Chee Soon Juan responds to Lee Hsien Loong’s National Day Rally address Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong delivered his National day rally speech on 29 Aug 10. This is SDP Secretary-General Chee Soon Juan’s respsonse. Dr Chee notes that Mr Lee ignored the problems caused by the flooding of foreigners in Singapore and how this is causing grave social and infrastructural problems for the country. NSP: Leave No Man Behind Like many Singaporeans, NSP is shocked to learn that the PAP is only giving due recognition to present NSmen while ignoring those past NSmen who have contributed to the safety and stability of this country. It is easy for the ruling party to say that it is not just about the money. However, the exclusion of those NSmen in Mindef Reserve from such rewarding system has hurt their feelings more than the mere $9000 in question. When the Prime Minister mentioned about this hand out of $9000 to NSmen, many Singaporeans are happy and glad that the PAP has not forgotten of the sacrifices and contributions that Singaporeans have made towards this country. Even though some of us may not get the full amount eventually, but at least it is a token of appreciation by the government that matters. However, we do not expect the PAP to miss out a whole two or three generations of older male Singaporeans who have completed their full cycle of National Service. This leaves a bitter taste in them and it seems to indicate that once they have passed their “useful” time to the Nation, the PAP will just abandon them aside. Such move betrays the cold, clinical pragmatism of PAP rule. It also makes us wonder whether PAP will abandon all of us when we become old and incapable to contribute to the country in time to come! Leave no man behind. This is what NSP believes in as what the Officer Cadet Course would teach all leaders of SAF. This is also the mantra of PAP but it just doesn’t really practise what it preaches. Goh Meng Seng Secretary General National Solidarity Party PM Lee’s National Day Rally Speech 2010 — James Bond is in town! By the Singapore Democrats 30 August 2010 Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has mastered the art of talking a lot but not saying much. He did this when he spoke on the hot-button issue of foreigners flooding Singapore, a topic that dominated his National Day (ND) Rally speech on Sunday night. His first statement already is dubious. Mr Lee says that the GDP for the first half of the year was 18% year-on-year and that this growth created “lots of jobs” and as a result “unemployment has gone down”. Not true. The Ministry of Manpower (MOM) reported that the the actual numbers of the jobless increased by nearly 25,000 between March and June this year. Seasonally adjusted figures show that around 68,100 Singapore residents were out of work in June 2010. The number of unemployed did decrease towards the latter half of 2009. But what good is a ND Rally speech when we cannot depend on the prime minister to use up-to-date information rather than spin us using data that’s more than half-a-year old? Worse, the MOM report shows that those who remained unemployed after six months is on the rise. This means that not only are more people losing their jobs, those who lost their jobs are finding it more difficult to find a new one. Mr Lee completely ignored this point and nonsensically concluded that the “economy has shaken off the recession” and happy days are here again. The last time another Mr Lee said this, telling Singaporeans that we were entering into a “golden period”, our economy fell off the cliff triggering the worst economic crisis in our history. More foreigners, please The Prime Minister used this spin to justify the PAP’s policy of bringing in yet more foreign workers. We already have 2 million people in Singapore (out of 5 million) who are not Singaporeans. He tells us that he wants to bring in more foreigners “so that in the long term we can rely less on foreign workers”. Did the PM think that he was talking to kindergarteners? The Government is still intent on increasing our population to 6.5 million which will mean that foreigners will eventually outnumber Singaporeans in this country. It is this kind of rubbish that makes Mr Lee’s ND Rally speech so insulting and infuriating. Then as if to make his point that we are relying less on foreigners, he assures us that instead of allowing 100,000 foreigners into Singapore this year, the Government will bring in only 80,000. Already everywhere we turn see foreigners doing everything. From hotels to hospitals, kopitiams to counters at shopping centres foreigners fill every niche in Singapore. Foreigners have even moved in on the prostitution and gangland scenes. And the PM thinks that taking in 80,000 instead of 100,000 is going to make a difference? It is like choosing between tweedle-dum or tweedle-dee. The PM must get serious. See that white elephant? Mr Lee diligently ignores the white elephant sitting in his Istana living room. He refuses to acknowledge the root cause of the problem which is that Singaporeans – skilled Singaporeans – are leaving Singapore. This country is hemorhagging talent and a major reason is the stifling PAP system here. If he is serious about increasing productivity and making Singapore a base for talent and innovation, he should ensure that we institute reforms to our tired and archaic political system. Mr Lee will also not admit that Singapore is using foreigners to suppress workers’ wages in Singapore in order that profit-margins can be maintained. Businesses may be registering greater profits but this is because our workers are getting paid less, not because they are getting more productive. He exhorts that “Productivity must be the responsibility of all of us” and that in order that we improve our productivity, we must “keep learning and upgrading” and “increase our value and contribution”. He completely omits the fact that, according to the International Labor Organization’s Global Wages Report 2009, Singaporeans are already working the longest number of hours but seeing their real incomes getting smaller. Bear with it, it’s for my good The final straw is Mr Lee telling the people, “So please bear with the larger numbers for the time being.” For the time being? You mean that foreign workers are only here temporarily and after some time, we are going to send them home and everything will be back to normal? Mr Lee must stop talking to us like we are little kids. Why must we bear with a policy that is crushing us – both figuratively and literally (in the MRT trains), one that we don’t agree with,  one that is rammed down our throats, and one that will ultimately ruin Singapore? Why must Singaporeans bear with a policy that is only for the PAP’s good? And while the Prime Minister tells us to bear with the burden, what is he and his ministers sacrificing? By increasing their already bloated salaries? Mr Lee is putting a chimp in a tuxedo and telling us that James Bond is in town. This is why the Democrats advocate retrenchment benefits By the Singapore Democrats 25 August 2010 The Ministry of Manpower reported that as of June 2010 nearly 70,000 people in Singapore are unemployed. The numbers also reveal that those who are still looking for jobs after six months is on the rise. Add to this is the fact that most of those retrenched are older workers – aged 40 and above. Behind the numbers are real people who suddenly find themselves out of a job. They have families to feed and bills to pay. They are also the ones who have children in their teens, a time when expenses are the highest. These are hardworking folks who through no fault of theirs are rudely greeted with a pink slip on day when they show up for work. And while the income stops, the bills continue to pile up. The electricity bill still needs to be paid, the HDB loan still needs to be serviced, and children still need to go to school. How do these people cope in the six months or more that they are struck down without an income? This is the reason why the Singapore Democrats call for temporary help for these people in the form of retrenchment benefits. This is the Singapore Democrats’ plan: The Government pays retrenched workers who do not have unemployment insurance 75 percent of their salary for the first six months. This amount would be reduced to 50 percent during the following six months, and further reduced to 25 percent in the third six months. The payments will stop once the individual finds employment. They will also cease 18 months after one’s retrenchment if the individual is still not employed by then. This will prevent a culture of welfare dependence from taking root. A cap will also be placed on the amount that any retrenched worker is paid. Under the SDP’s plan each worker will be allowed to reject only up to three job offers in the one-and-a-half years of the entitlement programme following which, as stated, the retrenchment benefit ceases. Such a scheme will provide workers a cushion when they are retrenched while at the same time encourage them to seek re-employment. The estimated cost for running such a programme based on the median income of $2,400 a month and on a scenario of 50,000 workers retrenched in a given year is less than $1 billion. Let’s put this amount into perspective. In 2008 Temasek Holdings and GIC lost $140 billion in disastrous investments. What the Singapore Democrats propose will be 0.007 percent of the amount Temasek and GIC lost. And this will help 50,000 Singaporeans and their families in Singapore instead of millionaire bankers in Merrill Lynch, UBS and Barclays. Already we are seeing an increase of hardship cases in Singapore leading to more suicides. The Samaritans of Singapore reported 410 suicides in Singapore 2009, up 10 percent from 2008. That averages out to more than one person taking his/her own life in this small country everyday. There is another upside to such a programme. People who are unemployed are in dire straits and they will urgently spend the money on basic necessities as opposed taking it out of the country for, say, a holiday. The retrenchment benefits paid out to them will make their way back into the economy. This will help businesses. The idea of a retrenchment benefits programme will be increasingly urgent as jobs will be harder and harder to come by because many of the multinational companies, especially the ones in the US and Europe, are not expanding their investments here because of the politico-economic situations back home. A retrenchment-benefits programme is needed now. It makes good economic sense. The PAP ministers cannot continue to twiddle their thumbs while Singaporeans suffer. For a more detailed account of this proposal, click here. Take care of Singaporeans too By the Singapore Democrats 19 August 2010 In his zeal to impress foreigners on how efficiently and smoothly he can run the Youth Olympic Games (YOG), Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports Dr Vivian Balakrishnan has been quite happy to sacrifice the daily necessities of Singaporeans. Take, for example, the temporary closure of bus-stops. The Land Transport Authority has ordered that buses cannot stop outside the YOG venues such as the one at the Toa Payoh Stadium. Two SBS bus inspectors are stationed at the stop to wave buses on and prevent commuters from getting off. Is such a measure necessary? Could security concerns be the reason that the LTA is doing this? The answer is no because anyone can walk into the vicinity of the stadium and competition halls. There is no security personnel to check visitors. A likelier reason is that the organisers don’t want the entrance of the carpark jammed by vehicular traffic which would prevent YOG athletes and officials from coming and going with ease. But how can this be? Buses typically stop for no more than a minute or two to allow passengers to alight. Can the YOG coaches ferrying the young athletes not wait momentarily for the SBS buses to pull clear before proceeding? Alternatively, could the traffic wardens on duty not halt the SBS buses to let the YOG coaches leave the vicinity first? Why the need to shutdown down the bus-stop for two weeks? Has Dr Balakrishnan considered that there are elderly persons and pregnant women who might have difficulty walking from the next bus-stop back down the road to their destinations? What about parents with infants and toddlers? Grandparents escorting their young charges to take the bus to school were seen arguing with officials at the bus-stop. Were alternative arrangements made to ensure that they are helped? Were residents given adequate notice that the stops would be closed? Apparently not because even the bus drivers had to be cued not to stop. If the drivers don’t know that the bus-stops are closed, how would residents be expected to know? The LTA couldn’t even be bothered to explain why the bus-stops needed to be closed. Such callousness is unacceptable especially in light of the fact that the minister spent $7 million on chartering an executive jet just to ferry the YOG flame and $9 million to publicise the Games. Could he not allocate a tiny portion of the budget to ensure that bus passengers, especially the elderly and the young, are taken care of? Then there are reports that students who were “selected” to attend the games were not given refreshments and were instructed to bring their own money to buy their own food and drinks. The Government can build elaborate stage sets which cost millions of dollars to set up to hold concerts that attracted hardly any audience, concerts that were not even central to the Games. And yet it cannot even buy our students drinks? And while the athletes were treated to buffet spreads, our local volunteers were given meagre portions of rice, fish and green beans. Why such a gulf in treatment? Because they are talent and we are not? To add injury to insult, volunteers now find themselves suffering from food poisoning. Thirty