by Jeff Yang
Wall Street Journal, Oct 10, 2012 (source)
SINGAPORE– I’m as far removed from the typical demographic for motor sports as you can imagine — as a general rule, I hate cars, loud noises, crowds and fast-moving objects — but I begrudgingly admit that all four are essential to the visceral thrill of Singapore’s Formula One Grand Prix, which I watched a few weeks ago from the bleachers of the Bay Grandstand, above the only part of the storied racecourse where the cars jink directly under the viewing audience’s seats.
The Singapore GP runs on one of the few street circuits in Formula One racing, and it’s the only one to take place at night. The twilight visibility and the weird shadows etched by the course’s blazing floodlights make the race’s agglomeration of high-order curves, granny hairpins, switchbacks and chicanes even more hair-raising for both participants and gawkers. An error of a single inch can mean disaster, and so there are crashes. There are always crashes. This year was no exception: An apocalyptic collision at this year’s Marina Bay meet took out F1 legend Michael Schumacher, arguably the greatest driver of all time, as a braking error catapulted his car directly into the rear of France’s Jean-Eric Vergne.
Last week, Schumacher announced that he would retire from Formula One racing at the end of this season, citing the Singapore smash-up as one of the reasons behind his decision to hang up his helmet for good. During a career marked by unprecedented success — no driver in F1 history has won more pole positions, victories or championships — Schumi established a reputation as one of the world’s most accurate drivers, incomparably capable of following a “clean line” around the track that minimizes wasted motion and unnecessary braking. Many pundits have associated Schumacher’s skills with his cultural background, referring to his “ruthless discipline” and “controlled precision” as aspects of his native “Germanic efficiency.”
And yet, as any race enthusiast will tell you, control, precision and discipline alone won’t get you checkered flags. It’s the ability to creatively push limits and take risks, to not just flirt with disaster, but take her out to dinner and a movie, that divides great drivers from mid-pack finishers.
Schumacher’s brilliance was in combining near-flawless racecraft with the willingness to inject death-defying, pants-wetting craziness into the equation — if that’s what it took to win.
Which brings me back to Singapore and the Bay Grandstands, where I’d struck up a conversation with a few neighboring seatmates, Simon and Wee. I wondered: Were there any Singaporean native sons in the race? The question prompted a bark of laughter from Simon, who pointed out that competitive racers are unlikely to emerge from a tiny island where the cost of automobile ownership is among the highest in the world. (To own a car in Singapore, you have to first buy a Certificate of Entitlement, which can cost as much as $60,000; adding in other fees and taxes, plus the base cost of the car itself, sends the real price of, say, a Volkswagen Passat over $150,000.)
Besides, added Wee, Singaporeans aren’t taught to take risks or improvise: “Our kids,” he quipped, “only know how to go in a straight line.”
Of course, for half a century, that straight line has been headed nowhere but up.
Singapore’s educational system has been called the “turbo booster” that’s propelled the country into the first tier of developed nations. When it became independent in 1965, Singapore had a per-capita GDP of US$512; as of 2012, it had a per-capita GDP of $56,532, which, according to a recent report by Knight Frank and Citi Private Wealth, makes it the richest country in the world.
That’s a pretty amazing statistic, and it’s hard not to give credit to Singapore’s schools, which since 1995 have consistently cranked out top scores on global STEM benchmark exams — ranking in the top three on both math and science in the last three quadrennial Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study scores at both the 4th and 8th grade levels. (The U.S., by contrast, has struggled to make it into the top 10, regularly placing well behind the likes of Slovenia, Hungary and the Czech Republic.)
But while the Singapore system’s heavy emphasis on the embedding of fundamentals, constant drilling and high-pressure examinations is optimized for generating great test scores, it’s also a major contributor to the conformist, inflexible mentality that’s viewed as an obstacle to the nation’s ability to compete in a world driven by entrepreneurship and disruptive innovation.
On the eve of the Grand Prix, I had lunch with musician Inch Chua, slated to perform with her band the Metric System for the swells at the exclusive Formula One Paddock Club. Over Hainanese chicken rice at the legendary local eatery Wee Nam Kee, Chua shares an anecdote that effectively illustrates Singapore’s psychic rigidity problem.
“I was in a musical recently, and the director told me about a visit she made to a very famous girls’ school here,” says Chua. “As a part of her presentation, she gave all the girls a piece of paper, and instructed them to cut it in half. That sent the girls into a panic — they were all saying, ‘We can’t do this, we don’t have any scissors!’ So she told them just to fold it in half and tear it, and they started crying and screaming, because they couldn’t get the tear exactly even. That pretty much sums up Singapore for me.”
Chua, whom I met when she performed at South by Southwest last year, says that she was always the odd one out at school: “I was the one digging for worms in the mud, and having the teachers shout at me for getting dirty. And when they had us drawing circles in class, everyone else would be using a compass, and I’d just shssss, whip one off. The other kids would say, ‘That’s not a real circle!’ and I’d tell them ‘You know, not everything has to be perfect.’”
Given her childhood inclinations, it probably isn’t too surprising that Chua is now one of the leading lights of Singapore’s indie rock scene — which is, to be sure, not a very large or loud one.
“Rock music is very much an underground phenomenon here,” admits Mike See, cofounder of Chua’s label Riot! Records. “I mean, a lot of what you’d associate with it is officially frowned upon in Singapore. Back in 1972, the government barred Led Zeppelin from entering the country because they had long hair — they actually turned them away at the airport.”
Even now, points out See’s partner Eugenie Yeo, “at the biggest local rock festival we have, Baybeats, the police still come every year and arrest ‘suspicious looking’ people, which pretty much means anyone with a Mohawk.”
Now 23, Chua launched her career at the age of 16, after spontaneously auditioning for a band that had posted an online notice seeking a lead singer. She served as frontwoman for that band, Auburn’s Epiphany, for several years, while finishing her high school education.
“Then the founder of the band pulled an Axl Rose on us and decided to sack everyone except himself,” she laughs. “So the rest of us decided to start our own band, which became Allura.”
Allura was a breakout success, selling out the entire run of its first EP, Wake Up and Smell the Seaweed, and turning Chua into as close a thing as there is to a local rock celebrity. When the band was forced to break up in 2008 — “Every good band in Singapore dies because of National Service,” she says, referring to Singapore’s compulsory military conscription policy — Chua went solo, releasing an album called The Bedroom, which was picked up by MP3 blog aggregator Hype Machine.
“Suddenly, my album turned up on the site’s top five, next to Arcade Fire and other big-name bands,” she says. “And next thing you know, I was headed to South by Southwest — all while juggling my college final exams.”
Exposure to the burgeoning rock scene at SXSW in 2010 and again last year confirmed to Chua that in order to continue growing as a musician, she’d have to leave her beloved home.
“My analogy is that being an artist is like being a farmer,” she says. “In Singapore, there’s no land, and what space there is is walled up and crammed. You’re farming on apartment balconies. I realized I needed to go somewhere with wide open spaces” — where there’s room to be creative.
Chua now divides her time between Singapore and Los Angeles, which she calls “an amazing training ground; I’m meeting so many talented, hungry people.” She isn’t aiming to be a big star in the States, though she obviously wouldn’t turn down opportunities if they came. “For me, it’s really about learning things that I can bring back here, to Singapore,” she says. “We have so much to offer the world, culturally. But ever since our independence, we’ve been focused on building our economy. The arts have always been in the periphery.”
Singapore’s relentless focus on industry above all was critical to its “survival years,” the decades after its expulsion from the Malaysian federation.
“Forty-six years ago, Malaysia kicked us out, and we had no choice but to make it on our own,’” says Eugenie Yeo. “We were the unwanted, thrown-away child. And so we spent the next half-century doing whatever we could to get to the top.”
Yeo, See and Chua share reminiscences of PSAs featuring animated characters like Teamy the Productivity Bee, who until 1999 exhorted Singaporeans to max out their efforts in service of the nation’s growth with his signature jingle “Good better best / Never let it rest / Till your good is better / And your better best!” and terrible apian puns like “Together, we can bee productive!”
(Teamy is just one of dozens of behavior-modification mascots created by the Singapore government, from Singa the Courtesy Lion to Bobo the Water-Saving Elephant and Oscar the Food Safety Otter. I point out to them that the only U.S. equivalent I can think of is Smokey Bear, which underscores America’s lower standards: We’re satisfied if our kids aren’t out there setting fires.)
But what was necessary in the 20th century is becoming a handicap in the 21st, not just in Singapore, but in other Asian countries with similar social values and educational philosophies — most notably, China: As Helen Gao wrote in The Atlantic in June, “Students with ideas that deviate from the official orthodoxy often seem to struggle in China’s education system, as do students whose pursuits differ from the system’s rigidly defined standards for talent and success….Whatever your formula for innovation — diversity of thought, collaboration, risk-taking — you’re not likely to find it in abundance in Chinese schools.”
The irony is that the characteristics that Asia’s developing markets have suppressed to secure their rapid growth are almost certainly the very ones they’ll need most to stay on top in the new economic order. Individualism and irreverance; a willingness to break down walls and rewrite rules. In short, the things that (along with sex and drugs) make up rock and roll.
Seen in that light, Chua and others like her aren’t just forging a new path for Singaporean music. They’re highlighting a way forward for Asia as a whole — one that combines effort and craft with iconoclasm and attitude. In short, the future, like Formula One, may be a game of Inches.
*****************
Inch Chua and the Metric System, “The Chefalo Knot” Live
Here appear occasional jottings of my random musings. Profound or jejune, they reveal the contours of my mental universe, with world history, intellectual history, civilizations, philosophy, religion, society, knowledge, and books as some major themes. Since May 2011, this blog has been exclusively focused on Singapore. All my other reflections are now posted in "Notes from Noosphere" (see link under "Miscellany" on the right margin).
Showing posts with label Singapore. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Singapore. Show all posts
Friday, October 12, 2012
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Jesus Camp in Singapore
(source: Wikipedia)
Jesus Camp (below) is a 2006 American documentary film directed by Rachel Grady and Heidi Ewing about a charismatic Christian summer camp, where children spend their summers learning and practicing their prophetic gifts and being taught that they can "take back America for Christ."
The film was met with controversy that led to the closure of the camp.
Jesus Camp (below) is a 2006 American documentary film directed by Rachel Grady and Heidi Ewing about a charismatic Christian summer camp, where children spend their summers learning and practicing their prophetic gifts and being taught that they can "take back America for Christ."
The film was met with controversy that led to the closure of the camp.
Jseus Camp (film in 8 parts)
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Election expenses
How much money did the opposition parties (and often it's the opposition candidates, spending their personal money) spend during the 2011 election campaigns?
How much of a financial advantage did PAP have against the oppositions?
For the record:
(source)
How much of a financial advantage did PAP have against the oppositions?
For the record:
(source)Saturday, June 11, 2011
Do we want a "political" or a docile President for Singapore?
The President has clearly defined custodial roles, as outlined in the Law Minister's statement (below).
However, the Constitution does not prohibit him/her from freely expressing his/her views on public and political issues, and advocating worthy social causes.
The President is the only public figure in Singapore who is elected with a mandate from the entire electorate, whereas the PM, being a MP of Ang Mo Kio GRC, has a mandate from a mere 7.6% (=179024/2350873) of the electorate.
The President, in one person, is therefore as much a representative of the people as the Parliament, as a body, is.
If the President has clearly proclaimed his views concerning public policies prior to the election, then, upon election, he has the moral authority, derived from the popular mandate, to express those views, and advocate policies in accord with those views. [I am using the phrase "moral authority" in the following sense: "Moral authority is the capacity to convince others of how the world should be." (source)]
Such a "political" President serves as an independent political voice (without legislative power) which the government has established the NMP (Nominated MP) and NCMP (Non-constituency MP) schemes to encourage.
The crucial point is that, having a plurality, if not a majority, of the national votes, the President can speak with a moral authority that NMPs and NCMPs sadly lack.
I would argue that, given PAP's monopoly of power since 1959, we are better served by such a "political" President, with moral, but no executive, authority, than by a timid and mute non-political President.
Whether we want such a "political" President should be a matter for Singaporeans to decide.
Let the Presidential candidates declare whether they intend to be mute on all political and social issues (except those that impinge on his custodial duties), and if not, what their platforms are.
If a mute candidate gets elected, then, during his term of office, he must remain mute.
If a "political" candidate gets elected, then he has the people's mandate to speak his mind. If he, as a President, incurs the wrath of the people through his words or deeds, he can be voted out after six years. There is little damage that a loudmouthed President, compared with an incompetent government, can inflict on Singapore.
Of course, the PAP can amend the Constitution to explicitly prohibit the President from commenting on all political matters not directly related to his custodial duties.
[Suppose that the President disagrees with the government on the spending of reserves or the appointment of some key personnel. Then the President surely must explain his reasons to the people.
Therefore the President must be free to express his political views pertaining to his custodial duties.]
At this stage, though the people of Singapore can debate such a Constitutional Amendment, there is insufficient opposition votes in Parliament to stop it.
