fine on whoever who used English terms in their Chinese conversations. He rose to the position of Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Communications and Information and the

Ministry of Transport A ministry of transport or transportation is a ministry responsible for transportation within a country. It usually is administered by the ''minister for transport''. The term is also sometimes applied to the departments or other government age ...

before retiring from the civil service to join Singapore Press Holdings (SPH). In total, his career as a government official spanned some 25 years. Becoming Group President of the Singapore-based media firm SPH in July 2002, it was in January 2003 that he became the company's chief executive officer. He is also part of its board of directors. Mr Chan retired from SPH on 1 September 2017. He was appointed Chairman of the

Land Transport Authority of Singapore The Land Transport Authority (LTA) is a statutory board under the Ministry of Transport of the Government of Singapore. History Incorporation of Land Transport Authority Land Transport Authority (LTA) was established on 1 September 1995, ...

on 1 April 2016. Chan was listed as one of "100 Inspiring Rafflesians" and described as "a Rafflesian who has crossed many boundaries" by Guan Heng Tan in 2008. Chan contributed an essay titled "My Tryst With Chinese" for Lee Kuan Yew's 2012 book, ''My Lifelong Challenge: Singapore's Bilingual Journey''. He was selected by INSEAD in 2009 as one of the "50 Alumni who changed the world".

Personal life

Chan is married with two children, a boy and a girl. Chan has three older siblings. His brother Heng Wing was Ambassador to Thailand, and one of his sisters, Heng Chee was Ambassador to the United States.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chan, Alan 1953 births Living people Members of the Public Service Commission (Singapore) Permanent secretaries of Singapore Singaporean people of Chinese descent Raffles Institution alumni