volunteers were reported to have come down with diarrhea and abdominal pain after they ate the food provided during the triathalon competition at East Coast Park last Sunday. (The incident happened on 15 Aug 10 but was not reported by the Government media until three days later. Even then, the news first broke on the Internet. Were the journalists asleep? Probably not.) Recently, Mr Goh Chok Tong took another swipe at Singaporeans, saying that they liked to gripe, that is, to complain about things trivial. It’s another indication how removed from the real world PAP ministers are. The YOG failings which Singaporeans are pointing out are not gripes. They are serious shortcomings of a Government that has long ceased to pay attention to the grievances of the people. Singaporeans are not an unreasonable lot. They will put up with and suffer inconveniences if they know that these inconveniences benefit our nation. But many know that the YOG was staged as a PAP-glorification exercise – one, it must be added, that has gone horribly awry. Dr Balakrishnan wants to show the world how well he takes care of an international sporting event. While he is at it he should perhaps think about taking care of Singaporeans too. Activist Seelan Palay jailed for exercising his rights By the Singapore Democrats 12 August 2010 Human rights activist Mr Seelan Palay is serving a 12-day prison term for taking part in the Tak Boleh Tahan (Malay for “cannot take it”) protest on 15 Mar 08 outside Parliament House. Mr Seelan was convicted together with 8 other activists by District Judge Chia Wee Kiat in Mar 2010. All of them have appealed the conviction. The appeal hearing date has yet to be fixed. Some of those convicted, including Ms Chee Siok Chin and Dr Chee Soon Juan, have served their two-week sentences. Mr Seelan, who produced One Nation Under Lee (ONUL), is facing another charge of participating in an illegal assembly on 9 Aug 08 together with 10 other activists (see here). The record-breaking video (which has nearly 100,000 views) has awakened many a young Singaporean. In fact, a few of the SDP’s Young Democrats joined the party after watching ONUL. The activist is also behind much of the campaigning against the mandatory death penalty. In fact, he has taken with him Once A Jolly Hangman written by Mr Alan Shadrake into prison to read. The book is for all intents and purposes banned in Singapore and Mr Shadrake himself is being charged with contempt of court. Mr Seelan was taken to court this morning in prison garb and shackled. When the Judge, Mr Kessler Soh, began the session, Mr Seelan said: “Before we begin, I’d like to clarify that I’m in the dock in shackles, cuffs and chains not because I have committed any crime. I am here in this state because of another unjust law administered on behalf of the PAP Government.” Mr Seelan’s conviction involved the case where the Government-affiliated Consumers Association of Singapore (CASE) had also held a protest in the same vicinity and had carried out similar activities as the Tak Boleh Tahan (TBT) protest. CASE had staged a protest two years in a row including protesting with placards and marching outside Parliament House. No action was taken against its organisers and participants. Such blatant double standards can only happen in an autocratic state where there is one set of rules for the rulers and another one for the rest. The TBT defendants raised the issue of illegal discrimination and exercise of police powers in bad faith when they allowed the CASE protest to proceed but clamped down on the TBT protest. The TBT activists cited Article 12 of the Constitution which states that all citizens must be treated equally under the law. However, DJ Chia Wee Kiat did not allow the defendants to raise the matter during the hearing and proceeded to convict the defendants. When Should One Retire? By Dr Wong Wee Nam 08 August 2010 “If I’d known that retirement was going to be this good I’d have done it the day after I left school!!!” — Mickey White Flowers know when to shrivel and die. Trees know when to shed their leaves. Animals know when they can no longer hunt. Even elephants know when to die. Do Singaporeans know when to retire? Some of them don’t, many of them just can’t and most just don’t know how to. Those who don’t are obviously the very well-paid. If you are getting an income of millions of dollars from your company, why would you want to give that up? I asked my long-retired mathematics teacher, aged 77, for his view on this and, with a mind still as sharp as his putt, he replied, “This is pure mathematical logic”. Those who can’t are those who have, all their lives, been so lowly-paid that they do not have enough savings to retire. These people just have to continue working at their menial job, on a pay that is continually being depressed by cheaper foreign labour and praying that they would not be replaced. For the Singaporeans who do not know how to retire, it is because all their lives they have only known how to work and slog in the name of productivity, but do not how to live and enjoy a life. Moreover how could they when the retirement age is periodically being extended and our venerated sage has advised that retiring is not the wise thing to do? Happy Retirees There is a time for everything. Retiring at the right time is not necessarily a bad thing. Furthermore, retirement from a job is not the same as retirement from living. A lion which has lost its teeth and can no longer hunt will starve to death. As human beings are capable of having family, friends and cultivating a variety of interests, they need not shrivel and die when they retire from a job. For many of the happy retirees whom I know, retirement is just the beginning of another chapter of their lives. My primary two form master’s wife, also a retired teacher, aged 75, is a good example. She wears brightly coloured dresses and dyes her hair in matching colours. Her exuberant expression and vibrant spirit shows how much she enjoys her retired life. Another is this 85 year old patient of mine who enjoys playing mahjong, helping out in church, meeting friends, cooking and wandering all over Singapore looking for food to eat. She once invited me for supper at 313 (I didn’t even know there was such a place then), knew exactly where to get the desert for me and then insisted on taking the MRT and bus home. Unhappy Retirees However not everyone is so fortunate. There are some who had been forced to retired because of ill-health. Two nights ago, a friend called me up to asked me for some advice regarding a friend of his, aged 52, who went into a coma as a result of diabetes. This person had been unemployed because of a festering gangrene of his foot and he had refused treatment because he did not want to burden his family with hefty medical bills and also having to take care of him for the rest of his life. He would rather die. I advised them to call for an ambulance immediately and bring him straight to hospital. When the ambulance came, he regained consciousness and refused to be sent to the hospital. To him, there is no meaning in retirement or living a life that is going to be very expensive for him. Similarly, there are others who have been forced into retirement because they have lost their jobs during the recession or have been displaced by cheaper labour. Because they are middle aged, these people thus find it very hard to get another job again. This group of premature retirees is likely to lose their self-esteem and become depressed instead of enjoying their retirement. To them, postponing the retirement age and asking them not to retire is totally meaningless. The Government’s Role With an aging population, the number of both happy and unhappy retirees will grow. For their contribution to the prosperity of our nation, this group of citizens is entitled to a life in this country. To achieve this, there must be a change in attitude towards retirees by society, the government and the retirees themselves. Instead of seeing them as economic burdens and discarding them as useless economic digits, the government should look to see how it could provide a favorable environment, a good infrastructure and appropriate social amenities to give a life to these people in their golden years. In the early fifties, the government planned and provided health and social services for the poor and the baby boomers. In the next fifty years, the government should be planning and providing healthcare and social services for the retirees. There must also be social and community programmes to engage the retirees. They deserve all these because it is their blood and sweat in their productive years that have given the country its wealth. Singapore is always building this hub and that hub. Have we ever thought of making Singapore a retirees’ hub? A retirees’ hub need not be detrimental to the country. It can spawn new goods and services that could fuel economic changes and also result in the development of skills and expertise that can be exported. The task may be enormous and challenging, but think of the coffee shops in Geylang and the integrated resorts that have benefited tremendously from the patronage of the retirees. We can certainly do with more of other healthier programmes. There is also the social benefit as well. Instead of encouraging the retirees to migrate or go to JB, such a hub would send a message to young Singaporeans that the State cares for them and it’s worthwhile to stay here for the rest of their lives. Retirement Is Not a Bad Thing Retirement is a fact of life. It is not a bad thing at all. It helps in the renewal of leadership, in rejuvenating the workforce and in the removal of stumbling blocks in the system. All workers have a use-by-date whether they like it or not.  An actress, when she is young and pretty, will get all the lead roles. As she grows older, she will act as someone’s mother. Later on she may still get some cameo roles as a grandmother. She should then retire because beyond that no director will cast her as a great-grandmother as there would be hardly any script for great-grandmothers. However not everyone is aware of his or her expiry date. No one will ever think of himself as a stumbling block. This blind spot is often found in civil and political leaders and patriarchs of family businesses. These people always like to think that without them everything will disintegrate and hence are very reluctant to relinquish their powers. Sadly they often end up being like a goalkeeper who has lost his reflexes, does not realize it and starts to let in goals.  Or they end up like the analogy once used in Parliament: an old 75 rpm gramophone that keeps jumping back to the same groove. The Parable of Zhuang Zi (庄子) There is a Chinese idiom害群之马when literally translated means “a horse that is harmful to the herd”. It is used to describe a person who is detrimental to a team. However, it is not easy for most people, especially powerful people, to realize and accept that they could be a harmful horse and retire gracefully. Only a person as enlightened as the Yellow Emperor will be able to do so. In Chapter 24 of his Complete Works entitled Xu Wu Gui (徐无鬼), Zhuang Zi wrote : One day the Yellow Emperor set out with six sages to seek the advice of a very wise man, Great Wei (大隗) at Mount Juci （具茨山）. In the wild countryside near Xiang Cheng City, they lost their way and could find no one to ask directions from.  Fortunately they chanced upon a young boy herding horses, and asked him for directions. “Do you know the way to Mount Juci?” they asked. “Yes.” “And do you know where Great Wei is to be found?” “Yes.” “What an extraordinary boy!” the Yellow Emperor exclaimed. “You not only know the way to Mount Juci, but you even know where Great Wei is! May I ask you how to govern the empire?” “Governing the empire is no big deal,” said the young boy. “It is just like your excursion. Move on and leave your worries behind. When I was little, I used to go wandering but unexpectedly I contracted a disease that made me giddy and which blurred my eyesight. An elderly man advised me to mount on the chariot of the sun and go wandering about in the wilds and not to worry about it. Now my illness is slowly getting better and I intend to go wandering again. Governing the empire just means doing what I’m doing. No big deal. Just go with the flow.” “I know that governing of the empire does not concern you,” the Yellow Emperor said. “Nevertheless, I would like to ask you how it should be done.” The young boy declined to comment but when the Yellow Emperor remained insistent. So the boy said, “Governing the empire is not much different from herding horses. Just get rid of the horses that are harmful to the herd.” The Yellow Emperor suddenly became enlightened. Addressing the boy as “Heavenly Master,” he kowtowed twice and retired. There must be much wisdom in Zhuang Zi’s parable. Otherwise how could it be around for more than 2300 years? 【原文】Original Text 黄帝将见大隗乎具茨之山，方明为御，昌寓骖乘，张若、謵朋前马，昆阍、滑稽后车；至于襄城之野，七圣皆迷，无所问塗。 适遇牧马童子，问塗焉，曰：“若知具茨之山乎？”曰：“然。”“若知大隗之所存乎？”曰：“然。”黄帝曰：“异哉小童！非徒知具茨之山，又知大隗之所存。请问为天下。”小童曰：“夫为天下者，亦若此而已矣，又奚事焉！予少而自游于六合之内，予适有瞀病，有长者教予曰：‘若乘日之车而游于襄城之野。’今予病少痊，予又且复游于六合之外。夫为天下亦若此而已。予又奚事焉！”黄帝曰：“夫为天下者，则诚非吾子之事。虽然，请问为天下。”小童辞。 黄帝又问。小童曰：“夫为天下者，亦奚以异乎牧马者哉！亦去其害马者而已矣！”