If the PAP wants to, it can impose a gag order on the President, making him/her as docile and servile as the PAP-controlled media.
But it will be a mistake for which the PAP will pay a heavy price at the next elections, as the people will then have realised the danger of granting PAP the power (which comes with two-thirds of the Parliamentary seats) to amend the Constitution at will.
[Related: Will a President that speaks up cause a Singapore Constitutional Crisis? (Thoughts of a Singapore Statistician): here]
***********************************
Clarifying the President's role (Law Minister's Statement)
Today Online (source)
Recent comments in the media suggest some confusion over what the President can and cannot do. As the Presidential Elections approach, it is important for Singaporeans to understand what the President is elected and empowered to do under the Singapore Constitution. The Attorney-General has confirmed that the following is the Constitutional position.
THE ROLE OF THE PRESIDENT
Singapore has a Parliamentary system of government, not a Presidential one. The President is the Head of State, not the Head of Government. The Prime Minister is the Head of Government and has the authority and responsibility to govern Singapore.
The Constitution clearly defines the role and scope of the President. He has custodial powers, not executive powers. In other words, he can veto or block Government actions in specified areas, but he has no role to advance his own policy agenda. National policies and running the Government are the responsibility of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. This is so for all policies, whether they concern security and defence, immigration and population, or housing and social safety nets. The Prime Minister and Cabinet are accountable to Parliament, where policies are debated and endorsed, and ultimately to voters, who decide every five years who to elect to Parliament and to govern Singapore.
The President's veto powers over the Government are limited to specific areas:
(a) Protection of past reserves, i.e. reserves accumulated during previous terms of office of Government;
(b) Appointment of key personnel; and
(c) ISA detentions, CPIB investigations and any restraining order in connection with the maintenance of religious harmony.
On all other matters, under the Constitution the President must act in accordance with the advice of the Cabinet. In addition, the President is required to consult the Council of Presidential Advisers (CPA) when exercising his veto powers in connection with reserves and appointments.
The President's veto powers are an important check against a profligate government squandering the nation's reserves, or undermining the integrity of the public service. That is why the President is directly elected by the people: To have the mandate to carry out his custodial role, and the moral authority to say no if necessary to the elected government.
PROTECTION OF PAST RESERVES
The Constitution protects the past reserves of the Government and key statutory boards and government companies ("5th Schedule" entities) like the CPF Board, MAS, HDB, GIC and Temasek. The reserves include physical assets like land and buildings as well as financial assets like cash, securities and bonds. The Government of the day can only spend past reserves with the approval of the President.
However, the President does not direct the operations of these statutory boards and Government companies. In particular, he is not empowered to direct the investment strategies of GIC and TemasekGIC and TemasekGIC and Temasek, and has access to any of the information that is available to their boards. This system of governance has allowed the GIC and Temasek to operate professionally and to achieve good returns over time, comparable to other reputable global investors.
APPOINTMENT OF KEY PERSONNEL
These include the Attorney-General, Chairman and members of the Public Service Commission, the Auditor-General, and the chiefs of the Armed Forces and Police. The President has similar veto powers over the appointment of the Chief Justice and Judges, and board members and CEOs of the 5th Schedule entities.
ISA DETENTIONS, CPIB INVESTIGATIONS AND RESTRAINING ORDERS IN CONNECTION WITH THE MAINTENANCE OF RELIGIOUS HARMONY
His concurrence also allows the Director of the Corrupt Practice Investigation Bureau to continue with investigations even if the Prime Minister has refused permission to conduct the investigations. The President can cancel, vary or confirm any restraining order made under the Maintenance of Religious Harmony Act, if the decision of Cabinet is against the recommendations of the Presidential Council for Religious Harmony.
CONCLUSION
The custodial and non-executive nature of the President's role is not new. It was clearly explained by Mr Goh Chok Tong (as First Deputy Prime Minister) when he moved the Constitutional Amendment creating the elected Presidency in 1990, and reiterated by Mr Goh (as Prime Minister) in a statement to Parliament in 1999.
This clarification should help Singaporeans better understand the role of the elected President, as set out in the Constitution.
However, the Constitution does not prohibit him/her from freely expressing his/her views on public and political issues, and advocating worthy social causes.
The President is the only public figure in Singapore who is elected with a mandate from the entire electorate, whereas the PM, being a MP of Ang Mo Kio GRC, has a mandate from a mere 7.6% (=179024/2350873) of the electorate.
The President, in one person, is therefore as much a representative of the people as the Parliament, as a body, is.
If the President has clearly proclaimed his views concerning public policies prior to the election, then, upon election, he has the moral authority, derived from the popular mandate, to express those views, and advocate policies in accord with those views. [I am using the phrase "moral authority" in the following sense: "Moral authority is the capacity to convince others of how the world should be." (source)]
Such a "political" President serves as an independent political voice (without legislative power) which the government has established the NMP (Nominated MP) and NCMP (Non-constituency MP) schemes to encourage.
The crucial point is that, having a plurality, if not a majority, of the national votes, the President can speak with a moral authority that NMPs and NCMPs sadly lack.
I would argue that, given PAP's monopoly of power since 1959, we are better served by such a "political" President, with moral, but no executive, authority, than by a timid and mute non-political President.
Whether we want such a "political" President should be a matter for Singaporeans to decide.
Let the Presidential candidates declare whether they intend to be mute on all political and social issues (except those that impinge on his custodial duties), and if not, what their platforms are.
If a mute candidate gets elected, then, during his term of office, he must remain mute.
If a "political" candidate gets elected, then he has the people's mandate to speak his mind. If he, as a President, incurs the wrath of the people through his words or deeds, he can be voted out after six years. There is little damage that a loudmouthed President, compared with an incompetent government, can inflict on Singapore.
Of course, the PAP can amend the Constitution to explicitly prohibit the President from commenting on all political matters not directly related to his custodial duties.
[Suppose that the President disagrees with the government on the spending of reserves or the appointment of some key personnel. Then the President surely must explain his reasons to the people.
Therefore the President must be free to express his political views pertaining to his custodial duties.]
At this stage, though the people of Singapore can debate such a Constitutional Amendment, there is insufficient opposition votes in Parliament to stop it.
If the PAP wants to, it can impose a gag order on the President, making him/her as docile and servile as the PAP-controlled media.
But it will be a mistake for which the PAP will pay a heavy price at the next elections, as the people will then have realised the danger of granting PAP the power (which comes with two-thirds of the Parliamentary seats) to amend the Constitution at will.
[Related: Will a President that speaks up cause a Singapore Constitutional Crisis? (Thoughts of a Singapore Statistician): here]
***********************************
Clarifying the President's role (Law Minister's Statement)
Today Online (source)
Recent comments in the media suggest some confusion over what the President can and cannot do. As the Presidential Elections approach, it is important for Singaporeans to understand what the President is elected and empowered to do under the Singapore Constitution. The Attorney-General has confirmed that the following is the Constitutional position.
THE ROLE OF THE PRESIDENT
Singapore has a Parliamentary system of government, not a Presidential one. The President is the Head of State, not the Head of Government. The Prime Minister is the Head of Government and has the authority and responsibility to govern Singapore.
The Constitution clearly defines the role and scope of the President. He has custodial powers, not executive powers. In other words, he can veto or block Government actions in specified areas, but he has no role to advance his own policy agenda. National policies and running the Government are the responsibility of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. This is so for all policies, whether they concern security and defence, immigration and population, or housing and social safety nets. The Prime Minister and Cabinet are accountable to Parliament, where policies are debated and endorsed, and ultimately to voters, who decide every five years who to elect to Parliament and to govern Singapore.
The President's veto powers over the Government are limited to specific areas:
(a) Protection of past reserves, i.e. reserves accumulated during previous terms of office of Government;
(b) Appointment of key personnel; and
(c) ISA detentions, CPIB investigations and any restraining order in connection with the maintenance of religious harmony.
On all other matters, under the Constitution the President must act in accordance with the advice of the Cabinet. In addition, the President is required to consult the Council of Presidential Advisers (CPA) when exercising his veto powers in connection with reserves and appointments.
The President's veto powers are an important check against a profligate government squandering the nation's reserves, or undermining the integrity of the public service. That is why the President is directly elected by the people: To have the mandate to carry out his custodial role, and the moral authority to say no if necessary to the elected government.
PROTECTION OF PAST RESERVES
The Constitution protects the past reserves of the Government and key statutory boards and government companies ("5th Schedule" entities) like the CPF Board, MAS, HDB, GIC and Temasek. The reserves include physical assets like land and buildings as well as financial assets like cash, securities and bonds. The Government of the day can only spend past reserves with the approval of the President.
However, the President does not direct the operations of these statutory boards and Government companies. In particular, he is not empowered to direct the investment strategies of GIC and TemasekGIC and TemasekGIC and Temasek, and has access to any of the information that is available to their boards. This system of governance has allowed the GIC and Temasek to operate professionally and to achieve good returns over time, comparable to other reputable global investors.
APPOINTMENT OF KEY PERSONNEL
These include the Attorney-General, Chairman and members of the Public Service Commission, the Auditor-General, and the chiefs of the Armed Forces and Police. The President has similar veto powers over the appointment of the Chief Justice and Judges, and board members and CEOs of the 5th Schedule entities.
ISA DETENTIONS, CPIB INVESTIGATIONS AND RESTRAINING ORDERS IN CONNECTION WITH THE MAINTENANCE OF RELIGIOUS HARMONY
His concurrence also allows the Director of the Corrupt Practice Investigation Bureau to continue with investigations even if the Prime Minister has refused permission to conduct the investigations. The President can cancel, vary or confirm any restraining order made under the Maintenance of Religious Harmony Act, if the decision of Cabinet is against the recommendations of the Presidential Council for Religious Harmony.
CONCLUSION
The custodial and non-executive nature of the President's role is not new. It was clearly explained by Mr Goh Chok Tong (as First Deputy Prime Minister) when he moved the Constitutional Amendment creating the elected Presidency in 1990, and reiterated by Mr Goh (as Prime Minister) in a statement to Parliament in 1999.
This clarification should help Singaporeans better understand the role of the elected President, as set out in the Constitution.
MIT Professor criticizes Singapore government's dominance in economy
Straits Times, Feb 12, 2010 (source)
HOW far should the Government extend its long arm into the private sector?
The Economic Strategies Committee last week proposed that the Government, aided by private sector fund managers, invest up to $1.5 billion in Singapore-based enterprises to help them grow and even take a stake in them.
The idea raised few eyebrows here but would have caused renowned political economist Huang Yasheng (personal website) to do a double-take.
To the Beijing-born Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) professor, who was in town recently to address the Civil Service College, state-linked enterprise models are a sure-fire way to stifle the economy in the long run.
Known for his critical view of China's bias towards state-linked enterprises at the expense of its home-grown businesses, he expressed the same scepticism about how far state intervention can help private enterprise here.
Singapore should 'rethink' the 'Temasek model', he says, referring to the state investment company Temasek Holdings, which has major stakes in large local corporations such as telecommunications player SingTel and developer CapitaLand.
'The private sector is the best way to grow the economy. It has the most productive, most innovative and entrepreneurial culture. The state-owned enterprise system doesn't give you that.'
He acknowledges that Singapore has 'the most streamlined state management model' worldwide among the countries which adopt this method, but it has milked this system for all it is worth.
'You are already hitting the wall,' he warns. Retaining this strategy could mean sacrificing future growth that is possible only through a bigger, more dynamic private sector.
When governments get involved in venture financing, they risk getting tangled in a whole host of issues. Few taxpayers, he reckons, can stomach the inherent risks of funding technology start-ups.
'Nine out of 10 investment projects fail. Does the government have such a high tolerance for risk? It's taxpayers' money, right? I don't think, politically, it's legitimate for the government to keep investing in failing individuals and failing projects. How do you defend these decisions?'
Those who fund these start-ups need to understand that risk-taking is part and parcel of the whole process.
'But does the average Singaporean understand that?'
Even if a project does succeed, other thorny issues crop up.
'The entrepreneur gets a disproportionate share of the benefits. Why should I, as a taxpayer, fund these projects? What do I get? There's a basic illogic to the government being involved in venture financing, at a political level and operational level.'
In most other countries, government funding typically goes into basic research without direct commercial applications.
'Maybe a better way is for the government to fund more basic research and then allow universities, private equity firms, venture capital firms and rich individuals to take care of the rest.'
That is because even when the state sector is well managed, it is not as innovative as the private sector, he says.
'From a technological development point of view, you need a bigger private sector to compete, to come up with new products, processes and technologies, to better compete with India and China.'
The case for private entrepreneurship is strong even when applied to these two Asian giants. In a 2006 Financial Times article, he compared the two economies, concluding that India was achieving a high level of economic growth with just a fraction of what China was receiving in foreign direct investment.
The difference boiled down to the level of support for local entrepreneurs.
'An economic litmus test is not whether a country can attract a lot of foreign direct investment, but whether it has a business environment that nurtures entrepreneurship, supports healthy competition and is relatively free of heavy-handed political intervention. In this regard, India has done a better job than China,' he wrote.
