Singapore will slash its top politicians' unpopular multimillion-dollar salaries by at least a third, a new salary scale shows, but its ministers will stay among the best paid in the world.
The cuts were promised by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong to appease public anger after a landmark general election in 2011, and he himself will take a 36 percent pay reduction to $A1.63 million.
That is still believed to be the highest salary of any elected head of government in the world - more than four times as much as Barack Obama, who earns $400,000 a year as president of the United States.
Singapore's largely ceremonial president will see his own salary reduced by 51 percent to $A2.34 million.
The cuts will be retroactive to the start of the current government's five-year term on May 21, 2011 and new guidelines will peg pay to the well-being of ordinary Singaporeans.
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