黄帝再拜稽首，称天师而退 MM Lee: PAP more likely to get the drainage right (run-up to GE 2006) Said Mr Lee: “The PAP makes promises they deliver. The Opposition cannot deliver.” “If you have a flood, just carefully think who is more likely to get the drainage put right and have the flood alleviated as quickly as possible: A PAP candidate with links to the ministers and Prime Minister, or a non-PAP candidate who has become an MP, like in Potong Pasir or Hougang, and who has to manage on his own?” “That’s a fact of life.” Source: Today newspaper, “MM Lee explains his tough stance against Opposition, throws a challenge“, 29 April 2006. SDP’s National Day Message 2010 — The Young Ones What kind of a society are we building for our young ones? What are their aspirations? Are they going to live in a country that is different from ours, one which is free and democratic? We hear from them in this year’s National Day Message from the SDP. Chiam’s wife to contest Potong Pasir Source: ST, 05 Aug 2010 POTONG Pasir MP Chiam See Tong has named his wife Lina as his political successor. It means that at the next general election, Mrs Chiam, 61, will contest the single-seat constituency her husband has held since 1984. And Mr Chiam, 75, intends to lead an opposition team to stand in the neighbouring Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC, a five-MP constituency he has been eyeing for some time. Speaking to The Straits Times at his Meet-the-People session last night, Mr Chiam said he chose his wife as she was his ‘natural successor’. ‘I think she’s very good at bonding with the residents and that’s what wins elections. She gets along very well (with the residents), especially the ladies,’ he said. Referring to his constituents, he added: ‘They told me for Potong Pasir, Mr Chiam is the first choice and anyone else who stands, they won’t win, except for Mrs Chiam.’ And if she is victorious at the polls, he said she would be well prepared to take over the running of the Potong Pasir Town Council, of which she is now the vice-chairman. ‘She has been working so closely with me that I think the staff even recognise her as some kind of a boss,’ he said. Mr Chiam is a retired lawyer and his wife was previously a staff nurse. His remarks put to rest long-running speculation on who would succeed him in Potong Pasir. Some names had been thrown up, including the Chiams’ only child, Camilla, 34, and Mr Desmond Lim. Mr Lim, 42, is a central executive committee member in Mr Chiam’s Singapore People’s Party (SPP) and the Singapore Democratic Alliance (SDA). Mrs Chiam said she and her husband wanted to let their daughter focus first on her life and marriage. As for Mr Lim, she agreed there was a time when they had groomed him as a possible replacement. ‘But somehow or other, I’m sorry to say, he just didn’t have the X-factor, (or) even the personality,’ she said. Mrs Chiam and Mr Lim are embroiled in a spat that reportedly began in May, after a proposal for the opposition Reform Party to join the SDA fell through. There was speculation that she blamed him for the failed merger. Mr Lim, when asked last night to comment on her being Mr Chiam’s chosen successor, said simply: ‘Congratulations.’ In an earlier statement to The Straits Times yesterday, he said he would support whichever candidate the party chooses. Mr Chiam hoped last night that ‘party politics will not interfere with this natural trend of events’. He said his wife’s candidacy would have to be endorsed by SDA members. If that failed, she might run on the SPP’s ticket or even as an independent. She said: ‘Do or die, I will stand in Potong Pasir. I want to continue the legacy.’ As for Mr Chiam’s plans, he said he was still keen to join forces with the Reform Party. Noting that the Reform Party had indicated an interest in West Coast GRC, he said: ‘West Coast is quite unknown to me, whereas Bishan-Toa Payoh, we are neighbours and I feel an affinity with them.’ The two parties are still in talks and Mrs Chiam said she had sent a revised proposal to the Reform Party, as well as the component parties of the SDA. She said the SDA had also approached the National Solidarity Party, which had indicated it might rejoin the alliance depending on the outcome of the talks with the Reform Party. Mr Chiam expressed the hope that the opposition could work together. Asked if he would retire from politics if he lost at the polls, he said: ‘I think so. Have you seen a loser come back again?’ Technician Huong Ing Kwong, 54, who moved to Potong Pasir ward two years ago, said: ‘I’ve admired Mr Chiam since he entered politics but I have yet to decide who to vote for at the next election.’ However, babysitter Habibah Bee, 62, who has voted for Mr Chiam at every election since moving to Potong Pasir 13 years ago, said she would support Mrs Chiam. ‘I will surely support anyone from Mr Chiam’s party.’ jeremyau@sph.com.sg ziliang@sph.com.sg The Youth Olympic Games — why the great apathy? Written by Ng E-Jay 03 August 2010 Why do so many Singaporeans fail to feel a sense of pride at our nation hosting the Youth Olympic Games, slated to take place from the 14th to the 26th of August this year? According to an informal poll conducted at the Channel News Asia website, 90% of the respondents indicated that they were not interested at all in the event. A quick survey of Singapore’s popular internet forums also reveal a general apathy towards the Games, sprinkled with negative comments about how the event has been organized thus far and how far removed the YOG seems from the daily lives and aspirations of ordinary citizens. The Singapore Democrats speculate in a scathing article posted on their website that the YOG has not been as successful as the government wants it to be in part because of poor timing — the World Cup, surely the greatest international sporting event this year, has overshadowed it. The SDP article also lambastes the government’s incompetence at planning the event, citing examples such as the original YOG budget ballooning out of proportion from $104 million to around $400 million, and renowned world athletes and International Olympic Committee (IOC) ambassadors Messrs Michael Phelps and Usain Bolt giving the event a miss. In late June, Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports Dr Vivian Balakrishnan accused Singaporeans of being “small-minded, unfair and very, very selfish”, because of certain remarks directed at foreign-born athletes. Some critics have been complaining that our government spends precious tax-payer dollars importing foreign-born athletes to help us win medals and achieve prestige, rather than spending time and energy grooming home-grown sporting talents. Thus far our government has only chided Singaporeans for displaying what it deems to be a xenophobic mentality, but without explaining why local born-and-bred citizens are not given more attention and resources to help them achieve the same standards displayed by foreign-born athletes. Has our nation really become so superficial, focusing only on winning medals and enhancing our international reputation in the short term, rather than on nurturing our precious stock of human capital for the long run? Is this why so many Singaporeans have become disinterested in the Games, because they sense the superficiality of it all and the fact that the government will easily set them aside once they are deemed of lesser value compared to the foreigners that can be easily imported? In thirteen short years, Singaporeans have been through three major recessions, the income gap has widened considerably, lower income citizens are struggling more than ever before to make ends meet because of rapidly rising prices, and the middle class has been disenfranchised because they are being progressively priced out of the property market which has gone to the stratosphere. It is hard to feel a sense of pride at the Games when the future seems so uncertain, and when the policies of the government seem to be constantly accentuating what author Catherine Lim terms “the great affective divide“. It is hard to feel a sense of pride when the government has been so embarrassingly uncreative in the organization of the Games and has committed such a vast litany of screw-ups. It is hard to feel as a sense of pride when there is the growing recognition that citizens are merely being treated as government fodder for increasing some vague notion of prestige that has nothing to do the real lives and challenges faced by ordinary citizens. It is not difficult to understand why there has been such general apathy and lack of interest for the Games. Our national values, our sense of belonging and identity, the unique sense of camaraderie and kinship that older generations of Singaporeans have shared has been slowly eroded over the years. At the end of day, perhaps Singaporeans don’t feel they are part of the Games because they feel the Games were never meant for them in the first place. The Taming of the Floods By Dr Wong Wee Nam 02 August 2010 The Contrast Floods have been China’s sorrow for thousands of years. They have also been Singapore’s talking point for the past few months. In China, people wailed and cried as they lost their loved ones, their properties and the crops to the calamity. Luckily for Singapore, except for those affected, we can still laugh and joke at the excuses made up by people who are supposed to address and solve the problem. The Legend Five thousand years ago, the flooding by the Yellow River was so bad that the confederation of chieftains under the leadership of Yao （尧）decided to appoint Gun （鲧） to take charge of the fight against the flood. When Yao abdicated out of old age to Shun （舜）, his successor continued to attach great importance to flood control. For nine years, Gun and his men built dams, dykes and barrages to try and stop the flow of the rivers, but these efforts only resulted in more disastrous floods and more destruction of lives and properties. For his failure and the increased loss of lives, Gun suffered detention without trial on Plume Hill and he was incarcerated there until his death. Shun then ordered Yü （禹）, who was Gun’s son, to carry on his father’s work of fighting the flood. The Toil and Sacrifice After a careful study of his father’s failures, Yü decided to abandon his father’s method of building dams and barrages to stop the flow of water. Instead, he attempted to divert water into the sea by digging ditches and canals and dredging the rivers. He even cut a canal into the Mount Long Men and other mountain ridges to achieve this. For thirteen years, rain or shine, Yü and his men dug and carried away the soil. He suffered sunburn and poor nutrition. His muscles wasted and hair dropped off from his legs. But he continued to toil and persevere. “Passing his own door three times and refusing to go in” (三过家门不入) is a popular Chinese saying and the story behind it is a tale of Yü ‘s dedication. When he was given the job, he had been married for only five days. During his thirteen years of fighting the flood, he passed by his home three times but refused to go in as he felt it would affect him in dealing with a public crisis. The first time he passed by, his wife was in labour and he heard the baby cried. The second time he passed by, the son was learning to walk and on the third time, his son was old enough to wave to him. Yet each time, Yü walked on, saying that as the flood was rendering countless people homeless, he could not rest in his own. After thirteen years of engineering feat and exemplary determination and perseverance, he finally brought the floods under control. Because of his achievement and selflessness, when Emperor Shun finally retired, he decided to pass the throne to Yü instead of his own son. In the Book of History (书经) he said： “Come, Yü. The inundating waters filled me with dread, when you realized all that you represented and accomplished your task, thus showing your superiority to other men. Full of toilsome earnestness in the service of the State, and sparing in your expenditure on your family, and this without being full of yourself or elated; you again show your superiority to other men. Without any prideful assumption, there is no one in the empire to contest with you the palm of ability; without any boasting, there is no one in the empire to contest with you the claim of merit. I see how great is your virtue, how admirable your vast achievements. The determinate appointment of Heaven rests on your person; you must eventually ascend the throne of the great sovereign.” (James Legge’s translation) 帝曰：「來！禹！降水儆予，成允成功，惟汝賢。克勤于邦，克儉于家，不自滿假，惟汝賢。汝惟不矜，天下莫與汝爭能；汝惟不伐，天下莫與汝爭功。予懋乃德，嘉乃丕績，天之歷數在汝躬，汝終陟元后。 The Lessons There are many lessons we can learn about public duties from the story of Yü’s Great Taming of the Floods. Firstly, there is the principle of accountability. Gun failed in his task and he had to answer for it. This is not surprising. Honour, shame and accountability had been the virutes of Chinese culture and government.  The 5000 years of Chinese history is replete with stories of officials who had to pay for their failures and blunders that included allowing prisoners to escape, security lapses and loss of national stockpile of grains. Secondly there is the indomitable spirit displayed by Yü. The Chinese people at that time believed that the floods were acts of the angry gods. However, they did not wring their hands in despair and look for reasons to explain away the disaster. Instead of being overcome by a sense of hopelessness, they decided they must do what they can to solve the problem and relieve the people’s suffering and not just blame the heavens. Thirdly, Yü also showed that as a public servant, you must put people’s suffering before your own. He showed it with his single-minded dedication and selflessness. As a result, ordinary people loved him because he was so kind and caring. He was also a very humble man, eschewing high rewards or luxuries. When he was first offered the throne, he declined by saying, “My virtue is not equal to the position.” This is why Yü is the only Chinese ruler posthumously honoured with the title “the Great (大禹)”. In The Analects, Confucius has this to say of Yü: “I can find no flaw in the character of Yü. He used himself coarse food and drink, but displayed the utmost filial piety towards the spirits. His ordinary garments were poor, but he displayed the utmost elegance in his sacrificial cap and apron. He lived in a low, mean house, but expended all his strength on the ditches and water channels. I can find nothing like a flaw in Yü.” 子曰：“禹，吾无间然矣。菲饮食而致孝乎鬼神，恶衣服而致美乎黻冕，卑宫室而尽力乎沟洫。