The trouble with civil servants leading the charge, he says, is that creative thinking is often in short supply.
'Civil service culture is about discipline. It's about execution. It's about efficiency. Entrepreneurial culture is about challenging the authorities, questioning the existing ways of doing businesses, moving away from the routines and norms. It's about the unconventional, rebellious and diverse. These values are almost polar opposites.'
He stops himself for a moment. 'I want to be very clear, Singapore has one of the best civil services in the whole world, and that's a very precious asset. The issue is, whether you want the civil service to play such a big role (in enterprise) or not.'
State-linked enterprises, he acknowledges, served Singapore very well before the rise of cheap labour in China and India, when growing the economy required merely ramping up production through higher efficiency. But today, the challenge is constant innovation.
'You can increase scale economy with government funding. But when it comes to new products, processes and technologies, it's very different. It's not just about money, it's culture.'
But growing up in the big shadow of state intervention has dwarfed the entrepreneurial culture here, he says. The 'orderly' environment here dulls the incentive to think out of the box. 'Everything is very well organised. Entrepreneurship typically happens in a more chaotic environment,' he observes.
Even Singapore's 'top-down' education system gets in the way.
'While producing excellent maths scores, it is not producing diversity in ideas and unconventional ways of solving problems,' he notes.
The new game is not about high averages, but outliers. Nor is it about size, but nimbleness.
He scoffs at the widely held view here that local firms are too small to compete outside Singapore without help from the government or government-linked firms.
'This idea that size gives you advantage is an extraordinarily strange view. Was Microsoft a big company in 1975? Was Google a big company in 1998?
'The key thing is whether or not you can grow, and how you grow. If government support is behind the growth of a company, that means the company has not survived the competition test. It may fail in a different environment.
Worse still, 'if the government support is strong, it dilutes the incentive to innovate'.
A small company, he says, can be 'extremely competitive' by occupying a strategic niche.
'Academic research shows overwhelmingly it is the small companies that create new technologies and new products. Big companies are innovative only when they acquire small companies.'
Hence, the critical question for Singapore is whether its big firms have enough small companies to acquire.
To help smaller players flourish, he believes local entrepreneurs should have easier access to private funds. The Central Provident Fund system, he points out, is worth a relook. While it builds up retirement nest eggs by enforcing savings that can run up to about 40 per cent of an employee's total wage, it also channels away a sizeable sum from the hands of potential entrepreneurs to government investments.
Putting some of these funds back in the hands of more nimble local entrepreneurs could be Singapore's best bet to stay ahead in this fast moving global economy. Failing to exploit the potential of its private sector could mean the country, once labelled an 'Asian Tiger' for its sparkling growth rates, might go down in history as an economic has-been, he says.
'I think Singapore has done a remarkable job in the last 50 years. The logic of its system is very powerful. But the issue now is that we have a very different environment.
'And the ultimate success of a system depends on its ability to adapt to new situations,' he adds.
HOW far should the Government extend its long arm into the private sector?
The Economic Strategies Committee last week proposed that the Government, aided by private sector fund managers, invest up to $1.5 billion in Singapore-based enterprises to help them grow and even take a stake in them.
The idea raised few eyebrows here but would have caused renowned political economist Huang Yasheng (personal website) to do a double-take.
To the Beijing-born Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) professor, who was in town recently to address the Civil Service College, state-linked enterprise models are a sure-fire way to stifle the economy in the long run.
Known for his critical view of China's bias towards state-linked enterprises at the expense of its home-grown businesses, he expressed the same scepticism about how far state intervention can help private enterprise here.
Singapore should 'rethink' the 'Temasek model', he says, referring to the state investment company Temasek Holdings, which has major stakes in large local corporations such as telecommunications player SingTel and developer CapitaLand.
'The private sector is the best way to grow the economy. It has the most productive, most innovative and entrepreneurial culture. The state-owned enterprise system doesn't give you that.'
He acknowledges that Singapore has 'the most streamlined state management model' worldwide among the countries which adopt this method, but it has milked this system for all it is worth.
'You are already hitting the wall,' he warns. Retaining this strategy could mean sacrificing future growth that is possible only through a bigger, more dynamic private sector.
When governments get involved in venture financing, they risk getting tangled in a whole host of issues. Few taxpayers, he reckons, can stomach the inherent risks of funding technology start-ups.
'Nine out of 10 investment projects fail. Does the government have such a high tolerance for risk? It's taxpayers' money, right? I don't think, politically, it's legitimate for the government to keep investing in failing individuals and failing projects. How do you defend these decisions?'
Those who fund these start-ups need to understand that risk-taking is part and parcel of the whole process.
'But does the average Singaporean understand that?'
Even if a project does succeed, other thorny issues crop up.
'The entrepreneur gets a disproportionate share of the benefits. Why should I, as a taxpayer, fund these projects? What do I get? There's a basic illogic to the government being involved in venture financing, at a political level and operational level.'
In most other countries, government funding typically goes into basic research without direct commercial applications.
'Maybe a better way is for the government to fund more basic research and then allow universities, private equity firms, venture capital firms and rich individuals to take care of the rest.'
That is because even when the state sector is well managed, it is not as innovative as the private sector, he says.
'From a technological development point of view, you need a bigger private sector to compete, to come up with new products, processes and technologies, to better compete with India and China.'
The case for private entrepreneurship is strong even when applied to these two Asian giants. In a 2006 Financial Times article, he compared the two economies, concluding that India was achieving a high level of economic growth with just a fraction of what China was receiving in foreign direct investment.
The difference boiled down to the level of support for local entrepreneurs.
'An economic litmus test is not whether a country can attract a lot of foreign direct investment, but whether it has a business environment that nurtures entrepreneurship, supports healthy competition and is relatively free of heavy-handed political intervention. In this regard, India has done a better job than China,' he wrote.
The trouble with civil servants leading the charge, he says, is that creative thinking is often in short supply.
'Civil service culture is about discipline. It's about execution. It's about efficiency. Entrepreneurial culture is about challenging the authorities, questioning the existing ways of doing businesses, moving away from the routines and norms. It's about the unconventional, rebellious and diverse. These values are almost polar opposites.'
He stops himself for a moment. 'I want to be very clear, Singapore has one of the best civil services in the whole world, and that's a very precious asset. The issue is, whether you want the civil service to play such a big role (in enterprise) or not.'
State-linked enterprises, he acknowledges, served Singapore very well before the rise of cheap labour in China and India, when growing the economy required merely ramping up production through higher efficiency. But today, the challenge is constant innovation.
'You can increase scale economy with government funding. But when it comes to new products, processes and technologies, it's very different. It's not just about money, it's culture.'
But growing up in the big shadow of state intervention has dwarfed the entrepreneurial culture here, he says. The 'orderly' environment here dulls the incentive to think out of the box. 'Everything is very well organised. Entrepreneurship typically happens in a more chaotic environment,' he observes.
Even Singapore's 'top-down' education system gets in the way.
'While producing excellent maths scores, it is not producing diversity in ideas and unconventional ways of solving problems,' he notes.
The new game is not about high averages, but outliers. Nor is it about size, but nimbleness.
He scoffs at the widely held view here that local firms are too small to compete outside Singapore without help from the government or government-linked firms.
'This idea that size gives you advantage is an extraordinarily strange view. Was Microsoft a big company in 1975? Was Google a big company in 1998?
'The key thing is whether or not you can grow, and how you grow. If government support is behind the growth of a company, that means the company has not survived the competition test. It may fail in a different environment.
Worse still, 'if the government support is strong, it dilutes the incentive to innovate'.
A small company, he says, can be 'extremely competitive' by occupying a strategic niche.
'Academic research shows overwhelmingly it is the small companies that create new technologies and new products. Big companies are innovative only when they acquire small companies.'
Hence, the critical question for Singapore is whether its big firms have enough small companies to acquire.
To help smaller players flourish, he believes local entrepreneurs should have easier access to private funds. The Central Provident Fund system, he points out, is worth a relook. While it builds up retirement nest eggs by enforcing savings that can run up to about 40 per cent of an employee's total wage, it also channels away a sizeable sum from the hands of potential entrepreneurs to government investments.
Putting some of these funds back in the hands of more nimble local entrepreneurs could be Singapore's best bet to stay ahead in this fast moving global economy. Failing to exploit the potential of its private sector could mean the country, once labelled an 'Asian Tiger' for its sparkling growth rates, might go down in history as an economic has-been, he says.
'I think Singapore has done a remarkable job in the last 50 years. The logic of its system is very powerful. But the issue now is that we have a very different environment.
'And the ultimate success of a system depends on its ability to adapt to new situations,' he adds.
Thursday, June 9, 2011
Do casinos cause Singaporeans to gamble away more money?
According to the following report, prior to 2010 when the casinos opened, the Singapore government (i.e. the Tote Board) collected S$500 million annually in gambling surplus (which I take to be gambling revenue (after subtracting payouts) less operating and other expenses). In the absence of financial statements from the Tote Board, this serves as an indicator of the magnitude of the pre-casino gambling economy in Singapore.
The reductioin in the Tote Board's gambling surplus due to the newly opened casinos was more than made up for by the casino entry levy. This implies that the money that the locals saved through the reduced playing of 4D, Toto, etc, went to the casino entry levy (and not to their gambling losses at the casinos).
Therefore the gambling revenue (estimated at US$3.06 billion, or S$4.3 billion, in 2010; here) that the casinos collected from the locals is money that, in the absence of the casinos, would not have gone into gambling. Casinos cause Singaporeans to gamble away a great deal more money (S$4.3 billion).
Contrary to the following report, the casinos and the Tote Board are not in a zero-sum game, competing for a greater share of a fixed-size local gambling pie. The local gambling pie has in fact been growing at a furious pace since the casinos opened.
The casinos serve to significantly expand Singapore's local gambling economy.
*******************
I have previously tried to estimate the magnitude of local casino gambling (here). The following report provided some data for further analysis.
My estimate is that 26% (1 in 4) of the local adults gambled at the casinos in 2010. On average, each of them lost S$6000 at the casinos, and S$195 in entry levy, in 2010.
How I estimated
The casino entry levy (S$100 a day, S$2000 a year) in 2010 amounted to S$140 million.
[ps.
According to the government, casino entry levy amounted to about S$70 million as of May 10, 2010 (after the operation for 3 months of one casino, and 2 weeks of the other) (source). The figure of S$140 million for 10.5 months (in 2010) of casino operation is therefore suspiciously low. ]
If every local gambler paid the daily levy (and none paid the yearly levy), then 1.4 million locals gambled in 2010.
However, let's assume that, of the local gamblers, 5% are serious gamblers and paid the yearly levy, and the remaining 95% paid the daily levy once in 2010.
Thus, on average, each local gambler paid S$195 in entry levy (5%x2000+95%x100=$195).
Therefore, there were 720,000 local casino gamblers in 2010. (To verify: 717950x$195=$140,000,250) This amounts to 26% of the 2.8 million local residents (citizens and PR) aged 21 and above.
(Since there are gamblers who paid the daily levy more than once, 720,000 is an overestimate. For simplicity, I did not further refine this estimate.)
The locals account for US$3.06 billion in casino gambling revenue, and 15.6 million casino visits in 2010 (here).
Thus, on average, each of the 720,000 local gamblers made 21.7 casino visits and lost US$4250 (S$6000, or S$570 a month, for 10.5 months) at the casinos, and S$195 in entry levy, in 2010.
The very high number (21.7) of casino visits is explained by the fact that, even with a daily levy (valid for 24 hours), a local can account for multiple casino visits, with each re-entry counted as a separate visit.
***************************
Casino levies boost Tote Board’s surplus
–Angela Lim, Yahoo Fit to Post, February 11th, 2011 (source)
The Singapore Tote Board will be giving away S$625 million to beneficiaries.
It seems gamblers in Singapore have left their old favourites behind for the latest game in town.
Toto, 4D and horse-racing have seen a drop in takings since the opening of the two integrated resorts (IRs) in February and April last year.
Takings from the Singapore Turf Club were the hardest hit, suffering a 30 per cent drop while Singapore Pools’ takings dipped by 3 to 5 per cent, according to the chairman of the Singapore Totalisator Board (Tote Board), Bobby Chin.
And yet, this has not stopped the Tote Board from doubling its financial commitment to charities.
Its collections from casino levies more than made up for the shortfall, prompting it to announce on Thursday that it will be giving away S$625 million, according to a Straits Times report.
Two of the Tote Board’s major beneficiaries — the Tote Board Community Healthcare Fund and the Community Chest – received S$100 million and S$50 million respectively. The cheque presentation ceremony was held at the National Council of Social Service (NCSS) auditorium on Thursday.
“We have been affected in some ways by the casinos, but nevertheless, because the Government has directed the levy to the Tote Board, it means additional quantum and additional ability and capability to help fund-worthy projects,” Mr Chin said.
Collections from casino levies made up around S$140 million of the Tote Board’s gaming surpluses between April and December last year. This amount is expected to rise at the end of the financial year 2010 in March 31.
