Our guest writer, Dai Kor, writes for the blog Singapore Kopi Tok.

2006 started off well enough. According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs website, PM Lee attended the wedding of the Johor Sultan's son in January, and Foreign Minister Syed Hamid made a visit here in February. And here, MFA's write-up stops. I'm not sure if it means there were no more exchanges, the page had not been updated, or simply no longer warranted attention.

Meanwhile, as ongoing negotiations over the bridge to replace the causeway did not appear to be bearing fruit - Malaysian leaders announced that a "scenic bridge" which would replace Malaysia's half of the causeway. Singapore insisted that unilaterally breaking the causeway, even your own half, would violate an international agreement.

Singapore stubbornly stuck to its position of agreeing to the bridge only on the basis that a package deal (i.e. on the price of water, air space, sand etc) could be struck. But UMNO politicians in Johor said that this was akin to selling Malaysia's sovereignty, and scuttled as chance of this deal happening.

This it was inevitable that in April, PM Abdullah announced that the scenic bridge would be scrapped ... after work had started. CIQ builder Gerbang Perdana would get a few hundred million ringgit in compensation. And on top of that, other expensive adjustments would have to be made so that the CIQ could be used with the existing causeway.

Several months of relative peace ensued, until in September Singapore's founding father Lee Kuan Yew made a comment at a S2006 related forum that the Chinese population in Malaysia and Indonesia were marginalized. Both countries responded (Malaysia more vocally so) and Lee issued an explanation that was really less of an apology than an affirmation and justification of what he had said.

Notwithstanding how the folks in UMNO Johor had put him between a rock and a hard place just a short few months earlier, PM Abdullah announced in November the multi-billion dollar Southern Johor Economic Region (SJER). Elated, the UMNO were only concerned that Singapore investors/companies should not be given juicy investments/contracts such as the proposed monorail (which is apparently supposed to link with Singapore's MRT). PM Lee's observations of "mixed signals" from the Johor side were quickly put to rest.

At least, bilateral relations ended on a relatively higher note after (and some may say despite) DPM Najib's plug for Genting was followed by the announcement that Genting had won the bid to build Singapore's 2nd casino (ok, ok, integrated resort) on Sentosa. Genting stock has since moved from about thirty cents to more than a dollar today (now, why oh why did I not buy any? ... sob!)

Any guesses for what's in store for 2007?