禹，吾无间然矣！” Is it any wonder that his name has lived for 5000 years? Yes, a flood may wash away a lot of things but it can also expose merits and flaws. If we have not been humbled, we have learned nothing. Shooting the messenger – PAP’s growing desperation By Alex Au, for the Asia Times Online 27 July 2010 (This is an abbreviated version of the article. The full article can be accessed here.) Three recent incidents have brought renewed attention to the repressive nature of Singapore’s People’s Action Party (PAP)-led government at a time when the island state is bidding to attract more foreign tourists and investment. A book critical of the way the death penalty is applied in Singapore saw its British author, Alan Shadrake, arrested on July 18. He was interrogated for 39 hours and now faces possible imprisonment for contempt of court. Earlier this month, the government banned the latest video made by filmmaker Martyn See, including an order that all copies of the film be removed from the Internet. See’s film focused on a November 2009 speech made by former political prisoner Lim Hock Siew, who was detained without trial for 19 years from 1963 to 1982. The speech described his time behind bars and the lack of due process that kept him there. In June, another ex-political detainee, Vincent Cheng, was barred from speaking at a forum organized by the National University of Singapore’s History Society. The ban on his participation came from the National Library Board, the venue’s state-affiliated owner. Detained from 1987-1990, Cheng was accused of being a “Marxist conspirator” out to subvert the state, a charge he has vehemently denied. Earlier this year, Singapore opened two multi-billion dollar casinos to draw more foreign tourists and has boasted rapid gross domestic product (GDP) growth. But behind the glitzy facade and fast growth is an enduring authoritarianism and state-sponsored human-rights abuses. The three incidents continue a pattern of strong-arm rule that dates to when the PAP first rose to power in 1959. It has ruled uninterrupted ever since and has been quick to squash any serious opposition or dissent. Over the years, the PAP has relied on fast economic growth and rising prosperity to maintain its legitimacy. Singapore’s GDP grew 16.9% year-on-year in the first quarter this year and provisional estimates suggest it expanded 19.3% in the second quarter. Even allowing for an expected slowdown in the second half, full year GDP growth could hit the 13% to 15% range. The rosy figures may be attributed partly to the low baseline for the first two quarters of 2009, when the economy recorded negative growth in line with the global recession, and partly from exports to Asia’s other robustly growing open economies. However, Singapore’s growth and profits are increasingly generated by foreigners for foreigners, with the city-state permitting ever-rising levels of immigration to power the economy. Citizens now question how much they are benefiting with so many foreigners competing for jobs and limited housing. Meanwhile, the income divide is fast widening. Nominated member of parliament Viswa Sadasivan recently noted that based on 2008 figures, Singapore has a much higher Gini coefficient – a statistical measure of income inequality – than other Asian countries, including China, Malaysia and the Philippines. If sterling headline economic numbers fail to quell the growing grumbling and skepticism over government policy, some wonder how much longer the populace will tolerate the PAP’s authoritarianism, most commonly demonstrated through detentions without trial and tilting the electoral system in its favor. The result is a ruling party that feels itself perennially under siege by ungrateful citizens, and ever fearful that its skeletons in the closet will one day be exposed. The government and ruling party are therefore extremely thin-skinned about any criticism of their record, legitimacy and policies. There is a rising air of desperation over the way the Singapore government attempts to monopolize the writing and interpreting of history, while stamping out any criticism of the way it has bent public institutions to its will. Singapore People’s Party elects new CEC Source: CNA, 25 July 2010 SINGAPORE : The opposition Singapore People’s Party (SPP) held its Ordinary Party Conference on Sunday, and elected 14 members to its decision making Central Executive Committee (CEC). Veteran politician Chiam See Tong remains in the committee. The new faces include his wife Lina Chiam and member Desmond Lim, who’s reported to have differences in the party over the possible inclusion of the Reform Party into the Singapore Democratic Alliance. Mr Chiam is the chairman of the Alliance while Mr Lim is its secretary-general. The CEC will meet in three weeks to decide on the positions. Current Chairman Sin Kek Tong said he hopes to make the party stronger for the next general election. But Sunday’s event wasn’t without its drama. A group of about 30 people tried to become members on the spot to take part in the party conference. But they were asked to leave after cadre members voted against the move. – CNA /ls Problem: Overpopulation. Solution? Bring in more people By the Singapore Democrats 22 July 2010 Rarely do stories dovetail so perfectly to make nonsense of what officialdom spews out, but these two did: What Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew said yesterday about the floods in Singapore and what Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong told Singaporeans about foreign workers. Lee Sr told his listeners: “There’s a limited amount of space that’s been dug underground, limited amount of space you can run off for canals and if you have an extraordinary rainfall, well you got to prepare for it.” Limited amount of space in Singapore. Now who could have guessed that? Haven’t we been having that fact beaten into our heads for only, oh, the last half-a-century? We all know that Mr Minister. We live it everyday. Not all of us live in a house on a hill-top on Orchard Road, remember? Most of us live in flats whose bedrooms are no bigger than Changi Prison cells. Some of us have to stand, face-to-elbow-sometimes-armpit, in over-packed MRT trains. Yes, we know that we live in an over-populated city. So over-populated in fact that the Overpopulation Index tells us that we are the number one over-populated country in the world. The Index surveys the degree to which “a country can support itself from its own renewable resources.” According to the study Singapore’s dependency, or proportion of consumption sourced from outside the country, is the highest in the world. So we know two things: One, we don’t have enough land to build enough canals to keep rainwater flowing out into the sea instead of into our living rooms and, two, we are the numero uno over-populated country on this planet. Will someone then please explain why in all of the PAP’s wisdom are we going to bring in more people from other places to come to stay here? Last week PM Lee said that the Government intends to further open the immgration gates to bring in another 100,000 foreign workers this year. This is one of those moments where we think that our ministers have formed their committees, obtained all the white papers, and computed all their calculations and come up with a left-no-stone-unturned study that has anticipated all problems. But this is also one of those moments where we have to remind our readers that a limping suspected terrorist went for a pee and then walked out of a high-security detention centre. Or an (allegedly drunk) artist cut through the fence of a protected mass public transport depot with clippers and painted graffiti on a train – which the train people didn’t even know was graffiti that had been painted. Foreign minister once said that the Government should have in place a masterplan to see how we can house all the foreign workers it has allowed into this country. It is a very good idea. It would be an even better idea to do this before that proverbial horse bolted. Studying how we can put a gate in place now may be a tad late. What the Minister Mentor is in effect saying is that floods are going to be a part of life in Singapore – so get used to it. What his Government does about it, whether it does anything about it – or worse, whether it worsens the situation by bringing in more people to live here, is no business of the people already living here. We just need to make sure that the GDP goes up by that one more digit. Now doesn’t seem to be a bad time to live on the hill on Orchard. Dr Lim Hock Siew By Dr Wong Wee Nam 20 July 2010 “You only have power over people so long as you don’t take everything away from them. But when you’ve robbed a man of everything, he’s no longer in your power — he’s free again.” – Alexander Solzhenitsyn I first met him at the wake of the late Dr Lee Siew Choh in July 2002. That was 20 years after he was released from an almost 20-year detention. I saw a friend sitting at another table and went up to say “hello” to her. He happened to be sitting at the same table and she introduced us. That was the first time I saw how he looked like. I have heard of him when I was a young boy. He was the son of a famous fishmonger in the market where I had lived. The father was famous because he had a clever son. Not a lot of poor people then had children who are doctors. I also heard of him as a young boy because of his reputation as a doctor. Not only did his clinic dispense free medicine for the needy and the real indigent, he also gave them transport money to go home. This is not surprising from a doctor who believes that the most common cause of anemia is not iron deficiency but poverty. It was understandable that I did not recognize him. After all, his pictures had never been splashed in the newspapers or over the TV. Nothing much was heard about him when he was incarcerated and nothing was seen or heard after his release. In spite of the news blackout and the low profile he has kept, he is still a political legend, being the second longest political detainee after Chia Thye Poh. Therefore, my reaction was one of excitement mixed with surprise and discomfort when he was introduced to me. He put me totally at ease when he asked in a very soft and friendly voice if I was the same one who wrote letters to the press. I was humbled by his sincerity and modesty. Subsequently, I met him occasionally at medical seminars and talks. We only exchanged some pleasant words and never discussed current affairs. He told me he read my articles on the blogs but never did he once try to engage me on those topics. At this stage of his life, I suppose he had transcended all these concerns. Remarkably, in my encounters with him not once had he expressed any hatred for anyone or any organization for having deprived him of 20 years of the prime of his life. In 1963, he was arrested because he was deemed a security threat to the interests of Singapore. To be kept in prison for 20 years, he must have had a pre-detention life that is more colourful or at least equal to that of Mas Selamat. Yet, when I looked up as many books (even books written by his ex-comrades) as I could on the era, I could find very little mention on him. Surely a security threat who warranted 20 years of detention would have enough open records of his activities for any movie director to make an equal number of political thrillers. Maybe one day the archives will let us know of his clandestine activities, if any. Recently at a launch of the book The Fajar Generation, he made a speech. Martyn See, the filmmaker, recorded the speech and put it on Youtube. The video is now banned. It cannot be for security reason that the video is banned. The speech was not fiery, there was no angry condemnation of government, no incitement to violence, no call to arms, no cry to overthrow anyone and no rousing appeal to unite and rally the audience for a cause. Indeed the speech was milder than any election rally speech by a mile. For months after the speech was made and aired, no investors pulled out of Singapore for security concerns and in fact, the economy recovered. Yet for inexplicable reason, the video was banned. Perhaps there is a reason. The video is in danger of changing people’s perception of Dr Lim Hock Siew. He comes off as a very calm and dignified person. There is no anger or bitterness. His intellect is intact and his mind is very clear. Beneath the frail frame is a man with strength of character. He looks so kind and fatherly that one wouldn’t see him as capable of slapping a fly or killing a mosquito, let alone hurting a fellow human being. Behind a soft-spoken exterior one can discern a man full of indomitable courage. Watching him talk reminds me of a story written by Zhuang Zi （庄子）in his chapter “Autumn Water” （秋水）: When Confucius was traveling in the State of Kuang, he was surrounded by the troops of Sung. Nevertheless, he continued singing and playing his lute, totally unfazed. Zi Lu, his disciple, asked, “Master, why are you enjoying yourself?” Confucius said, “For a long time, I’ve tried to stay out of hardship but failed. This is due to fate. I’ve tried to succeed but failed. This is due to the times. “During the times of Yao or Shun, there was no hardship. This had nothing to do with a person’s wisdom. During the reign of King Jie and King Zhou, people did not achieve success but this was not due to lack of wisdom. It was due to time and circumstance. “To travel across the water and not shrink from the sea serpent or the dragon is to have the courage of a fisherman. To travel on land and not be afraid of the rhinoceros or tiger is to have the courage of a hunter. To meet clashing blades and face death unflinchingly is to have the courage of martyr. “To understand that hardship is a matter of fate and success is a matter of the times; and to able to face enormous difficulties without fear or terror is to have the courage of a sage.” 知穷之有命，知通之有时，临大难而不惧者，圣人之勇也。 