The entry levy is what Singapore citizens and permanent residents have to pay to enter the two casinos — S$100 a day or S$2,000 a year.
Ministers of Parliament (MPs) and industry watchers have since raised concerns about the effectiveness of the current levy and are proposing a review of current casino levies.
Before the casinos opened, the Tote Board made about S$500 million on average in annual gambling surpluses. The surplus was used to fund community projects.
But industry experts say the drop in forms of gambling like horse betting, 4D and lotteries was not unexpected.
Dr Derek da Cunha, author of Singapore Places Its Bets, a book about the two IRs and their economic and social impact, said,”I’ve always said that it’s a . The casinos will inevitably affect and cannibalise some other forms of gambling.”
He added that, in comparison to games like 4D and Toto, casino table games offer gamblers better odds.
“Some casino table games offer better odds. This explains why a proportion of people have migrated from the turf club to the table games at the two IRsda Cunha explained.
Mr Carey Wong, an analyst with OCBC Investment Research, said, “The integrated resorts are meant for foreigners — and the Government has said so many times — but the numbers show that Singaporeans have been going to the casinos.”
Although the surplus last year was boosted by the casino levies, Mr Chin said it is too early to tell if the trend will continue.
“We hope to maintain the same level of commitment, but you have to assess the quantum at a steady state. The initial six months to a year, there is a novelty effect. It is not reflective of what is going to happen in the future,” he said.
NCSS, which will receive an undisclosed sum from Community Chest’s S$50 million kitty, plans to increase the number of family service centres (FSC) from 37 to 42 by 2015, and improving the human aspects of the FSCs to provide the same standard of service across its centres.
The organisation’s chief executive officer, Ang Bee Lian, said,”We are quite clear that we want to position FSCs as, what I sometimes call, social polyclinics. We want FSCs to be your first stop, a convenient stop, for social issues that families face.”
Stressing the importance of the quality of intervention, Ms Ang said, “It’s intervention that counts. It’s not about the facility but really the quality of the interaction with the social worker, the counsellor, even the receptionists.”
The reductioin in the Tote Board's gambling surplus due to the newly opened casinos was more than made up for by the casino entry levy. This implies that the money that the locals saved through the reduced playing of 4D, Toto, etc, went to the casino entry levy (and not to their gambling losses at the casinos).
Therefore the gambling revenue (estimated at US$3.06 billion, or S$4.3 billion, in 2010; here) that the casinos collected from the locals is money that, in the absence of the casinos, would not have gone into gambling. Casinos cause Singaporeans to gamble away a great deal more money (S$4.3 billion).
Contrary to the following report, the casinos and the Tote Board are not in a zero-sum game, competing for a greater share of a fixed-size local gambling pie. The local gambling pie has in fact been growing at a furious pace since the casinos opened.
The casinos serve to significantly expand Singapore's local gambling economy.
*******************
I have previously tried to estimate the magnitude of local casino gambling (here). The following report provided some data for further analysis.
My estimate is that 26% (1 in 4) of the local adults gambled at the casinos in 2010. On average, each of them lost S$6000 at the casinos, and S$195 in entry levy, in 2010.
How I estimated
The casino entry levy (S$100 a day, S$2000 a year) in 2010 amounted to S$140 million.
[ps.
According to the government, casino entry levy amounted to about S$70 million as of May 10, 2010 (after the operation for 3 months of one casino, and 2 weeks of the other) (source). The figure of S$140 million for 10.5 months (in 2010) of casino operation is therefore suspiciously low. ]
If every local gambler paid the daily levy (and none paid the yearly levy), then 1.4 million locals gambled in 2010.
However, let's assume that, of the local gamblers, 5% are serious gamblers and paid the yearly levy, and the remaining 95% paid the daily levy once in 2010.
Thus, on average, each local gambler paid S$195 in entry levy (5%x2000+95%x100=$195).
Therefore, there were 720,000 local casino gamblers in 2010. (To verify: 717950x$195=$140,000,250) This amounts to 26% of the 2.8 million local residents (citizens and PR) aged 21 and above.
(Since there are gamblers who paid the daily levy more than once, 720,000 is an overestimate. For simplicity, I did not further refine this estimate.)
The locals account for US$3.06 billion in casino gambling revenue, and 15.6 million casino visits in 2010 (here).
Thus, on average, each of the 720,000 local gamblers made 21.7 casino visits and lost US$4250 (S$6000, or S$570 a month, for 10.5 months) at the casinos, and S$195 in entry levy, in 2010.
The very high number (21.7) of casino visits is explained by the fact that, even with a daily levy (valid for 24 hours), a local can account for multiple casino visits, with each re-entry counted as a separate visit.
***************************
Casino levies boost Tote Board’s surplus
–Angela Lim, Yahoo Fit to Post, February 11th, 2011 (source)
The Singapore Tote Board will be giving away S$625 million to beneficiaries.
It seems gamblers in Singapore have left their old favourites behind for the latest game in town.
Toto, 4D and horse-racing have seen a drop in takings since the opening of the two integrated resorts (IRs) in February and April last year.
Takings from the Singapore Turf Club were the hardest hit, suffering a 30 per cent drop while Singapore Pools’ takings dipped by 3 to 5 per cent, according to the chairman of the Singapore Totalisator Board (Tote Board), Bobby Chin.
And yet, this has not stopped the Tote Board from doubling its financial commitment to charities.
Its collections from casino levies more than made up for the shortfall, prompting it to announce on Thursday that it will be giving away S$625 million, according to a Straits Times report.
Two of the Tote Board’s major beneficiaries — the Tote Board Community Healthcare Fund and the Community Chest – received S$100 million and S$50 million respectively. The cheque presentation ceremony was held at the National Council of Social Service (NCSS) auditorium on Thursday.
“We have been affected in some ways by the casinos, but nevertheless, because the Government has directed the levy to the Tote Board, it means additional quantum and additional ability and capability to help fund-worthy projects,” Mr Chin said.
Collections from casino levies made up around S$140 million of the Tote Board’s gaming surpluses between April and December last year. This amount is expected to rise at the end of the financial year 2010 in March 31.
The entry levy is what Singapore citizens and permanent residents have to pay to enter the two casinos — S$100 a day or S$2,000 a year.
Ministers of Parliament (MPs) and industry watchers have since raised concerns about the effectiveness of the current levy and are proposing a review of current casino levies.
Before the casinos opened, the Tote Board made about S$500 million on average in annual gambling surpluses. The surplus was used to fund community projects.
But industry experts say the drop in forms of gambling like horse betting, 4D and lotteries was not unexpected.
Dr Derek da Cunha, author of Singapore Places Its Bets, a book about the two IRs and their economic and social impact, said,”I’ve always said that it’s a . The casinos will inevitably affect and cannibalise some other forms of gambling.”
He added that, in comparison to games like 4D and Toto, casino table games offer gamblers better odds.
“Some casino table games offer better odds. This explains why a proportion of people have migrated from the turf club to the table games at the two IRsda Cunha explained.
Mr Carey Wong, an analyst with OCBC Investment Research, said, “The integrated resorts are meant for foreigners — and the Government has said so many times — but the numbers show that Singaporeans have been going to the casinos.”
Although the surplus last year was boosted by the casino levies, Mr Chin said it is too early to tell if the trend will continue.
“We hope to maintain the same level of commitment, but you have to assess the quantum at a steady state. The initial six months to a year, there is a novelty effect. It is not reflective of what is going to happen in the future,” he said.
NCSS, which will receive an undisclosed sum from Community Chest’s S$50 million kitty, plans to increase the number of family service centres (FSC) from 37 to 42 by 2015, and improving the human aspects of the FSCs to provide the same standard of service across its centres.
The organisation’s chief executive officer, Ang Bee Lian, said,”We are quite clear that we want to position FSCs as, what I sometimes call, social polyclinics. We want FSCs to be your first stop, a convenient stop, for social issues that families face.”
Stressing the importance of the quality of intervention, Ms Ang said, “It’s intervention that counts. It’s not about the facility but really the quality of the interaction with the social worker, the counsellor, even the receptionists.”
Saturday, June 4, 2011
Has Singapore been cheated? A speech by Dr Chee Soon Juan
(source)
Dr Chee Soon Juan launched his book A Nation Cheated on 31 Aug 08 during which he spoke to the more than 150 guests.
Buy here
Extract of Dr Chee's speech
When I was in jail in 2006, I re-read the book Comet In Our Sky, a compilation of essays written by friends and associates of the late Lim Chin Siong (Wikipedia). I will assume most of you here know Lim Chin Siong and will not endeavour to go into detail how he was seen by the majority of Singaporeans as the natural leader of our then fledgling republic in the 1950s and 60s, other than to say that his charisma and compassionate style of leadership won the hearts and minds of many.
The book includes a chapter written by Professor of Southeast Asian Studies, Tim Harper, from Cambridge University. Professor Harper documented his research after poring through bundles of de-classified papers, memos, letters, etc. written by Britsh colonial officials during the turbulent period leading up to Singapore's independence (see links on Lim Chin Siong vs LKY at the end of this post).
The picture that emerged was one not quite the story that I heard and read growing up. In a nutshell, the Professor's account was that the people of Singapore wanted Lim Chin Siong as their leader but the British would not allow it and wanted Lee Kuan Yew instead.
So we have two versions of what happened: one written by a disinterested, third-party academic and based on verifiable de-classifed papers, and the other by Lee Kuan Yew who still has vested personal interests in telling these events. I do not think I would be far wrong if I say that the majority of people would look to the former for a more accurate and objective account of that part of history.
This is what I tried to do in the first part of A Nation Cheated, that is, summarise Professor Harper's research findings.
But my nerves are rubbed raw when I keep hearing Lee Kuan Yew, who came to power backed by the colonialists, rant about how the West should not foist its system on an Asian people, meaning us. Somehow the democratic practices that allowed Lee Kuan Yew to become prime minister suddenly become Western and not suited for us Singaporeans.
Today the propaganda continues unabated, that Singaporeans are not interest in human rights and democracy. I will come to this subject in a moment and show you how this lie has now been exposed.
For now, let me dwell a little on the notion that things have worked wonderfully for Singaporeans.
Whether it is our CPF or healthcare costs or wages or our financial reserves, I have presented evidence in the book to show how things are not quite what they seem. I have tried to stay away from polemics especially in part two of the book and concentrated on putting together the data from alternative sources to make my case. I will leave it to you the reader to decide for yourself whether I have done my job or not.
To illustrate what I really set out to say in this book, I want to relate a story. It is about a man whom I met when I went for my jog one morning. He is in his mid-seventies and works for the town council as a cleaner. He starts work at 7 am and knocks off at about one or two in the afternoon depending on how much work there is that day. He works six days a week. His salary? $400 a month.
When he was a young man in his 20s, he was told that if he just stayed disciplined, didn't support independent unions, didn't clamour for his rights and trusted the PAP to govern in his best interest, he would be better off. He did that, or at least he wasn't given a choice.
Today, he is told that he must not think of retiring. In fact he is told that he needs to work for less pay. He is told that part of his savings is in Merill Lynch and in about 15 to 20 years, he should be able to start seeing returns on the investment, that is if the bank doesn't go belly up first.
Doesn't the word "cheated" come to mind?
This old man's story is not an aberration. Statistics tell us that our poorest segment of society continue to see their wages shrink. Fifty percent of the people haven't seen their incomes grow over the past ten years.
But then our ministers increased the salaries in 2007 by a heart-stopping 85 percent. The president is paid $4 million a year, for what no one quite knows. The Senior Minister and Minister Mentor are also paid close to that amount, again for what no one quite understands. The Prime Minister is paid $3.8 million which works out to be about $10,000 a day.
They tell you that they must be amply rewarded for building such a fine country. Really? Let's see what Singaporeans think:
Have you thought of this number before, ladies and gentlemen? These are astounding figures. I cannot think of another country where after 50 years of uninterrupted rule, we produce a nation where its people profess no love for it and can't wait to get out?
Tell me, hand on heart, that you still think that the PAP has governed in the interest of Singapore and Singaporeans. Tell me that we have not been cheated.
Dr Chee Soon Juan launched his book A Nation Cheated on 31 Aug 08 during which he spoke to the more than 150 guests.
Buy here
Extract of Dr Chee's speech
When I was in jail in 2006, I re-read the book Comet In Our Sky, a compilation of essays written by friends and associates of the late Lim Chin Siong (Wikipedia). I will assume most of you here know Lim Chin Siong and will not endeavour to go into detail how he was seen by the majority of Singaporeans as the natural leader of our then fledgling republic in the 1950s and 60s, other than to say that his charisma and compassionate style of leadership won the hearts and minds of many.
The book includes a chapter written by Professor of Southeast Asian Studies, Tim Harper, from Cambridge University. Professor Harper documented his research after poring through bundles of de-classified papers, memos, letters, etc. written by Britsh colonial officials during the turbulent period leading up to Singapore's independence (see links on Lim Chin Siong vs LKY at the end of this post).
