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George Yeo Yong-Boon (p=Yáng Róngwén; born 13 September 1954) is a Singaporean former politician and brigadier-general who served as Minister for Foreign Affairs between 2004 and 2011.
Yeo served in the Singapore Army and later Republic of Singapore Air Force (RSAF) between 1976 and 1988 and attained the rank of Brigadier-General. He also served as Chief of Staff – Air Staff between 1985 and 1986, and Director of Joint Operations and Planning at the Ministry of Defence (MINDEF) between 1986 and 1988.
A member of the governing People's Action Party (PAP), Yeo was a Member of Parliament (MP) for Aljunied Group Representation Constituency (GRC) between 1988 and 2011. He also served as Minister for Information and the Arts between 1990 and 1999, Minister for Health between 1994 and 1997, Minister for Trade and Industry between 1999 and 2004 and Minister for Foreign Affairs between 2004 and 2011.
He subsequently went on to complete a Master in Business Administration degree from Harvard Business School in 1985 as a Baker Scholar.
When Yeo returned to Singapore, he served as Chief of Staff – Air Staff between 1985 and 1986, and Director of Joint Operations and Planning at the Ministry of Defence (MINDEF) between 1986 and 1988. He also led the team which conceptualised the SAFTI Military Institute.
Yeo left the SAF in 1988 and attained the rank Brigadier-General, before entering politics.
Following his election into Parliament, Yeo served in various ministries, including the Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Information, Communications and the Arts, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Trade and Industry and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Yeo represented the Eurasian community in the Cabinet at their request. He was the chairman of the PAP's youth wing from 1991 to 2000, which saw a renaming to Young PAP (YPAP) in 1993. As an incentive for joining the YPAP, he said people joining the YPAP could take positions different from central party leadership.
In 2006, Yeo and the rest of his team faced the Workers' Party (WP) and won with the election's narrowest margin, with 56.09% of the vote to 43.91% for the WP.
However, in the 2011 general election, when Yeo led the PAP team for reelection in Aljunied GRC, Yeo's team was defeated by the WP team of Pritam Singh, Sylvia Lim, Faisal Manap, Low Thia Khiang and Chen Show Mao with WP winning 54.72% of the vote. Yeo was one of the first two cabinet ministers since Singaporean independence, as well as the 1963 election, to be defeated for reelection and thus lose their parliamentary seats to the opposition; the other was Lim Hwee Hua, fellow anchor minister for Aljunied GRC before the 2011 election. As a result, both lost their Cabinet positions as well.
On 10 May of the same year, Yeo announced his retirement from politics. During his announcement, Yeo stated that he declined running for presidency later that year despite being approached by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, cited that he was a "free spirit" and he was not "temperamentally suited for such a job", despite being popular in online and have "a flood of support" on post-election. He although stated on his Facebook page that he was "thinking hard" about the possibility of becoming a candidate on 1 June, but on 15 June, Yeo confirmed that he declined standing for presidency. Yeo later revealed that Lee Kuan Yew had encouraged him to run for the presidency; however, Yeo declined, saying that he "was not going to stand if Lee had another candidate in mind".
On 5 October, Yeo stepped down from the PAP's Central Executive Committee. However, he continued to be a member of the PAP.
In 2013, Yeo was appointed as a non-official member of the newly established Hong Kong Economic Development Commission.
In 2014, Yeo was named as a member of the Vatican City's Council for the Economy. He was amongst the first lay Catholics appointed by the Vatican to oversee organisational and economic issues faced by the Holy See. At that time, Yeo was the only Asian appointed to the commission.
Yeo is currently a member of the Foundation Board of the World Economic Forum, the Nicolas Berggruen Institute's 21st Century Council and the International Advisory Board of IESE Business School (IAB).
Yeo was involved in reviving the ancient Buddhist Nalanda University, in Bihar, India. He was chancellor of the Governing Board, as well as its International Advisory Panel. In November 2016, he resigned from the chancellorship of the university, accusing the Indian government of failing to maintain the university's autonomy.
In Singapore, he is also advisor to the Sun Yat Sen Nanyang Memorial Hall and Teochew Poit Ip Huay Kuan, as well as a patron of Lasalle College of the Arts.
On 23 August 2020, V3 Group, led by Osim founder Ron Sim, announced that George Yeo would join the group as senior advisor. Yeo is also an independent board director of Nasdaq-listed e-commerce platform Pinduoduo, the largest agriculture platform in China.
Yeo was appointed as an independent non-executive director of Creative Technology in 2021. As of April 2024, George Yeo owns 400,000 shares in Wilmar International, and was appointed as an independent non-executive director.
In 2004, their youngest son, who has struggled with childhood leukemia since age three, received a bone marrow transplant at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee. Recognising the difficulties faced by families in such situations, Leong founded the Viva Foundation to help Childhood cancer to improve the survival rate and cure of children with cancer, especially childhood leukemia, in Singapore and Southeast Asia. In May 2006, a memorandum of understanding was signed between St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, National University of Singapore (NUS), National University Hospital (NUH) in Singapore, and the VIVA Foundation for Children with Cancer (VIVA).
Yeo is an avid Jogging and has participated in the Singapore Marathon 10 km run. He is a student of tai chi, an Neijia Chinese martial art, and describes himself as "a bit of a Taoist".
According to himself, Yeo is pro-China.
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