Dr Lim Hock Siew may or may not be a sage but he must be a remarkable man. He was stored away for 20 years and then led a quiet life for the next 28 years. Yet when he made his speech at a book launch, he created enough anxiety for the video to be banned. Truly remarkable! Our police state is fraying at the edges Written by Ng E-Jay 20 July 2010 Recent events have shown unequivocally that not only has the PAP Government run the country as a police state, but also that the authorities are now getting panicky and desperate to the point that they are fumbling and making glaring mistakes. Barely two weeks ago, a member of the National Solidarity Party (NSP) was fined by the National Environment Agency (NEA) for illegal hawking. (See here.) His alleged “offence”: Selling the Party newspaper in a public area. The NSP has written to NEA seeking a clarification on the matter, based on the fact that it was not engaging in any unhygienic activity, but merely promoting its political cause in a fashion that surely, in any democratic country, is 100% legitimate. Apparently the authorities must have felt that NSP’s activities are politically unclean and pose a political health concern (to the PAP, that is). To this date, as far as the NSP has revealed, the NEA has yet to reply on the matter. This is a blatant example of how the authorities have used the rules to intimidate political opposition in an attempt to silence dissent. The motive behind NEA’s action is clear: To scare new activists into refraining from engaging in political activity, and to curb the spread of undesirable publications, namely those espousing views different from that of the PAP. It gets worse, however. Barely days after the NSP member was fined, the Media Development Authority banned Martyn See’s film which shows a recording of a speech by former political prisoner Dr Lim Hock Siew. Martyn See was ordered to take down the film from Youtube and surrender all copies of the film in his possession to the MDA, or risk facing possible jail terms and fines. He has complied with the order, but he also pointed out that anonymous people in cyberspace have chosen to continue distributing the film in defiance of the law. Readers of this blog who also follow Malaysian politics would notice the close similarity in methods used by the ruling parties on both sides the causeway to clamp down unjustly on film-makers and activists and prevent the painful truth from being spread. In its statement to the press, the MDA said that “the Singapore Government will not allow individuals who have posed a security threat to Singapore’s interests in the past, to use media platforms such as films to make baseless accusations against the authorities, give a false portrayal of their activities in order to exculpate their guilt, and undermine public confidence in the Government in the process“. The MDA is basically asserting that it alone has the power to judge whether a certain content is accurate or not, and to ban it if it feels it is inaccurate, in the name of protecting the public interest. There is no opportunity for dialogue and debate. There is no chance for dissent and criticism, no avenue to express a view different from that of the establishment. Either remove the banned content, or face jail time, regardless of the underlying facts, regardless of whether the content was created to distort the truth, or expose the truth. If that is not enough, just last Saturday, a Lianhe Wanbao reporter was handcuffed and detained by the police for an hour because he was taking pictures of the flood. Apparently, nowadays anyone who takes photographs that can potentially embarrass the Government may be given the Chee Siok Chin treatment. Fortunately, the reporter is from the mainstream press and could use the power of his editorial to expose the injustice. His outrageous story was given front page attention on his own Daily on Saturday. If he had been from alternative media instead, his case would never have been known to the general public because it would have been covered up. According to the police statement, the reporter, Mr Shafie Goh, was trying to take photos in the middle of the road and he had been repeatedly asked to move to a safe place as he was taking photos in a dangerous position. But he refused to comply, and continued walking along the road divider, snapping away. Officers then handcuffed him. Mr Goh was not wearing any media identification at the time, and officers were not aware that he was from the press. In addition, Minister for Environment and Water Resources Yaacob Ibrahim told Parliament on Monday that there is no ministry policy that prohibits the taking of flood pictures. When the authorities get desperate enough and the embarrassment to the Government gets acute enough, they fumble, sometimes outrageously. That was what happened to reporter Mr Shafie Goh. Mr Yaacob Ibrahim could only offer empty assurances that did absolutely nothing to address the injustice and humiliation Mr Goh had suffered. Obviously he is at a loss for words regarding this incident, because it is so closely connected with his own ineptitude at handling the flood situation. On Sunday morning, British author Alan Shadrake was arrested for criminal defamation and contempt of court, apparently in connection with his book “Once A Jolly Hangman” that was launched on 17 July. Mr Shadrake’s book is about Singapore’s mandatory death penalty for drug traffickers. Mr Shadrake has been granted bail and has Mr M Ravi acting as his counsel. Choo Zheng Xi of The Online Citizen speculates that the use of the draconian law of criminal defamation as well as contempt of court was motivated by Mr Shadrake’s story about the trial and execution of Vignes Mourthi which he described as “arguably one of the most appalling miscarriages of justice in Singapore’s history“. And to show just how tight the noose can get (no pun intended), anti-death penalty activist Rachel Zeng was apparently harassed last week. Rachel was one of the organizers of Mr Shadrake’s book launch in Singapore. How low can the powers-that-be get? How idiotic and moronic is all this? All these incidences, put together, paint a grim picture of a Government that is surely losing control of itself. Facing embarrassment from so many different angles and having had its incompetence as well as its draconian, autocratic ways highlighted for all the world to see and to condemn, the authorities have begun to fumble and make glaring errors that have only worsened the situation for themselves and heightened the embarrassment they are suffering. The only viable solution for them is to admit they have steered Singapore down the wrong path and have committed human rights atrocities on their political opponents. But to compel the authorities to admit the grave folly of their ways, we need a strong opposition presence inside and outside of Parliament, a political opposition that is able and willing to speak up on BOTH bread and butter issues AS WELL AS broader issues like democracy, social justice, and the rule of law. If not, we’ll just be running around in circles and it will be cold day in hell before the Government even comes close to admitting it is blatantly in the wrong. Every flood is a slap in the face for PAP Saturday’s flooding embarrasses PAP yet again. Source: ST Online, 17 July 2010 HEAVY rains lashed Singapore early on Saturday morning, uprooting trees and causing flash floods in many area. The affected areas included Braddell Road, Changi Road and Bukit Timah, where rising floodwaters stranded several drivers in their vehicles. At the Tessarina Condo in Bukit Timah area, waters rose to knee-high, flooding the basement carpark. Some cars were almost submerged in water, prompting frantic residents to move them out to drier grounds. Straitstimes.com reader Jerry Chan said the flooding was ‘chaotic’ and it was the third time in seven months, not ‘once in 50 years as suggested’. Singapore Civil Defence Force personnel also evacuated 60 people in 20 different places, including passengers who were stuck in an SBS bus along Upper Thomson Road. There were also reports of a fallen tree along Dorset Road, which was causing traffic congestion. Along Upper Thomson Road, shops were reported to be badly damaged, with huge fridges overturned and smashed. There were also reports of a flooded carpark at the Delfi Orchard, which was hit by the worst flooding in 26 years in June just less than a month ago. Parts of Kallang and Tanjong Katong were also flooded. Ms Grace Loh, a resident of Tanjong Katong, sent pictures of her flooded home, which she called a ‘shocking sight’. Said Ms Loh: ‘The flood today seems worse than what I experienced as a child in the 1980s!’ Repeated flooding of Singapore shows PAP Govt’s ineptitude Source: Channel News Asia, 17 July 2010 SINGAPORE: The Singapore Civil Defence Force says the flash floods at all affected areas have receded. There were flash floods in several low-lying areas in Singapore as a result of heavy rain Saturday morning. SCDF officers evacuated some 60 people in about 20 different locations islandwide. They include Changi Road, Telok Kurau, Bukit Timah and Chai Chee. Most of those who were evacuated had called the authorities for assistance as they were trapped in their vehicles due to the rising flood water. Earlier, callers contacted the MediaCorp Hotline, saying several low-lying shop houses along Changi Road and Telok Kurau were flooded. Floods were also reported along Braddell Road, Bukit Timah and Chai Chee. At Upper Thomson Road, Singapore Civil Defence Officers helped evacuate 20 passengers stranded from inside an SBS bus due to the flooding. Several passengers also had to be evacuated from another bus along Bukit Timah Road. MediaCorp understands several drivers were also stranded in their vehicles until Civil Defence officers arrived. One caller said a fallen tree along Dorset Road caused heavy traffic congestion. PUB earlier said heavy showers with thunder and gusty winds were expected over many areas in Singapore between 6am and 7am on Saturday. - CNA/de/jm Once in 50-year freak event now occurring on regular basis “Impossible To Flood” Orchard Road flooded for UMPTEENTH time this year; MEWR lambasted by citizens for making “sweeping statements”. Source: ST Online, 17 July 2010 AFTER being hit by the worst flooding in 26 years last month, Delfi Orchard was again flooded on Saturday morning. A tenant of the building, Ms Shanta Sundarason, said she arrived to work to find the basement three carpark flooded with ‘waist-deep’ waters. Ms Sundarason also told straitstimes.com that tenants at Orchard Towers and Palais Renaissance were ‘also mopping up after the waters gushed in’. ‘So much for the ‘once in 50 years Freak Flood’ along Orchard Road,’ rued Ms Sundarason. ‘It would be nice for the problem to be addressed and dealt with, rather than a sweeping statement from the ministry,’ she added. In the June floods, shoppers in the prime Orchard Road area around Scotts Road had to wade to safety through swirling brown water the colour of milk tea, when heavy rain caused a huge flood. One of the worst-hit places was Liat Towers, where a new branch of Wendy’s burger restaurant had opened just three days before. The restaurant had to close as $500,000 worth of furnishings and equipment was damaged by waist-high floodwaters. Authorities later found that a drain the width of a bus near Delfi Orchard was so choked with leaves that it triggered a run-off enough to fill 20 Olympic-size swimming pools. The run-off gushed into basement shops and carparks in Liat Towers, Lucky Plaza, Delfi Orchard and Tong Building. Losses along the shopping belt were estimated to be more than $10 million. Heavy rain lashed Singapore early on Saturday morning, with flash floods reported in several other areas including Bukit Timah, Katong and Changi. Hong Kong to introduce minimum wage. Singapore? By the Singapore Democrats 15 July 2010 Hong Kong, one of the last few moderm economies holding out on minimum wage, will likely pass a bill next week that will legislative minimum wage in the territory. According to legislators, the law is meant to protect workers from being exploited. The Singapore Democrats have been calling for more than a decade for a similar law to be introduced in Singapore. We have said time and again that the most vulnerable workers are being taken advantage of by being paid wages that does not provide them a decent living. For example, elderly workers are routinely paid a little more than $3 an hour for doing menial jobs. This works out to less than $600 a month for a full-time job. How does one survive on such an income in an expensive economy like Singapore? Hitherto, Hong Kong has also resisted paying minimum wage and this has led to both economies having one of the biggest income disparities in the world. If Hong Kong passes the legislation, Singapore will be one of the few countries left that does not have such a mandated provision. Over 90 percent of countries across the world have minimum wage in one form or another. The few countries that have no laws or regulations on minimum wage are Bahrain, Qatar, UAE, Tonga, Brunei, Somalia, and, of course, Singapore. A Minimum Wage Commission will be established in Hong Kong comprising of trade unionists, employers and scholars to determine the level of minimu wgae. Currently many Hong Kong employers pay their workers less than US$4 (S$6) an hour. This is already higher than what Singapore pays its low-wage workers. The SDP has laid out a compelling case for minimum wage in Singapore in our Alternative Economic Programme (see here). We repeat our call for the Government to introduce a similar legislation to that in Hong Kong. This will ensure that our workers are not exploited and that prosperity and progress are enjoyed by all, not just the wealthy elite. Hong Kong lawmakers debate minimum wage CNN 14 Jul 10 Hong Kong lawmakers resumed debate Wednesday on a bill that may result in the region’s first statutory minimum wage. The Minimum Wage Bill is a controversial piece of legislation that lawmakers hope will protect the most vulnerable workers in Hong Kong, one of the few places in the world without any sort of minimum wage law. The debate is set to take two to three days. A recent government survey showed that around half a million workers in Hong Kong earn less than $4 an hour. These include low-skilled workers from the catering, retail, and cleaning industries. According to Man Hon Poon, a policy researcher at the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Union, the lack of legal protection for workers has led to serious exploitation. “Workers in restaurants have to work for 12 hours or even 14 hours a day to earn a living,” he said. “They cannot even go to the cinema.” Legislator Tommy Cheung, however, claims that the government should not interfere with the free market economy, which he says has served Hong Kong well in the past. A minimum wage could deter investors and lead to increased unemployment, said Cheung, who represents the catering industry. “There is one fear within the industry, that they would have to close down,” he said. “When you see a closure, everyone loses out.” The government first proposed the current bill in 2008 following a failed attempt at a voluntary minimum wage. Labor unions, however, have been lobbying for a minimum wage since 1998, following the Asian financial crisis. The rate of the minimum wage has also been under great debate. Trade unions have been demanding a minimum wage of $4 while employer groups have been asking for $3 per hour. If the bill passes this week, the rate of the minimum wage will be set by the Minimum Wage Commission, a consortium of trade union members, employers and scholars, in the coming months. Once the chief executive approves the rate, employers will have six months to implement the law. The Hong Kong government estimates that the earliest the minimum wage law may take effect is May 2011. http://edition.