The picture that emerged was one not quite the story that I heard and read growing up. In a nutshell, the Professor's account was that the people of Singapore wanted Lim Chin Siong as their leader but the British would not allow it and wanted Lee Kuan Yew instead.
So we have two versions of what happened: one written by a disinterested, third-party academic and based on verifiable de-classifed papers, and the other by Lee Kuan Yew who still has vested personal interests in telling these events. I do not think I would be far wrong if I say that the majority of people would look to the former for a more accurate and objective account of that part of history.
This is what I tried to do in the first part of A Nation Cheated, that is, summarise Professor Harper's research findings.
But my nerves are rubbed raw when I keep hearing Lee Kuan Yew, who came to power backed by the colonialists, rant about how the West should not foist its system on an Asian people, meaning us. Somehow the democratic practices that allowed Lee Kuan Yew to become prime minister suddenly become Western and not suited for us Singaporeans.
Today the propaganda continues unabated, that Singaporeans are not interest in human rights and democracy. I will come to this subject in a moment and show you how this lie has now been exposed.
For now, let me dwell a little on the notion that things have worked wonderfully for Singaporeans.
Whether it is our CPF or healthcare costs or wages or our financial reserves, I have presented evidence in the book to show how things are not quite what they seem. I have tried to stay away from polemics especially in part two of the book and concentrated on putting together the data from alternative sources to make my case. I will leave it to you the reader to decide for yourself whether I have done my job or not.
To illustrate what I really set out to say in this book, I want to relate a story. It is about a man whom I met when I went for my jog one morning. He is in his mid-seventies and works for the town council as a cleaner. He starts work at 7 am and knocks off at about one or two in the afternoon depending on how much work there is that day. He works six days a week. His salary? $400 a month.
When he was a young man in his 20s, he was told that if he just stayed disciplined, didn't support independent unions, didn't clamour for his rights and trusted the PAP to govern in his best interest, he would be better off. He did that, or at least he wasn't given a choice.
Today, he is told that he must not think of retiring. In fact he is told that he needs to work for less pay. He is told that part of his savings is in Merill Lynch and in about 15 to 20 years, he should be able to start seeing returns on the investment, that is if the bank doesn't go belly up first.
Doesn't the word "cheated" come to mind?
This old man's story is not an aberration. Statistics tell us that our poorest segment of society continue to see their wages shrink. Fifty percent of the people haven't seen their incomes grow over the past ten years.
But then our ministers increased the salaries in 2007 by a heart-stopping 85 percent. The president is paid $4 million a year, for what no one quite knows. The Senior Minister and Minister Mentor are also paid close to that amount, again for what no one quite understands. The Prime Minister is paid $3.8 million which works out to be about $10,000 a day.
They tell you that they must be amply rewarded for building such a fine country. Really? Let's see what Singaporeans think:
- Despite having gone through national education at school, 37 percent of Singaporean youths say they are not patriotic. More than 50 percent want to emigrate overseas if given a chance. (Channel News Asia, 17 January 2007)
- Another survey of older Singaporeans showed that two-thirds said they have considered retiring in another country. (Straits Times, 20 August 2008)
- A few weeks ago, the Government confirmed that an average of 1,000 Singaporeans had given up their citizenship annually over the last three years. (Asia Times, 21 August 2008)
Have you thought of this number before, ladies and gentlemen? These are astounding figures. I cannot think of another country where after 50 years of uninterrupted rule, we produce a nation where its people profess no love for it and can't wait to get out?
Tell me, hand on heart, that you still think that the PAP has governed in the interest of Singapore and Singaporeans. Tell me that we have not been cheated.
[continue to read: here]
Friday, June 3, 2011
LKY's mindless vindictiveness: ex-President Devan Nair's insight
In order to combat the servile idolizing of LKY prevalent in the main stream media, let us revisit what former President Devan Nair revealed about the character of LKY.
Requiem for an unbending Singaporean (source 1, source 2)
C.V. Devan Nair
Former President
Republic of Singapore.
March 26, 1999
A SERIOUS threat of closure faces the Workers’ Party led by Mr J. B. Jeyaretnam because of failure to pay the forbidding damages awarded against the Party by a court in Singapore.
One hopes against hope that this might be avoided at the last minute. It is a slim hope.
The world has come to assume, rightly or wrongly, that the political tactics used by the governing PAP against opposition politicians have for some time come to include suing their pants off, forcing them into bankruptcy and losing their seats in parliament as a result. Now the same device is resorted to against opposition political parties themselves, as registered institutions.
The onus of proof is on the government of Singapore – not on global public opinion.
Nothing that smacks of opposition seems safe in Singapore any longer. Singaporeans must sooner or later come to realise the harsh truth that nobody in Singapore is truly saved unless ALL are SEEN to be saved.
The post of no return has long passed for Singaporeans, and one fears they will perforce learn this lesson the hard way. In the ultimate analysis, this is probably best. The more painful the price paid to learn basic human lessons, the more firmly might they become embedded in the national fibre.
A free Singapore will arise and justify the sacrifices and efforts of undaunted Singaporeans, now including the courageous Chee Soon Juan, who had immolated themselves on the altar of freedom.
Phoenix-like, their dreams will rise once again from their ashes. Were this process not true, the world would have come to an end long ago.
It is just as well that I release this requiem now. If not timely yet, it will be soon enough. Here goes, for good or ill to myself:
Some months after I was kicked upstairs to the presidency of the republic of Singapore in October 1981, there was a by-election in the parliamentary constituency of Anson, which I had held prior to my ill-fated elevation. I had won that seat with a comfortable majority of some 80 percent of the votes cast. The PAP’s candidate in the by-election was a relative unknown, while the Workers Party put up J.B Jeyaretnam. To the consternation of the PAP, Jeyaretnam won.
The day after the by-election verdict was declared, I had lunch with the Prime Minister. I was amazed at how he fretted and fumed like a caged fury. As I saw it, Jeyaretnam constituted no threat at all to the PAP whether in parliament or outside it. For one thing, despite Jeyas courage, he displayed a woeful lack of economics. He clearly never knew at any point of time how Singapore clicked economically. And it was as plain as a pikestaff to me that in five years of free performance in ‘parliament against the likes of Dr Goh Keng Swee, Mr Lim Kim San et al, he would stand exposed in public for his abysmal ignorance of economics.
In truth, if I had to cope with J.B Jeyaretnam as a hostile delegate at regular National Trade Union Congress (NTUC) Delegates Conferences, I would have given him all the rope and more he wanted to hang himself with. And after free and open arguments over three days of conferencing, I would have beaten him hands down at the ballot box. I knew this, as did the workers. For they knew that in the colonial days, Jeyaretnam had never stood on a picket line. I had, not once but several times, not only stood on picket lines, but also bedded down for the night on the gravel with the workers whom I led.
I told all this to Kuan Yew. Nothing I said sank in. He fretted about a potential critical percentage drop in PAP votes across all the constituencies that could eventually bring the PAP government down, and he wouldn’t stand for it. Only later did I realise that this was the moment that started his formidable brain box ticking away furiously at the fecund gerrymandering schemes he was to introduce later to ensure that all opposition parties would be put in a Gordian bind that would make it impossible for them to ever achieve control of parliament, unless an Alexander came along. Such a possibility appears impossible now, unless it takes the awesome shape of shattering geo-political circumstances already building up around Singapore.
Immediately, however, Kuan Yew’s attention was concentrated on how he would deal with J.B Jeyaretnam in parliament. I was quite alarmed at some of the things he told me at that lunch. “Look,” he said, “Jeyaretnam can't win the infighting. I’ll tell you why. WE are in charge. Every government ministry and department is under our control. And in the infighting, he will go down for the count every time.” And I will never forget his last words. “I will make him crawl on his bended knees, and beg for mercy.”
Jeyaretnam was made of sterner stuff. To his eternal credit he never did crawl on bended knees, or ever begged for mercy. And it is to Lee Kuan Yew’s eternal shame that Jeyaretnam will leave the political scene with his head held high, enjoying a martyrdom conferred on him by Lee. Lest I be misunderstood, let me state that Jeya more than deserves the crown of the martyr for his indomitable courage and dignity in the face of the vilest persecution.
Even greater human spirits than Jeyaretnam had refused to bend their knees to Lee Kuan Yew. It is my considered view that the greatest human being living in Singapore today is one who declined to surrender to the intimidation of prolonged incarceration and restrictions imposed on him without trial for a total period which exceeds that suffered by Nelson Mandela. And here was the mark of true greatness. He emerged from the experience like a god unembittered. His name is Chia Thye Poh.
And it is Lee Kuan Yew who emerged from the episode as the knave and fool of his own mindless vindictiveness, while the real conqueror smiles benignly – unnoted, of course, by the local media. For only sound waves from the Istana Annexe are picked up and regurgitated by His Master¹s Voice.
There is no political justification for obliging the Workers’ Party to close down. And not a shred of moral justification. What lies behind the move is among the most brazen vindictiveness ever shown in the political life of Singapore. It merely adds one more nail in the coffin of the PAP’s reputation when the true history of the party will be exposed to the world, as it surely will be one day in the coming decades of the third millennium. As mankind accelerates to the abyss, the shining memories of the past will certainly not include Lee Kuan Yew and the department store dummies he boasts today as his acolytes. He clearly does not possess the foresight to avoid such a fate.
I gladly salute J.B. Jeyaretnam and the Worker’s Party at this highly deserved requiem, even if I never once had shared their platform.
Requiem for an unbending Singaporean (source 1, source 2)
C.V. Devan Nair
Former President
Republic of Singapore.
March 26, 1999
A SERIOUS threat of closure faces the Workers’ Party led by Mr J. B. Jeyaretnam because of failure to pay the forbidding damages awarded against the Party by a court in Singapore.
One hopes against hope that this might be avoided at the last minute. It is a slim hope.
The world has come to assume, rightly or wrongly, that the political tactics used by the governing PAP against opposition politicians have for some time come to include suing their pants off, forcing them into bankruptcy and losing their seats in parliament as a result. Now the same device is resorted to against opposition political parties themselves, as registered institutions.
The onus of proof is on the government of Singapore – not on global public opinion.
Nothing that smacks of opposition seems safe in Singapore any longer. Singaporeans must sooner or later come to realise the harsh truth that nobody in Singapore is truly saved unless ALL are SEEN to be saved.
The post of no return has long passed for Singaporeans, and one fears they will perforce learn this lesson the hard way. In the ultimate analysis, this is probably best. The more painful the price paid to learn basic human lessons, the more firmly might they become embedded in the national fibre.
A free Singapore will arise and justify the sacrifices and efforts of undaunted Singaporeans, now including the courageous Chee Soon Juan, who had immolated themselves on the altar of freedom.
Phoenix-like, their dreams will rise once again from their ashes. Were this process not true, the world would have come to an end long ago.
It is just as well that I release this requiem now. If not timely yet, it will be soon enough. Here goes, for good or ill to myself:
Some months after I was kicked upstairs to the presidency of the republic of Singapore in October 1981, there was a by-election in the parliamentary constituency of Anson, which I had held prior to my ill-fated elevation. I had won that seat with a comfortable majority of some 80 percent of the votes cast. The PAP’s candidate in the by-election was a relative unknown, while the Workers Party put up J.B Jeyaretnam. To the consternation of the PAP, Jeyaretnam won.
The day after the by-election verdict was declared, I had lunch with the Prime Minister. I was amazed at how he fretted and fumed like a caged fury. As I saw it, Jeyaretnam constituted no threat at all to the PAP whether in parliament or outside it. For one thing, despite Jeyas courage, he displayed a woeful lack of economics. He clearly never knew at any point of time how Singapore clicked economically. And it was as plain as a pikestaff to me that in five years of free performance in ‘parliament against the likes of Dr Goh Keng Swee, Mr Lim Kim San et al, he would stand exposed in public for his abysmal ignorance of economics.
In truth, if I had to cope with J.B Jeyaretnam as a hostile delegate at regular National Trade Union Congress (NTUC) Delegates Conferences, I would have given him all the rope and more he wanted to hang himself with. And after free and open arguments over three days of conferencing, I would have beaten him hands down at the ballot box. I knew this, as did the workers. For they knew that in the colonial days, Jeyaretnam had never stood on a picket line. I had, not once but several times, not only stood on picket lines, but also bedded down for the night on the gravel with the workers whom I led.
I told all this to Kuan Yew. Nothing I said sank in. He fretted about a potential critical percentage drop in PAP votes across all the constituencies that could eventually bring the PAP government down, and he wouldn’t stand for it. Only later did I realise that this was the moment that started his formidable brain box ticking away furiously at the fecund gerrymandering schemes he was to introduce later to ensure that all opposition parties would be put in a Gordian bind that would make it impossible for them to ever achieve control of parliament, unless an Alexander came along. Such a possibility appears impossible now, unless it takes the awesome shape of shattering geo-political circumstances already building up around Singapore.
