American counterparts from intercepting their communications during the 2014 Red Flag exercise, resulting in a boost in support for the usefulness of Singlish among Singaporean netizens. Preservation issues Chinese varieties (classified as dialects by the Singapore government), with the exception of Mandarin, have been in steep decline since the independence of Singapore in 1965. This is in part due to the Speak Mandarin Campaign that was launched in 1979. As part of the campaign, all programmes on TV and radio using non-standard varieties were stopped. Speeches in Hokkien by the prime minister were discontinued to prevent giving conflicting signals to the people. By the late 1980s, Mandarin managed to some extent, to replace these varieties as the preferred language for communication in public places, such as restaurants and public transport. The preservation of local varieties in Singapore has been of increasing concern in Singapore since the 2000s, especially among the younger generation of Chinese youths. This sudden revival of other varieties can mainly be attributed to a feeling of disconnection between the younger and the elder generations, as well as a sense of loss of identity from their own linguistic roots for many others. While more work has to be put in to revive these varieties, the recent 2014 Singapore Teochew Festival held in Ngee Ann City can be regarded as a positive sign that more people are becoming more actively involved in reconnecting with their linguistic roots. Controversy over learning of Chinese varieties In March 2009, a newspaper article was published in Singapore broadsheet daily The Straits Times on a Language and Diversity Symposium organised by the Division of Linguistics and Multilingual Studies at Nanyang Technological University. Ng Bee Chin, acting Head of the Division, was quoted in the article as saying, "Although Singaporeans are still multilingual, 40 years ago, we were even more multilingual. Young children are not speaking some of these languages at all any more. All it takes is one generation for a language to die." The call to rethink the ban on dialects elicited a swift reply from Minister Mentor, Lee Kuan Yew. "I thought it was a daft call. My then-principal private secretary Chee Hong Tat issued a reply on my behalf: Using one language more frequently means less time for other languages. Hence, the more languages a person learns, the greater the difficulties of retaining them at a high level of fluency… It