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/asiapcf/07/14/china.hong.kong.minimum.wage/index.html?hpt=T2&fbid=cFYYtTV0ap3 A lesson for the opposition By the Singapore Democrats 13 July 2010 The oft-quoted poem by Pastor Martin Niemoller “They came first…” (see below) has much to teach the opposition in Singapore. A variation of this truism is the adage: United we stand, divided we fall. We are, of course, referring to the victimisation of the members of the opposition and civil society groups by the PAP, and the concomitant lack of solidarity among the actors in these sectors whenever the ruling party embarks on one of its crackdowns. The latest, of course, is the issuing of a fine to a member of the National Solidarity Party (NSP) by the National Environment Agency for selling the party’s newspaper. Let it be clear that the Singapore Democrats find such action by the Government a travesty of democracy. It is shameful that even the simple act of selling a party newspaper is prohibited by the law. The NSP, or any other opposition party, must be allowed, in the interest of democracy, to sell its party publication unmolested. But herein lies a deeper problem that the opposition and civil society must consider. Clearly, the law says that it is an offence to hawk goods in public without a permit. What do opposition parties do? If we continue to sell our party newspapers in such a manner, we are knowingly breaking the law. So how do opposition parties go about the sales and still keep within the law? Obtain a hawking license? The Ministry of Environment has said that it does not issue such licenses. Sell them through news outlets and proprietors? It is an open secret that all the newsvendors are licensed to sell SPH newspapers and do not dare to sell newspapers published by the opposition (the SDP has tried repeatedly to ask newsvendors to sell our newspaper The New Democrat to no avail). Selling our newspapers is just one aspect of the problem that the opposition faces. Everytime a party goes on a walkabout to meet the people or distribute flyers, it is either conducting an illegally assembly and/or procession. The fact that the SDP is the only party prosecuted for these offences does not mean that other parties have not broken, or are not breaking, the law. For example, SDP’s members and friends have been charged for assembly without a permit (trial to begin next month) for distributing flyers on National Day 2008. And yet, we have evidence that members of the Workers’ Party (WP) and NSP also conducted similar activties that particular day but have not been prosecuted. Is the SDP the only party that has broken PAP’s law? Such a scenario presents the opposition with a dilemma. Do we comply with such laws? If we do, and we must if we are honest about strictly keeping within the bounds of the law, then we must cease most of our activities including walkabouts and newspaper selling. The question that is screaming to be asked is: Are such laws, and/or their undemocratic application to stifle the activities and eventual electoral success of the opposition, just? More important, what do other opposition parties or civil society organisations do when one party is victimised? The obvious answer is that everyone must speak out. This is where Martin Niemoller’s poem rings so loud and ominous: “THEY CAME FIRST for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist. THEN THEY CAME for the trade unionists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist. THEN THEY CAME for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew. THEN THEY CAME for me and by that time no one was left to speak up.” The Singapore Democrats have not restricted ourselves to exhortations. We spoke up when other parties or their members have been attacked by the PAP. We defended Dr James Gomez when the WP candidate found himself held for questioning after the 2006 elections. We upbraided the National Development Ministry for coming with an absurd report on Town Councils that ranked the ones run by Hougang and Potong Pasir at the bottom of the pile. And now we speak up on the NSP fine. Readers of this website must know by now that the Singapore Democrats have repeatedly called for greater cooperation and unity. We organised forums and meetings in 2008, 2009 and, most recently, in May 2010 encouraging opposition parties to come together. In civil society, we stoutly defended Mr M Ravi when he was attacked ad hominem for his campaign against the mandatory death penalty. We decried the persecution of Falungong practitioners even though none of our members are followers of the faith. We spoke up for Mr Martyn See when he was interrogated by the police for his films. Whenever and wherever democratic rights are trampled upon, the Singapore Democrats rally and speak up. This we do in the knowledge that it is only through unity that the pro-democracy camp in Singapore can withstand the authoritarian onslaught of the PAP. While opposition parties may have their own approaches and platforms, the lack of democracy and freedom in Singapore must bind us all in unity of purpose. The SDP has often cited our counterparts across the causeway. As disparate as the ideologies of Parti-se-Islam (PAS) and the Democratic Action Party (DAP) are, they are able to come together for the sake of entrenching democratic practices in Malaysia. The opposition in Singapore must likewise demonstrate such political maturity. For a start, we must stand up and speak up whenever one party finds itself at the end of the PAP’s oppressive whip. If we are unwilling to do this we should, at the minimum, not adopt a holier-than-than attitude. For under the PAP’s laws, we are all transgressors. Perhaps it is worth remembering the wise words of Benjamin Franklin when the American independence fighters were battling their British colonialists: “Gentlemen, we must hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.” Future generations will pay for the sins of PAP Written by Ng E-Jay 06 July 2010 I wish I could come up with a more optimistic pronouncement. But this is the most honest assessment I can make: Future generations of Singaporeans will have to pay for the sins of the PAP if something is not done about the present situation. Let me state quite frankly that I do not deny that Singapore has made huge economic progress over the decades under the PAP’s watch. As some of my friends would point out, however, much of the growth could have come about not because of, but in spite of, PAP’s policies. Singapore is situated in a very favourable geographical location, and even though advancements in transportation technology over the decades have eroded our geographical advantage slightly, it cannot be denied that our prime location at the southern tip of the Malaysian peninsula has afforded us enormous leverage as far as trade is concerned. When the PAP came into power in 1959, Singapore was already a bustling metropolis, not a sleepy fishing village like National Education textbooks like to put it. When we achieved complete independence and sovereignty in 1965, the foundations for our future economic success had already been laid. Investments were already pouring in and our industries were already being rapidly developed, despite the racial turmoil and the communist threat that existed at that time. All this was happening at a time when the then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew was occupied in a power struggle with the Tunku. I do not know whether the PAP made things significantly better after 1965, but I do know the PAP managed to make things significantly worse at some point in its reign. The PAP’s first major policy blunder was its “Stop At 2″ policy which it introduced in 1969 in an attempt to curb Singapore’s rapidly expanding population, which was then seen as a serious threat to Singapore’s long term growth potential. Sterilization policies were progressively liberalized from 1969 to 1974. By 1977, 21 per cent of women of child-bearing age in Singapore had been sterilized. [1] The PAP’s error in this policy was in going overboard with it. The repercussions would later come back to haunt future generations of Singaporeans. The pro-eugenics policies of the PAP culminated in the Graduate Mother Scheme which was implemented in 1984. Graduate couples were provided with considerable financial incentives to have more children, the rationale being that children from graduate couples were more likely to be intelligent and would grow up to be more economically productive. However the scheme was scrapped after a few years when the horribly discriminatory implications of the policy gradually dawned on the electorate. By then, of course, the damage had been done. All developed economies eventually enter a phase when their birth rates start to decline due to evolving social attitudes and a higher standard of living. In Singapore’s case however, the policies of the PAP greatly accelerated the process and made the inevitable come much sooner than would have been the case had the PAP not gone overboard. A decade after the demise of the Graduate Mother Scheme, Singapore’s Total Fertility Rate had plunged to a mere 1.3, far below the replacement level of 2.1 that demographers insist is needed for a population to sustain itself. This prompted the PAP Government to open the floodgates to foreigners to shore up our population base. Of course, a sustainable population base was not the only reason given by the PAP for doing so. The PAP told the electorate that foreigners were needed because they brought skills and expertise that Singaporeans lack, and their numbers were needed for continued economic growth. For every job which went to them, we were told, more jobs would be created for us citizens. In more recent times, the electorate was told that Singapore would go the way of the dodo if foreigners were not imported in large numbers, and that Singaporeans should accept this because we are less hard-driving and hard-striving than foreigners. [2] However, because PAP’s policies have led to an indiscriminate and uncontrolled import of foreigners, some of whom do not seem to bring in new expertise or skill sets over and above what we already have, wages at the lower end of the spectrum have been suppressed, bringing hardship to the lower income. This indirectly leads to suppression of aggregate demand from one segment of the population, which in turn depresses overall economic activity. It should be noted that unlike countries like Hong Kong and Taiwan, Singapore did not quite have a roaring comeback after the previous two recessions. Perhaps part of the reason lies therein. The rapid import of foreigners has also created strain on the fabric of our society, with more than a few openly voicing their concern whether the newcomers will make a serious effort at integrating into our society and embracing local social norms. The larger malaise confronting us, however, is not just the rapid influx of foreigners, which the government has realized only this year must be more tightly controlled. The economy is being systematically hollowed out, milked for what it is worth. The economic path we have embarked on is unsustainable. Our future growth potential is rapidly being drawn down in a misguided attempt at boosting our GDP figures and justifying ever increasing public sector and Ministerial salaries. How is the economy being hollowed out? By the entrenchment of unproductive Government-Linked Corporations (GLCs) and the crowding out of smaller players that could have made the economic landscape more competitive and vibrant had they been given a fair chance at the economic pie. By the overly liberal import of foreigners which is causing an artificial population expansion and which is putting an enormous strain on our nation’s resources and infrastructure. By the government “picking favorites” amongst industry players and in so doing, creating mis-allocation and