Immediately, however, Kuan Yew’s attention was concentrated on how he would deal with J.B Jeyaretnam in parliament. I was quite alarmed at some of the things he told me at that lunch. “Look,” he said, “Jeyaretnam can't win the infighting. I’ll tell you why. WE are in charge. Every government ministry and department is under our control. And in the infighting, he will go down for the count every time.” And I will never forget his last words. “I will make him crawl on his bended knees, and beg for mercy.”
Jeyaretnam was made of sterner stuff. To his eternal credit he never did crawl on bended knees, or ever begged for mercy. And it is to Lee Kuan Yew’s eternal shame that Jeyaretnam will leave the political scene with his head held high, enjoying a martyrdom conferred on him by Lee. Lest I be misunderstood, let me state that Jeya more than deserves the crown of the martyr for his indomitable courage and dignity in the face of the vilest persecution.
Even greater human spirits than Jeyaretnam had refused to bend their knees to Lee Kuan Yew. It is my considered view that the greatest human being living in Singapore today is one who declined to surrender to the intimidation of prolonged incarceration and restrictions imposed on him without trial for a total period which exceeds that suffered by Nelson Mandela. And here was the mark of true greatness. He emerged from the experience like a god unembittered. His name is Chia Thye Poh.
And it is Lee Kuan Yew who emerged from the episode as the knave and fool of his own mindless vindictiveness, while the real conqueror smiles benignly – unnoted, of course, by the local media. For only sound waves from the Istana Annexe are picked up and regurgitated by His Master¹s Voice.
There is no political justification for obliging the Workers’ Party to close down. And not a shred of moral justification. What lies behind the move is among the most brazen vindictiveness ever shown in the political life of Singapore. It merely adds one more nail in the coffin of the PAP’s reputation when the true history of the party will be exposed to the world, as it surely will be one day in the coming decades of the third millennium. As mankind accelerates to the abyss, the shining memories of the past will certainly not include Lee Kuan Yew and the department store dummies he boasts today as his acolytes. He clearly does not possess the foresight to avoid such a fate.
I gladly salute J.B. Jeyaretnam and the Worker’s Party at this highly deserved requiem, even if I never once had shared their platform.
Thursday, June 2, 2011
PN Balji, formerly of ST: Paid spin doctor for Dr Susan Lim, or respected journalist-commentator?
PN Balji
Dr Susan Lim
Dr Susan LimWhile I applaud PN Balji (see below for all relevant news and his bio) for questioning the conduct of Singapore's Attorney-General's Chamber (regardless of the merit of his case), he certainly should have declared his financial interest, being a PR consultant for the immensely expensive Dr Susan Lim, in the judiciary's decision concerning Singapore Medical Council vs. Susan Lim.
Being a veteran journalist, he surely understands conflict of interest (the very issue that he raised concerning the actions of Singapore's Director of Medical Services): that posing as an independent commentator, while advancing one's personal gain, is deceitful and unethical.
He should promptly apologize for his deception, to salvage his credibility.
Presumably he has used his close association with The Straits Times, The New Paper, Today, SPH, Channel News Asia, and MediaCorp to promote favourable coverage and views of Susan Lim (which is what he has been paid to do, after all).
How much success did he have? Did he declare his personal financial interest to those editors and journalists whom he sought to influence?
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The New York Times Company Policy on Ethics in Journalism (source)
The above policy serves as a sound ethical standard for journalists, columnists and commentators. The following extracts are pertinent:
Steering Clear of Advice Roles
40. It is an inherent conflict for a journalist to perform public relations work, paid or unpaid. Staff members may not counsel individuals or organizations on how to deal successfully with the news media. They may not, for example, advise candidates for public office, write or edit annual reports, or contribute to the programs of sports teams.
Outside Contributors [PN Balji is an outside contributor to The Jakarta Globe]
136. Our audience applies exacting standards to all of our journalism. It does not normally distinguish between the work of staff members and that of outside freelancers. Thus as far as possible, freelance contributors to the Times Company's journalism, while not its employees, should accept the same ethical standards as staff members as a condition of their assignments for us. If they violate these standards, they should be denied further assignments.
137. Before being given an assignment, freelance contributors must sign a contract with the Times Company or one of its units. Such a contract obliges them to take care to avoid conflicts of interests or the appearance of conflict. Specifically, in connection with their work for us, freelancers will not accept free transportation, free lodging, gifts, junkets, commissions or assignments from current or potential news sources. ...
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Straits Times, Jun 1, 2011 (source)
THE Attorney-General's Chambers (AGC) on Tuesday said it disagreed with an Indonesian newspaper article on the disciplinary proceedings against Dr Susan Lim.
The Jakarta Globe column was written by Mr P.N. Balji [also a consultant to The Jakarta Post]. But it failed to mention that he acted as a public relations consultant for the surgeon accused of overcharging a royal patient from Brunei.
It said that 'a seemingly straightforward case of a private fee agreement... has thrown open serious issues of conflict of interest, prejudging by a medical tribunal against a doctor and re-writing rules midway through the disciplinary inquiry process'.
The article, headlined 'Surgeon's case casts doubts on Singapore's legal system', was published last Wednesday.
A day later, High Court judge Philip Pillai dismissed Dr Lim's application for a judicial review, in which she had argued that the Singapore Medical Council (SMC) was biased against her.
Yesterday, in response to questions from The Straits Times, the AGC said it disagreed with Mr Balji's views. 'The judgment of Justice Pillai speaks for itself and he has found that all the allegations that were made by Dr Susan Lim were of no merit,' said a spokesman.
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PN Balji's article (source)
Surgeon’s Case Casts Doubt on Singapore’s Legal System
PN Balji | May 25, 2011
Singapore. Beyond the sensational headlines and some below-the-belt tactics used by a government lawyer, the Singapore High Court case of a history-making transplant surgeon has exposed an underside of Singapore’s squeaky clean and upright image.
Whichever way the verdict — expected on Wednesday — goes in the case against surgeon Susan Lim, a seemingly straightforward case of a private fee agreement in the city-state has thrown open serious issues of conflict of interest, prejudging by a medical tribunal against a doctor and re-writing rules midway through the disciplinary inquiry process.
The case revolves around fees charged by Lim, who in 1990 became the first doctor to perform a liver transplant in Asia, for services provided by her team of doctors and nurses treating a cancer patient from the Brunei royal family in 2007. The final bill came up to 12.1 million Singapore dollars, 3.3 million Singapore dollars of which was for third-party costs and for other doctors who helped treat the patient.
After the patient, Pangiran Damit, died in August 2007 after six months of treatment and a six-year battle with breast cancer, Brunei’s Health Ministry went to its Singapore counterpart to seek a discount. All the other bills before 2007, amounting to about 14 million Singapore dollars, had been paid without a fuss.
On receiving the request for discount from Brunei, Singapore’s director of medical services, K. Satku, filed a complaint against Lim to the Singapore Medical Council, of which he was the registrar, and sought to begin a disciplinary inquiry into “overcharging by a medical practitioner.”
At the same time, he ordered five raids on the surgeon’s clinic at Gleneagles Hospital. He also told Brunei not to pay Lim.
He thus played three roles at one time — complainant, raider and prosecutor — presenting a conflict of interest that Lim’s lawyers hammered home during a High Court hearing in March.
The case saw another twist when the three panel members of the disciplinary committee stepped down during the first day of a closed-door hearing in July 2010 following accusations that they had pre-judged the case, a first in the history of medicine in Singapore.
The inquiry was suspended, and rules were rewritten to say there was no longer an obligation on the part of the committee to inform the defendant of advice given by the legal assessor to the disciplinary committee regarding the charge.
The Attorney General’s Chambers denied in court that it was done to target Lim, but then it performed an about-face after saying the change did not apply to her case.
The order to start a second inquiry was given. In the face of those actions by a regulatory body, Lim took her case to the High Court to expose what her lawyer deemed “blatantly unlawful actions.”
In the High Court in March, details of the painstaking nature of Lim’s medical services came to light. Pengiran Damit, the queen’s sister, was presented as someone whose demands on Lim and her team were far from ordinary. She had refused to return to Singapore for treatment on one occasion, forcing Lim to set up an intensive care unit and fly it by private jet to Brunei.
Lim was required to be on 24/7 standby for six months. This extended to the time when Lim had undergone eye surgery and was recovering in a hospital bed. Pengiran Damit insisted the doctor be by her side, despite the possibility that Lim could be blinded in one eye if she moved around too much. Lim had to be transported from her own hospital bed to attend to her.
There was also an attempt by government lawyer Alvin Yeo to accuse Lim of marking up the bills of other doctors who had helped her in treating the patient. This was fiercely denied by the doctors involved, who submitted sworn affidavits refuting the accusation immediately.
Suok Kai as its deputy registrar and said he would be taking over K. Saktu’s duties. That post did not previously exist. A provision was made in the law and sanctioned in the Singapore Parliament in January 2010.
All of this has made the case embarrassing for the government, which has already come under attack for a series of missteps that turned into hot-button issues during the recent general elections.
For those in the medical profession and beyond, all eyes will be on the court today.
Goh Seng Heng, medical director of the Aesthetic Medical Partners, said: “This case is very important to all of us in the profession. It has thrown into doubt the way the medical council conducts its inquiry process.”
Another doctor said: “Very seldom do doctors take the medical tribunal to court. Dr. Lim has taken that bold step. We are all waiting to see which way the verdict will go.”
PN Balji is former deputy editor of the Straits Times.
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Article reader's online comment
PN Balji's article is a shoddy piece of work and not worthy of any journalistic merits.
Balji does not understand what is conflict of interest.
There is no conflict of interest for the Director of Medical Services (DMS) Professor Saku to initiate the displinary inquiry. He is not part of the disciplinary committee who will decide whether disciplinary action should be taken against Dr Susan Lim. He is therefore not acting as the prosecutor and the judge at the same time.
The roles of a complainant, raider and prosecutors are not conflict of interest roles and Dr Susan Lim will not be prejudiced by Prof Saku complaining, raiding and prosecuting her. He is not the judge of her guilt or otherwise.
Secondly, the fact that members of the first DC stepped down on allegation of pre-judging shows the integrity of members in avoiding allegations of bias on the outcome. There is nothing sinister or unbecoming of this fact.
Thirdly, it is factually wrong to allege that the Attorney-General's Chambers performed an about face for saying that the changes to rules did not apply to Dr Susan Lim's case. The changes did not apply because the changes were made AFTER her case had commenced at the DC level. This is entirely consistent with and supports the AGC's insistence that the changes in rules were not targeted at Dr Susan Lim.
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PN Balji's bio (source, Nov 2008)
After spending the last 20 years building two of Singapore’s most successful newspaper start-ups, veteran editor P. N. Balji is turning his attention to professional development as the Director of the new Asia Journalism Fellowship at Nanyang Technological University (NTU).
Mr Balji entered journalism in 1970 when he joined the Straits Times group in Malaysia as a cadet journalist for the Malay Mail. He moved to the group’s New Nation paper in Singapore the following year, rising steadily up the editorial ranks. From 1982 to 1988, he was deputy editor of the The Straits Times, the country’s national daily and the largest English-language paper in Southeast Asia.
However, it was his leadership of underdog titles that sealed his reputation as one of the sharpest news men in the business. He helped Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) launch The New Paper in 1988, serving as the deputy editor of the afternoon tabloid. As its editor from 1991 to 2000, he pushed its circulation up to the 100,000 mark.
In 2000, he embarked on an even riskier project. He joined MediaCorp to help the national broadcaster, enter the newspaper market. As its chief executive officer and editor in chief from 2000 to 2003, Mr Balji achieved with TODAY what no newspaper had done in a century: challenge the formidable Straits Times for a share of the daily morning market, and survive.
Mr Balji will continue his involvement with industry as a consultant to The Jakarta Post and to MediaCorp’s integrated advertising sales arm. His new and diversified portfolio of projects also includes recently becoming a grandfather.
[my note] PN Balji is also the co-host on Channel News Asia's Talking Point (a talk show) (here).
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
How much money are Singaporeans gambling away at the casinos?
According to CNBC (see below), the gross gaming revenue of the two Singapore casinos is US$5.1 billion in 2010. Projected 2011 gaming revenue range from $6.4 billion (25% rise from 2010) to an astounding $8.1 billion (60% rise from 2010).
[Resorts World Sentosa casino opened on Feb 14, 2010. Marina Bay Sands casino opened on April 27, 2010. Therefore the 2010 gaming revenue was collected in 10.5 months.]
Locals account for 60% of the gamblers. Assuming that they also account for 60% of the money lost to the casinos, then locals gambled away US$3.06 billion (=5.1bn x 60%) in 2010.
There are 2,802,269 adult residents (citizens and PR) aged 21 or older (2010 Census).
Thus, on average, each adult resident gambled away US$1090 (S$1500, at 2010 conversion rate) at the casinos in 2010.
There were 26 million visitors to the casinos in 10.5 months in 2010. (Equivalently, 81,000 visitors every day; or 56 visitors every minute, day and night.) About 60%, or 15.6 million, are locals. So, on average, each adult resident made 5.6 casino visits.