wastage of resources. By the government micro-managing and interfering excessively with the free market economy. By the government trying to attract foreign capital at all costs, which leads to very volatile liquidity flows and periodic asset bubbles. Singapore will probably see several years more of good growth and perhaps even rising incomes in the middle and upper classes. But the distortions in the economy created by PAP’s policies will also lead to periodic asset bubbles, especially in housing. Asset bubbles are very bad for a country, and even worse for a small country like Singapore. Not only do asset bubbles lead to mis-allocation of capital, when they inevitably come crashing down, many people get hurt badly in the process. We see this each and every time the property market here takes off and goes to the stratosphere, only to come down to reality several years later, leaving in its wake hordes of homeless citizens who have been chased out of their flats because they are unable to service their mortgages. After the PAP has milked the Singapore system for what it is worth, I fear that future generations of Singaporeans will be faced with a hollowed out economy and slow growth rates that will not match their expectations. I fear that many people, especially those just embarking on their careers, will not be able to afford to retire peacefully when they grow old. They will be faced with an overcrowded city, lack of job opportunities, rising inflation, and poor economic prospects. I am very tempted to try to alter my prognosis so that it does not sound so pessimistic. But to do so would not be honest. In my sincere assessment, if Singapore citizens do not stand up and take charge of the situation now, future generations will have to pay a heavy price for the sins of the PAP. __________________________________ References: [1] SG Democrats, “Creating a ’superior’ race in Singapore“, 12 June 2005 (first posted on Sg Review). [2] The Online Citizen’s transcript of MM Lee Kuan Yew’s interview with Mark Jacobson from National Geographic Magazine on 6 July 2009. Chee: Have clear guidelines of what constitutes speech By the Singapore Democrats 06 July 2010 Dr Chee Soon Juan asked for clear guidelines from the courts as to what constitutes a speech. The SDP leader made this call in his closing submissions today to District Judge Jill Tan. Dr Chee was convicted of giving an address in April 2006 without a permit. He was fined $5,000 with 5-weeks imprisonment in default. He was selling The New Democrat at bangkit Road in Bukit Panjang and was accused of giving a speech. The police recorded him addressing passers-by for about four minutes asking them to purchase a copy of the newspaper. The Public Entertainment and Meetings Act (PEMA) under which Dr Chee was charged does not specify or define what a speech is. “Anyone speaking in a public place to members of the public can be said to be giving a speech,” he said. “Should all these folks be charged? Surely that is not the intent of the Act.” There are questions that need to be answered. For example: How long would speaking to a group of people have to be before that act would be considered an address? How many people would have to been listening before a speech is considered to have been given? What is the content before someone talking to others is considered to have given a speech? “Absent clear guidelines and definitions, it is difficult to determine if my actions and words that morning can be said to constitute an address,” the SDP secretary-general stated. For example, if one is fined for speeding, the police must be able to determine at what speed the driver was travelling and compare that to a clearly spelt out speed limit. The police cannot just accuse the driver of simply driving too fast. Making decisions in such ill-defined offences such as what constitutes a speech under PEMA would necessitate the judge making an arbitrary decision rather than a considered and studied one premised on a set of clearly laid out criteria. Such subjectivity, which leaves matters open to abuse, should have little role to play in criminal prosecution. The criteria of what constitutes a speech notwithstanding, Dr Chee insisted that even if he had given a speech, it was constitutionally his right to do so. What kind of a democracy is it when politicians cannot even speak to the public and reach out to voters during an election period? The PAP has always been able to “win” elections simply because it has prevented the opposition from making public speeches and effectively reaching out to the voters. In democratic states, like in the UK, the opposition is able to freely speak to voters. As a result the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats were able to run effective campaigns and beat the Labour Party in the recent elections. The prevention of the opposition and the tight control of the media by the PAP ensures that while the people are more than exposed to the PAP’s propaganda, the public hears and reads little of the opposition. This is why the Singapore Democrats fight so hard for the right of Singaporeans to speak freely Besides, the question of not having a permit is all a wayang because Home Affairs Minister Wong Kan Seng has repeatedly stated that no permit will be given for outdoor political activities. Judge Jill Tan rejected all these arguments and found Dr Chee guilty as charged. This is the last of a series of eight charges, five of which ended in guilty verdicts. The AG dropped the other three charges. Each conviction carried a $5,000 fine. Dr Chee has served a five-week jail term for the first charge. The remaining four are pending appeal. Mr Yap Keng Ho, who was helping the SDP to sell the newspaper in 2006, was also convicted and fined $2,000. Bus fares increased 40% for some commuters Source: Channel News Asia, 05 July 2010 SINGAPORE: Monday was the first work-day after the public transport operators started calculating bus fares based on distance travelled on 3 July. Those travelling to Malaysia by bus were in for a surprise. The Land Transport Authority (LTA) has said that under the new system, one in three commuters would see a fare increase. For those affected, LTA estimates the average weekly fare rise to be about 30 cents per commuter. However some commuters have called the Channel NewsAsia hotline, saying the fare for the journey from Kranji MRT Station to Johor is up by 40 percent – from $1 to $1.40. This has affected many who are working or studying in Singapore, as they are also not allowed to cross the Causeway on foot. Meanwhile, private bus operators said they have not seen an increase in customers because “many commuters may not have realised that bus fares are higher now”. New Distance Fare System is Fare Hikes in Disguise NSP Press Release, 02 July 2010 We are greatly disappointed by the new fare system that the PTC intended to implement on 3rd July 2010. Our recent research on SMRT as well as LTA Public Transport websites shows that almost all the MRT fares that we have checked from different lines have increased quite substantially. Please refer to the following table for our findings: We are not able to do a complete table on the various fare comparisons for all possible rides but from our sample findings, it shows that fare increase resulted from the new Distance Fare system ranges from 3.75% to more than 7%. The PTC has not made such straight forward indications when they try to convince Singaporeans that most of them will enjoy lower fares for their daily travels on public transport. The PTC should stop misleading Singaporeans with its assertion that most Singaporeans would benefit from this new fare system. PTC should be more truthful upfront by publishing the whole matrix of comparisons between fares for MRT rides between all possible combinations. Any fare increase more than 2% in such simple straight forward MRT rides is totally unacceptable as wage increase for many of the lower wage earners who utilize public transport most do not have much increment on their wages. Many Singaporeans rely on MRT for their travelling needs and there is little alternative to MRT rides without wasting great amount of time in interchanging between buses and being trapped in traffic jams. Such enormous outrageous hike in fares is totally unacceptable for a monopoly like SMRT. On the other hand, it is impractical to expect bus commuters to waste time changing buses during peak hours just to “enjoy” any lower fares. Such “lower fares” may only be lower in comparison with the new long haul trunk services. We believe that even with such “lower fares”, it will still be higher than the old fares for long haul rides. PTC should present to Singaporeans the comparison between NEW and OLD fare structures for some main trunk services. We strongly condemn PTC for its attempt to implement such a fare system which is in fact an outrageous hike in fare in disguise. Goh Meng Seng Secretary General of the 13th CEC The Legacy of Reputation By Dr Wong Wee Nam 04 July 2010 There is an old Chinese saying which goes like this: “When a leopard dies, it leaves behind the skin, but when a person dies, he or she leaves behind a name.” In Chapter Nine of The Romance of The Three Kingdoms, Wang Yun told Li Bu, ‘If you, the general, can help the Han Dynasty, you are a loyal minister and will leave a good name in history and in posterity (流芳百世).” To do otherwise (and support the tyrant Dong Zhuo), Wang Yun said, “You bequeath your stench that will last for tens of thousands of years.” (遗臭万年) The phrase 流芳百世 (liu fang bai shi) literally translated means “the flow of the sweet-smelling fragrance through hundreds of generations”. It has become a Chinese idiom meaning “leaving a good reputation for a hundred generations”. 遗臭万年 (yi chou wan nian) means “leaving a bad name for thousands of years” or in other words, “being condemned for posterity”. To the Chinese, therefore, leaving behind a good name is very important. It becomes even more important if you are a celebrity, a leader or a political figure. This perhaps explains why famous people, in the twilight of their lives, like to write memoirs or publish their diaries. They do this because they would like to try to whitewash all their faults and blemishes and make sure posterity only remembers the good things they have done. This is especially so when you are a political leader. Li Peng, the former Prime Minister of China, has been widely blamed for the massacre of hundreds or even thousands on the Tiananmen Square on 4th June 1989. A diary of the event purportedly written by him has leaked out. If the diary is authentic and the accounts are true, it may help to wash some blood off his hands and spread the blame around. Being branded as the mastermind behind the military crackdown and being held responsible for killing civilians is certainly not a nice tag he would like to carry for hundreds of generations. Unfortunately, it is not certain that writing memoirs or publishing diaries alone will atone for the ruthless and wicked things a person had done. Good people are revered because of who they were and what they did and not what they wrote about themselves. Qu Yuan, the poet, and Yao and Shun, the two legendary emperors, left behind good reputations because they were benevolent and concerned for the welfare of the people. They believed in the democratic rights of the common folk or what was then known as “the will of the people”. On the other hand, the names of tyrants, despots and traitors stink forever. The best example of a stinker is Qin Hui. Qin Hui was a court official in the Southern Song Dynasty. When General Yue Fei was winning brilliant battles against the Jin invaders and became a hero, Qin Hui, the mean fellow, resorted to false accusations and frame-ups to jail Yue Fei and finally got him executed. When Emperor Xiao Zong later succeeded to the throne, he cleared Yue Fei of all the charges. A Tomb was built by the side of West Lake in Hangzhou to bury him and a Memorial Temple was erected for posterity to pay homage to this patriotic hero. Before the tomb, there are four cast-iron figures, kneeling and bowing forever to Yue Fei. The figures represent Qin Hui, his wife and two subordinates. Qin Hui and his wife are good examples of the “stench that will last for thousands of years”. Up to recent times, people still spat on the statues to vent their hatred and disgust for the couple. The bad smells and the ugly sights are so disgusting that the authorities have to put up a notice to ask visitors not to spit on them. (See photograph above.) The dumpling is eaten in honour of Qu Yuan. After Yue Fei was executed, a pastry vendor kneaded some dough into two human shapes, one representing Qin Hui and the other his wife, twisted them together and fried them. This symbolic food became a instant hit and even today, when we are eating the youtiao or the Chinese cruller, we do not realise we are chewing up Qin Hui and his wife. There is great wisdom in these two Chinese idioms but there will be despotic chieftains thinking that history will be kind to them as long as they do something good. This is not necessary so. Qin Shi Huang, the First Emperor of a unified China, is remembered more for his tyranny than his creations. As emperor, he had created a lot of monuments, built a network of roads and erected the Great Wall. Yet people remember through folklore and songs the sweat and blood of the workers that went into these constructions. Qin Shi Huang had simplified the written Chinese script, standardized weights and measures, and minted new copper coins. Yet people remember him for burning books, stoning intellectuals and burying scholars alive. Shakespeare has this to say: “The evil that men do lives after them, The good is oft interred with their bones.” We do not know how history will judge Mr Li Peng but History has shown that it is unlikely to be kind to those who have been unkind. S’pore says it