In summary, on average, each local made 5.6 casino visits and lost S$1500 in 2010.
Of course, only a fraction of Singapore residents actually gambled at the casinos. Therefore an average local gambler lost much more than $1500 at the casinos.
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[ps. A 2008 Survey on Gambling Participation Among Singapore Residents (conducted by the government, here) shows that 54% of Singapore residents aged 18 and above gambled.
Let's assume that besides these 54%, another 11% of adult residents also gambled at the casinos, out of curiosity, in 2010. Therefore 65% (nearly 2 in 3) of adult Singapore residents (1,821,500) accounted for the casino visits and gaming revenues stated earlier.
Thus, each local gambler, on average, made 8.6 casino visits, and lost US$1680 (S$2350, or $225 a month, for 10.5 months) in 2010.]
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[pps. Further data (here) suggest that only 26% (and not 65%, as I guessed above) of the 2.8 million adult local residents gambled at the casinos.
Consequently, on average, each local gambler made 21.7 casino visits and lost US$4250 (S$6000, or S$570 a month, for 10.5 months) in 2010.]
*******************************************
The answer to the related question of how much Singapore gamblers lose annually to Singapore Pools and Singapore Turf Club, i.e. to the government, is not made public (see here).
[Resorts World Sentosa casino opened on Feb 14, 2010. Marina Bay Sands casino opened on April 27, 2010. Therefore the 2010 gaming revenue was collected in 10.5 months.]
Locals account for 60% of the gamblers. Assuming that they also account for 60% of the money lost to the casinos, then locals gambled away US$3.06 billion (=5.1bn x 60%) in 2010.
There are 2,802,269 adult residents (citizens and PR) aged 21 or older (2010 Census).
Thus, on average, each adult resident gambled away US$1090 (S$1500, at 2010 conversion rate) at the casinos in 2010.
There were 26 million visitors to the casinos in 10.5 months in 2010. (Equivalently, 81,000 visitors every day; or 56 visitors every minute, day and night.) About 60%, or 15.6 million, are locals. So, on average, each adult resident made 5.6 casino visits.
In summary, on average, each local made 5.6 casino visits and lost S$1500 in 2010.
Of course, only a fraction of Singapore residents actually gambled at the casinos. Therefore an average local gambler lost much more than $1500 at the casinos.
***********************************
[ps. A 2008 Survey on Gambling Participation Among Singapore Residents (conducted by the government, here) shows that 54% of Singapore residents aged 18 and above gambled.
Let's assume that besides these 54%, another 11% of adult residents also gambled at the casinos, out of curiosity, in 2010. Therefore 65% (nearly 2 in 3) of adult Singapore residents (1,821,500) accounted for the casino visits and gaming revenues stated earlier.
Thus, each local gambler, on average, made 8.6 casino visits, and lost US$1680 (S$2350, or $225 a month, for 10.5 months) in 2010.]
*************************************
[pps. Further data (here) suggest that only 26% (and not 65%, as I guessed above) of the 2.8 million adult local residents gambled at the casinos.
Consequently, on average, each local gambler made 21.7 casino visits and lost US$4250 (S$6000, or S$570 a month, for 10.5 months) in 2010.]
*******************************************
The answer to the related question of how much Singapore gamblers lose annually to Singapore Pools and Singapore Turf Club, i.e. to the government, is not made public (see here).
Singapore On Track to Overtake Vegas as Second-Largest Gaming Center
CNBC, May 7, 2011 (source)
(extract)
Twelve months into business and Singapore’s first two casino resorts Marina Bay Sands and Resorts World Sentosa have already won the jackpot for the island country. The two generated gross gaming revenue of $5.1 billion dollars in 2010.
This year Royal Bank of Scotland forecasts revenue is set to rise by 25 percent to $6.4 billion, placing Singapore on track to overtake the Las Vegas Strip, which is forecast to earn $6.2 billion. That would make the island nation, the world's second biggest gaming center behind Macau.
Analysts say the voracious appetite for gambling among Asians and their growing wealth will drive momentum in Singapore's casino sector for years to come. This is a stark contrast from the Strip, which has seen a slump in revenues for four consecutive months.
The 2,561-room luxury hotel Marina Bay Sands, which has a 200-meter-tall, boat-shaped SkyPark and a lavish casino equipped with 500 gaming tables, attracted more than 11 million visitors over the past year — 885,000 guests walked through its doors over just four days of the Chinese New Year holiday in February.
Marina Bay Sands reported net revenue of $560 million in the three months to December, $457 million (82%) of this amount was generated by the casino alone. “Our recent financial results show that Marina Bay Sands is on track on all fronts, even surpassing our original expectations,” commented Mr. Leven, President and COO of parent company Las Vegas Sands.
The success of the casino tycoon Sheldon Adelson’s Singapore venture has helped put Las Vegas Sands back on track after a bankruptcy scare three years ago.
Its rival, Resorts World Sentosa, has seen measurable success welcoming 15 million visitors last year. The family focused casino-resort generated revenue of $623 million in the fourth quarter, over 80 percent came from gaming alone.
While the success of Resorts World Sentosa has been positive for Malaysian-based parent company Genting Group, it has stolen the limelight from the corporation’s own Resorts World Genting, located outside Kuala Lumpur, which was one of the first casinos to open in the Southeast Asian market. Resorts World Genting saw a notable fall in foreign visitors last year, causing its net profit to decline by 3.6 percent in 2010.
Gaming analyst Jonathan Galaviz of Galaviz & Company believes that Singapore’s reputation as a safe and corruption-free global city has been key in boosting its competitive advantage in Asia’s casino industry.
The blazing performance of the Marina Bay Sands and Resorts World Sentosa is also in large part due to the patronage of local Singaporeans, who made up about 60 percent of the casino customers last year, despite a S$100 ($79) entrance fee imposed by the government to act as a deterrent. “I don’t mind the $100 fee because I just go in and win it back,” says 24-year old Singaporean civil servant who frequents the casino once or twice a week.
****************
However, both Fischer and Hung believe that junkets will eventually get licensed given the very significant business opportunity. “We estimate Singapore gaming revenues of $8.1 billion next year — we see up to 50 percent upside to these estimates should a number of high quality junkets operate in Singapore,” Fischer concluded.
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The Marina Bay Sands reported earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation of $284.5 million for the three months ended March 2011, down from $391.3 million in the September-December 2010 period. (source)
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The Marina Bay Sands reported earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation of $284.5 million for the three months ended March 2011, down from $391.3 million in the September-December 2010 period. (source)
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Joan Hon, daughter of Hon Sui Sen, on LKY
First note (source)
A reply to Catherine Lim's blog post (here), "The GE 2011 Political Demise of Lee Kuan Yew: A Supreme Irony"
by Joan Fong (a.k.a. Joan Hon)
May 18th, 2011 at 3:56 pm
Dear Catherine,
I read your commentary with some exasperation. It seems as if you have to make a wonderfully accurate commentary on all that is going on politically and go down in history for your sharp wit and perception. And to talk in terms of “downfall” with such relish so many times just got my goat.
He happens to be someone I know. In the past I have been with him a few times, not often, enough to be able to read his mind and make a comment that hit the nail on the head as to what he was pondering.
Take this as a woman’s instinct. The instinct of a woman who happens to like men, as part of the human race, as friends, and who feels for their welfare. And who care to makes them cushioned against things that are hurtful, especially to their ego.
Before his wife died and we visited for Chinese New Year, 2010, He let us (me and my sister) in to view his wife, someone who had always been on easy terms with me. I put my hand on her shoulder as she lay immobile and prayed over her.
He waited until I had finished, and then pointed to the wall behind me. “She chose this herself,” he said. I saw a large framed picture of the Virgin carrying the Child Jesus. And was astounded. She had in the past brought back a glass bust of the Virgin for my mother.
We went back to the dining table and indulged in some juicy gossip, none of it political. My nephew gave him this thing like a hamburger that his firm was selling, to show him something invented and made in Singapore.
In CNY 2011, he went down to our car to talk to my mother because she could not climb stairs anymore. She had been brought by us, her four daughters, to the wake at the Istana of a good friend without our telling her what it was all about, and she burst into tears when she realised what had happened. Loong and Yang were concerned and didn’t know how to placate her. Their father was not around. So, it was at this Chinese New Year visit, 2011, that she got to meet him.
She asked how Ling-Ling was, and she was called out from her computer to talk to her too.
He asked if she still went to Mass every day. She is now 94. We said yes for her as she is stone deaf. How does she go? he wanted to know. I said, “Oh, by taxi, with the maid.” My sister said to me later, “Idiot! We all go daily Mass and we take her there, and it is only on days she didn’t follow us in the morning that she takes a taxi.” It doesn’t matter. When you are growing old, details are immaterial.
I had just lost my husband to cancer half a year before that. He had just lost his wife. One can guess how he feels now at the vacuum in his life. I can also guess, most of his fire and confidence stemmed from her lively presence in his life.
She would say funny things to me like, “Look at me. If he didn’t marry me, nobody else would have!” and she actually doubled up in laughter. She used to shove yogurt into my mouth saying it is good for me. I hated yogurt and she never dug this truth out of me but fed me a second spoonful. She asked if I remember which room I used to stay in, in Oxley Road. I pointed to one of the middle rooms – that one!
When I bought a house, she was my lawyer, and said to me how stupid we were long ago, not to have bought our properties. “In those days, if we didn’t have the money, we just didn’t go and buy one. We didn’t want to borrow money, not even from the banks.”
When Loong lost his first wife, he was disconsolate. His father wished he had a religion or a God to carry him through this, my father said. I wrote him a long soulful letter on how we are all contingent beings, not responsible for our own existence on earth and who are journeying in this life with us. I said, if he didn’t believe in God, well, I did and will pray for him. God will compensate him for this tragedy.
His father told my father that I had a good heart, like my mother. That little remark meant that Loong must have snapped out of his mood.
In life, it is people that matter and not things. Things can go hang but it is the people who matter. If they are sad you lift them up. If they fall, one does not shout to all their lowly stance and describe their wounds with accuracy.
I am trying to say they are as human as you and me. And I have not spoken about our friendship with them, in case we give the idea we like to hobnob with the great. If now he has no power over the masses anymore, I would step forward and offer my support. I would do anything to boost his morale.
I sense now he is tired of everything, without his wife, even politics. It is time to step back. Will he be out of the picture completely? No, his opinion will still be sought and he will give it for what it is worth.
There are worse things in life he had suffered without having to worry about one GRC ward being lost. And if Loong can act as he thinks, and can promise to aim to corrent deficiencies, and thus swing votes for himself, he is doing all right. Time to put himself out to pasture. I don’t think he feels much sorrow leaving the picture.
Well, I might be wrong. It is my two cents worth. Now I too will return to the shadows. I have a late husband to muse over. And I wish you all the best and hope you are happy.
Joan
********************************************
Second note (source)
Somebody sent this to me, and I realised, my personal comment to Catherine, and nobody else, is being sent around and commented on.
Okay, what I was saying to Catherine is simply, LKY is a family friend and I gave her some insights into our interactions with him to say he is a human being with feelings. No matter what he has done, you don't hit a man when he is down, even if verbally.
It is not a humane thing to do. If you think MM was vicious towards other people, there is no need to be like him then, and be vicious to him. Just go through the letters that are in this site and you will see the degree of viciousness in the comments, which are not justified.
You want to talk about the Marxist conspirators? My nephew's wife was arrested. I was suffering along with him throughout the whole business. At the time I didn't know if there was or was no conspiracy and when in the end, it turned out these people were innocent, it was all-in-all a very regrettable thing.
Those who object are not old enough to see Communism coming down to the top of the Malay peninsula, according to what is called the Domino theory. This was something I was personally fearful about, to the point of wanting to emigrate. So, MM and the government are equally fearful, and hence the heavy handedness of their using the ISA to investigate things.
I was laughing at all the comments made. How you can condemn people without knowing what is true and what isn't.
For the record, my family of mother and three sisters and myself have been opposing government policies even before my father went into politics. It took MM 10 years to persuade him to stand for election. Articles always called him the reluctant politician.
Ok. I didn't like anything against human rights. And morality. I didn't like the way they told people to have two children only. And I can demarcate between actions that you can blame on the government and those you have to blame on the people who execute the policies. It was the nurses who scolded women who were having their third child in KK Hospital that I found distasteful.
And then Catholic schools lost the right of admitting who they wanted to admit. If you have three or more children you lose your right of admission.
If you have to blame the government for anything, look at the policy, look at those who put forth the policy and then look at the people on the ground carrying this out, and then decide who you really want to hate.
Next, if you were Singaporean and married a foreigner of low education, your spouse was barred from living in Singapore. Something I found stupid, inhumane and distasteful.
Next was the abortion policy. This was the thing I could not stand, wrote umpteen letters to the press and none were printed.
So after my Dad had passed away and I could not then disgrace him with my doings, I wrote an Open Letter to the PM (at that time LKY) with a copy of the video Silent Scream, and a picture of babies all bloody and mangled in buckets. I sent a copy of these to all MP's.