doesn’t have serious trafficking problem EDITOR’S NOTE: The Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics (HOME) has also responded to the US Trafficking In Persons (TIP) report. View a copy of their report at the end of this blog post. Source: Simeon Bennett, Bloomberg Businessweek 03 July 2010 Singapore doesn’t have a serious human trafficking problem, its government said in a response to a U.S. State Department report that said the city-state had regressed in its battle against the practice. The State Department last month put Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam on a watchlist of middle-tier countries for trafficking, one level above the worst offenders such as North Korea, Myanmar and Saudi Arabia. Singapore showed an “inadequate response” to sex trafficking with only two convictions last year, and didn’t prosecute anybody under its forced labor laws, the report said. The report’s reliance on reported and prosecution figures was “superficial and perfunctory at best,” the government said in a six-page response received today by e-mail. The low numbers show that Singapore’s approach to combating trafficking in persons, or TIP, has been effective, it said. “Different countries adopt different approaches and it is a matter of what works for each country,” the government said. “Singapore will continue with its calibrated and pragmatic approach to TIP issues, and review this if necessary, rather than blindly follow a one-for-all operating model just to achieve a better technical ranking on the US TIP Report.” Singapore’s police conducted 2,600 anti-vice operations and arrested 7,614 women for suspected vice activities last year, compared with 1,400 operations and 5,047 arrests in 2008, according to the statement. A total of 476 employers were prosecuted for breaching their employment obligations, last year. Authorities investigated 32 cases of alleged trafficking, and prosecuted two, the government said. “A low absolute number of reported and convicted cases is therefore no basis for concluding that Singapore has a serious TIP problem,” the government said. “Singapore takes a stern view of practices leading to the exploitation or abuse of vulnerable persons and we investigate and prosecute such offences vigorously.” The Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics (HOME)’s response to the US TIP report 4th July 2010 Your Excellency, Ambassador David Adelman Embassy of the United States 27 Napier Road, Singapore 258508. Dear Ambassador We take this occasion on your Independence Day, this 4th July 2010, to thank your government on your stand for the rights of domestic workers at the recent International Labor Conference (ILC) held in June in Geneva. “The United States Government fully supports the adoption of a Convention and Recommendation on decent work for domestic workers. We look forward to the development of a robust Convention that can be widely ratified by member states, supplemented by a Recommendation that provides for useful guidance for effectively implementing the Convention. Such a proposed Convention on domestic workers might usefully be framed in the overall context of a call for member states to adopt, implement, and periodically review a national policy on domestic work aimed at improving the situation of domestic workers and promoting equality of treatment between domestic workers and other wage earners.” - Michel Smyth, Acting Director of the Division of Interpretations and Regulatory Analysis for the United States Department of Labour’s Wage and Hour Division. Extract from US Opening statement at ILC 2010. As a non-governmental organization in Singapore, we have been promoting the enhanced protection of migrant workers’ rights in Singapore. Among the 900, 000 migrant workers are some 200,000 domestic workers in Singapore. Though the majority appear ‘happy’ working in Singapore, we see over a 1000 cases of abuse and labour exploitation a year that is in need of our assistance. So it was really tremendous encouragement when your Mr. Michel Smyth of the US delegation at the International Labour Conference in Geneva, made a historic opening statement in support of decent work for domestic workers. Domestic workers around the world suffer discrimination and are not recognised as workers simply because they are working in an informal sector. In Singapore, they are denied the right to pregnancy, the right to a weekly rest day, the right to freedom of movement, among other violations of their dignity as persons. We would like to thank your State too for the recent recommendations you made in your Trafficking in Persons Report 2010 on Singapore. We view these recommendations as useful insights into the human trafficking situation in our country and we are glad these were made public to our government. Over the last 6 years, we have worked with sex trafficked women who fled to us for safety and assistance. Though few in numbers – around 10 persons a year, we believe that they are representative of many others, who may have failed to escape from the traffickers. Hence, among the recommendations made, we wish to highlight your recommendation on enhanced victim protection measures. There could not be prosecutions, if victims are unwilling to be witnesses because of inadequate socio-economic support services and immunity from criminal prosecution. “Singapore does not provide victims of sex or labor trafficking with legal alternatives to removal to countries where they may face hardship or retribution. The government did not provide positive incentives, such as immigration relief and legal aid, for foreign victims of trafficking to participate voluntarily in investigations and prosecutions of trafficking offenses. Identified victims were able to obtain work authorization while assisting with the prosecution of their traffickers, but some had difficulty in finding employment. When cases were being investigated or prosecuted, the government generally held the victims’ passports and declined their requests for repatriation. Although victims are legally entitled to pursue civil cases against their traffickers, in practice, most foreign victims do not have the financial resources to do so”. - Extract from US State Department Trafficking in Persons report 2010. We, therefore, take the position, that Singapore like other ASEAN States — Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Malaysia – should enact an Anti Human Trafficking law and be signatory to the Palermo Protocol. There should also be the adoption of a multi stakeholders’ approach strategy to develop and implement a national plan to combat human trafficking, including especially, the training of police and enforcement officers on the identification of victims of sex and labor trafficking. Many victims, we believe, have been criminalized as immigration offenders and deported after serving imprisonment. In Thailand, for example, I have personally observed how closely NGOs are engaged with the police authorities on addressing the needs of the victims of trafficking. In Taiwan, victims of human trafficking are allowed to work in cross sector jobs, allowing for job mobility. In Hong Kong, the maternity rights of the domestic worker are protected under the Employment Ordinance. In the Philippines, the Philippines Overseas Employment Administration mandates a standard contract for all Overseas Filipino Workers that provide for a cap on agency placement fees to an equivalent of one month’s salary, minimum wages and weekly rest days. Singapore has indeed made some significant improvements, over the years, especially by the Ministry of Manpower, but there is still much that could be done on enforcement measures against human trafficking as defined by the Palermo Protocol. We recommend too that destination countries, like Singapore should have binding bilateral agreements with source countries to arrest ‘debt bondages’, contract substitutions, faked documents, forced repatriation and irregular migration. The transnational crimes against women and children are too horrendous for any State or persons not to exercise greater political will to end the flesh trade that rake billions for criminals. We share the joy of the American people as you celebrate your Independence Day and as you share your freedom with those who are victims of modern slavery in this century. Thank you America! Happy Birthday! Warmest Wishes, Bridget Tan President Keeping S’pore flood free not worth it but losing $140b is By the Singapore Democrats 02 July 2010 Mr Lee Hsien Loong finally emerged from wherever he was cocooned to tell Singaporeans to be realistic because it is too costly to upgrade our canal system to make Singapore flood-free. “It is not worth it,” he says. (Read statement here.) But really, Mr Prime Minister, how much would it cost to make Singapore flood-free? Ten, twenty, thirty billion dollars? More than $140 billion? Because that is the amount Mr Lee Kuan Yew and Ms Ho Ching lost in 2008 through failed investments. We may or may not be able to forevermore prevent floods from happening in Singapore, but that should not deter the Government from making it the goal. Three floods in just as many weeks, with the latest one happening yesterday, have caused damage to property in the millions of dollars. The worse part is that this Government cannot bring itself to say sorry and take responsibility. Instead it goes through its quite sickening game of smoke and mirrors. Nowhere in the Straits Times report released by the Prime Minister’s Office – imagine the White House using a CNN report as Mr Obama’s statement – does the Prime Minister acknowledge responsibility. The PUB is mentioned (in defence of it), and even Singaporeans are mentioned. But there is not a single word about his administration taking responsibility. Instead, he chastises Singaporeans for being unrealistic by expecting a flood-free Singapore, forgetting that it was his environment minister who said that such floods occurred only once in half-a-century. But why should Singaporeans be realistic when Ministers pay themselves quite unrealistic salaries? He then points out that it is better to prevent widespread flooding, implying that the current flooding is not really widespread. Let’s see: In the last three weeks Orchard Road, Sin Ming Road, Boon Lay Road, Dunearn Road, Tai Seng Road, Kampong Ampat Road, MacPherson Road, and Paterson Road (and counting) were flooded. Is this not widespread enough for Mr Lee? Finally the PM tells the people that they are not free of blame for the floods. Singaporeans, he says, “must prevent litter from choking up our drains.” This tactic is similar to the one his father used. Mr Lee Kuan Yew bizarrely chided the people for being complacent when Mr Mas Selamat, a suspected terrorist, escaped whilst under detention. What evidence is there that litter choked the drains and caused the floods to occur? Isn’t Singapore one of the most litter-free cities in the world where even chewing gum is banned? The PM must show proof that the floods were a result of litter clogging the drains. Otherwise he should stop trying to distract Singaporeans from the real issue which is that it was poor planning by the Government that caused the floods. The truth is that the Prime Minister is conveniently deflecting the blame onto the people because this Government feels that it can do no wrong and, therefore, is above accountability. No one expects Singapore to be flood-free, but we expect the PAP to be humble and apologise when it has failed to do its job properly instead of making cockamamie excuses like flash floods occurring only once every 50 years or that a blocked culvert caused Orchard Road to flood or that litter clogged up our drains. The Government should then undertake an immediate and comprehensive study of our drainage system, including research on whether the massive land reclamation taking place around the Marina South area is contributing to the floods. It’s objective should be to make Singapore flood free and use the money from the GIC and Temasek Holdings to fund the infrastructural projects. The really scary part is that we are only in the month of June where downpours, though not uncommon, are nothing compared to the rains that come during the year-end Monsoons. Low birth rate This is an ST forum letter by Mr Tan Kin Lian (blog). An edited version of this letter was published in Straits Times Online on 29 June 2010. A Straits Times editorial entitled “A case of try and try again” (28 June 2010) reported on the many failed attempts to arrest the declining birth rate in Singapore. The current average of 1.22 children per woman of child bearing age is far below the replacement level of 2.07, and must place our birth rate as among the lowest in the world. This worrying fact was noted by the Government almost 25 years ago and several rounds of incentives have been introduced, with great publicity and fanfare, but all of them have failed miserably. We refused to recognise the real reasons for the failure and instead said that this is a trend faced by other countries. If this is the case, why should Singapore fare worst than others? Singapore’s low birth rate is the outcome of our social and economic policies of the past decades, which has resulted in high cost of living, low security of employment, low wages, wide disparity of income, high cost of housing, a stressed education system and so on. The measures to increase the population through immigration will have their negative impacts. Worse, it will not solve the underlying problems, as the immigrants will face the same difficulties as the local born citizens, and they have more opportunity (and less deterrence) to move to other countries at a convenient time in the future. I hope that we will be prepared to face reality, address the underlying issues, and be prepared to try new measures that were not tried before in Singapore (but have proven successful in other countries). Tan Kin Lian