My argument, I told PM, was not based on religion. It was from pure humane considerations. It was also from common morality. Why should it be a crime if the baby is born and you kill it, but it is lawful before it is born?
I told him of a remark overheard in a shopping mall: "Have a good time man! Just give her five dollars!" I swung round to see who said that and it was a boy talking to her friends, all of whom looked around 13 years old. This is what abortion is doing to their morals. It is just Casanova's charter. More girls can be taken advantage of without the boy being at risk of being held responsible.
People get confused. Is this right or wrong, morally -- to kill a baby in the womb? Why are we doing it if it is wrong? As usual we imitate the West slavishly. Roe vs Wade in America. The decision that unlocked the flood of abortions we have now.
The next consideration I told PM, was that we need manpower. The reduction of births will only lead to economic consequences that are bad for the nation. Now, see the 1.2 fertility rate? I rest my case.
It is too late for me to add this to that letter, but I can't help adding this point now. Why are we giving parents something like $20,000 for every child they bear, plus maternity benefits, but we are still aborting babies. Isn't it time to rethink the policy?
For the record, my Dad, Hon Sui Sen, was the first President or CEO(Chairman?) of DBS. His salary was a princely chiak-buay-leow amount of $10,000 per month. At that time, Goh Keng Swee was a very sick man and my Dad did most of his work. This is the Civil Service. The boss gets the credit. So, LKY persuaded him to stand for election, something he had no interest in and would prefer to die than to do it. He had a fear of public speaking. But he agreed.
His pay fell to $3,000 per month. All the other Ministers also earned $3,000 per month. PM earned a little more -- $3,500 per month. This was when he went on record in the press saying he was a kept man! The year was 1970. By 1983, when he had a heart attack and died, my Dad earned $14,000 per month. I read in the papers that Malaysian Ministers earned $18,000 per month. The ringgit was not far off our Singapore dollar. Don't forget we were kicked out and had nothing in those days to make our dollar worth much.
Next thing that riled me - those casinos. All religious heads are dealing in their respective religions with the terrible problems of addictive gambling. All these head begged not to have casinos. I'm sure those in Parliament had a ding-dong verbal battle over it too. I'm sure, reading MM's mind again, he would rather NOT have them. His own father was ruined by gambling, he said.
So why are we having the casinos now? To get jobs for 35,000 people. I can bet you the gambling addiction will in future send more than 35,000 people to ruin. Counting bankrupt addicts and their family members. And this number will grow and grow with time, but the 35,000 jobs will stagnate. To help these people find jobs you ruin a larger number of people.
I read Lily Neo's speech in Parliament and was filled with rage at the thought -- there are the poor people and there are the high salaries of the rich. I am not one of these rich. Retired without pension. Coupled by the fact that an old retainer of ours (meaning someone who had worked for us at home for his whole life) was sick together with his wife. Two people who would be bankrupted by it. We contributed a five-figure sum to help out.
The PAP are right in recognising that it is not the poor fighting for themselves now. The middle class and rich can recognise how terrible is their plight and where injustice lies and are putting their money where their mouth is. There are MPs who give their MP earnings to the poor. I hear Lily Neo is one of them.
I hate to report that I have been shooting my mouth off to PAP MPs who came calling. "You just wait. You won't know what has hit you when the results are out!" I let loose about arrogance, over earnings, my Dad and his poor pay. When MM said something about this generation having forgotten about the Old Guard and what they did, I wanted to say, the Old Guard didn't pay themselves fabulous sums of money, and they didn't start casinos, or let Mas Selamat escape or foul up the roads with traffic.
But they started abortion. And we gave it to my Dad at meal-times and my mother said he had better leave the PAP, and the poor man kept quiet and never let on his own stand on the matter. Look, if I can let MM know my mind regarding abortion {he replied saying he wanted people to have their choice, but lowered the permitted period for abortion from 6 to 3 months} do you think I want to make a show of knowing him well or his family?
What I am able to do is -- disagree with him, tell him so, but in nice terms. I don't have to hate him or the PAP. Right now I feel we have won our right to speak our minds without having to bear grudges and hate anybody at all. Or be rude to them when you do not agree.
One thing Singaporeans have not really fully cultivated yet is being magnanimous. I count myself guilty too sometimes. How to disagree without being disagreeable? It simply makes a bad show of ourselves and after that nobody will listen to us.
Joan Hon
A reply to Catherine Lim's blog post (here), "The GE 2011 Political Demise of Lee Kuan Yew: A Supreme Irony"
by Joan Fong (a.k.a. Joan Hon)
May 18th, 2011 at 3:56 pm
Dear Catherine,
I read your commentary with some exasperation. It seems as if you have to make a wonderfully accurate commentary on all that is going on politically and go down in history for your sharp wit and perception. And to talk in terms of “downfall” with such relish so many times just got my goat.
He happens to be someone I know. In the past I have been with him a few times, not often, enough to be able to read his mind and make a comment that hit the nail on the head as to what he was pondering.
Take this as a woman’s instinct. The instinct of a woman who happens to like men, as part of the human race, as friends, and who feels for their welfare. And who care to makes them cushioned against things that are hurtful, especially to their ego.
Before his wife died and we visited for Chinese New Year, 2010, He let us (me and my sister) in to view his wife, someone who had always been on easy terms with me. I put my hand on her shoulder as she lay immobile and prayed over her.
He waited until I had finished, and then pointed to the wall behind me. “She chose this herself,” he said. I saw a large framed picture of the Virgin carrying the Child Jesus. And was astounded. She had in the past brought back a glass bust of the Virgin for my mother.
We went back to the dining table and indulged in some juicy gossip, none of it political. My nephew gave him this thing like a hamburger that his firm was selling, to show him something invented and made in Singapore.
In CNY 2011, he went down to our car to talk to my mother because she could not climb stairs anymore. She had been brought by us, her four daughters, to the wake at the Istana of a good friend without our telling her what it was all about, and she burst into tears when she realised what had happened. Loong and Yang were concerned and didn’t know how to placate her. Their father was not around. So, it was at this Chinese New Year visit, 2011, that she got to meet him.
She asked how Ling-Ling was, and she was called out from her computer to talk to her too.
He asked if she still went to Mass every day. She is now 94. We said yes for her as she is stone deaf. How does she go? he wanted to know. I said, “Oh, by taxi, with the maid.” My sister said to me later, “Idiot! We all go daily Mass and we take her there, and it is only on days she didn’t follow us in the morning that she takes a taxi.” It doesn’t matter. When you are growing old, details are immaterial.
I had just lost my husband to cancer half a year before that. He had just lost his wife. One can guess how he feels now at the vacuum in his life. I can also guess, most of his fire and confidence stemmed from her lively presence in his life.
She would say funny things to me like, “Look at me. If he didn’t marry me, nobody else would have!” and she actually doubled up in laughter. She used to shove yogurt into my mouth saying it is good for me. I hated yogurt and she never dug this truth out of me but fed me a second spoonful. She asked if I remember which room I used to stay in, in Oxley Road. I pointed to one of the middle rooms – that one!
When I bought a house, she was my lawyer, and said to me how stupid we were long ago, not to have bought our properties. “In those days, if we didn’t have the money, we just didn’t go and buy one. We didn’t want to borrow money, not even from the banks.”
When Loong lost his first wife, he was disconsolate. His father wished he had a religion or a God to carry him through this, my father said. I wrote him a long soulful letter on how we are all contingent beings, not responsible for our own existence on earth and who are journeying in this life with us. I said, if he didn’t believe in God, well, I did and will pray for him. God will compensate him for this tragedy.
His father told my father that I had a good heart, like my mother. That little remark meant that Loong must have snapped out of his mood.
In life, it is people that matter and not things. Things can go hang but it is the people who matter. If they are sad you lift them up. If they fall, one does not shout to all their lowly stance and describe their wounds with accuracy.
I am trying to say they are as human as you and me. And I have not spoken about our friendship with them, in case we give the idea we like to hobnob with the great. If now he has no power over the masses anymore, I would step forward and offer my support. I would do anything to boost his morale.
I sense now he is tired of everything, without his wife, even politics. It is time to step back. Will he be out of the picture completely? No, his opinion will still be sought and he will give it for what it is worth.
There are worse things in life he had suffered without having to worry about one GRC ward being lost. And if Loong can act as he thinks, and can promise to aim to corrent deficiencies, and thus swing votes for himself, he is doing all right. Time to put himself out to pasture. I don’t think he feels much sorrow leaving the picture.
Well, I might be wrong. It is my two cents worth. Now I too will return to the shadows. I have a late husband to muse over. And I wish you all the best and hope you are happy.
Joan
********************************************
Second note (source)
Somebody sent this to me, and I realised, my personal comment to Catherine, and nobody else, is being sent around and commented on.
Okay, what I was saying to Catherine is simply, LKY is a family friend and I gave her some insights into our interactions with him to say he is a human being with feelings. No matter what he has done, you don't hit a man when he is down, even if verbally.
It is not a humane thing to do. If you think MM was vicious towards other people, there is no need to be like him then, and be vicious to him. Just go through the letters that are in this site and you will see the degree of viciousness in the comments, which are not justified.
You want to talk about the Marxist conspirators? My nephew's wife was arrested. I was suffering along with him throughout the whole business. At the time I didn't know if there was or was no conspiracy and when in the end, it turned out these people were innocent, it was all-in-all a very regrettable thing.
Those who object are not old enough to see Communism coming down to the top of the Malay peninsula, according to what is called the Domino theory. This was something I was personally fearful about, to the point of wanting to emigrate. So, MM and the government are equally fearful, and hence the heavy handedness of their using the ISA to investigate things.
I was laughing at all the comments made. How you can condemn people without knowing what is true and what isn't.
For the record, my family of mother and three sisters and myself have been opposing government policies even before my father went into politics. It took MM 10 years to persuade him to stand for election. Articles always called him the reluctant politician.
Ok. I didn't like anything against human rights. And morality. I didn't like the way they told people to have two children only. And I can demarcate between actions that you can blame on the government and those you have to blame on the people who execute the policies. It was the nurses who scolded women who were having their third child in KK Hospital that I found distasteful.
And then Catholic schools lost the right of admitting who they wanted to admit. If you have three or more children you lose your right of admission.
If you have to blame the government for anything, look at the policy, look at those who put forth the policy and then look at the people on the ground carrying this out, and then decide who you really want to hate.
Next, if you were Singaporean and married a foreigner of low education, your spouse was barred from living in Singapore. Something I found stupid, inhumane and distasteful.
Next was the abortion policy. This was the thing I could not stand, wrote umpteen letters to the press and none were printed.
So after my Dad had passed away and I could not then disgrace him with my doings, I wrote an Open Letter to the PM (at that time LKY) with a copy of the video Silent Scream, and a picture of babies all bloody and mangled in buckets. I sent a copy of these to all MP's.
My argument, I told PM, was not based on religion. It was from pure humane considerations. It was also from common morality. Why should it be a crime if the baby is born and you kill it, but it is lawful before it is born?
I told him of a remark overheard in a shopping mall: "Have a good time man! Just give her five dollars!" I swung round to see who said that and it was a boy talking to her friends, all of whom looked around 13 years old. This is what abortion is doing to their morals. It is just Casanova's charter. More girls can be taken advantage of without the boy being at risk of being held responsible.
People get confused. Is this right or wrong, morally -- to kill a baby in the womb? Why are we doing it if it is wrong? As usual we imitate the West slavishly. Roe vs Wade in America. The decision that unlocked the flood of abortions we have now.
The next consideration I told PM, was that we need manpower. The reduction of births will only lead to economic consequences that are bad for the nation. Now, see the 1.2 fertility rate? I rest my case.
It is too late for me to add this to that letter, but I can't help adding this point now. Why are we giving parents something like $20,000 for every child they bear, plus maternity benefits, but we are still aborting babies. Isn't it time to rethink the policy?
For the record, my Dad, Hon Sui Sen, was the first President or CEO(Chairman?) of DBS. His salary was a princely chiak-buay-leow amount of $10,000 per month. At that time, Goh Keng Swee was a very sick man and my Dad did most of his work. This is the Civil Service. The boss gets the credit. So, LKY persuaded him to stand for election, something he had no interest in and would prefer to die than to do it. He had a fear of public speaking. But he agreed.
His pay fell to $3,000 per month. All the other Ministers also earned $3,000 per month. PM earned a little more -- $3,500 per month. This was when he went on record in the press saying he was a kept man! The year was 1970. By 1983, when he had a heart attack and died, my Dad earned $14,000 per month. I read in the papers that Malaysian Ministers earned $18,000 per month. The ringgit was not far off our Singapore dollar. Don't forget we were kicked out and had nothing in those days to make our dollar worth much.
Next thing that riled me - those casinos. All religious heads are dealing in their respective religions with the terrible problems of addictive gambling. All these head begged not to have casinos. I'm sure those in Parliament had a ding-dong verbal battle over it too. I'm sure, reading MM's mind again, he would rather NOT have them. His own father was ruined by gambling, he said.
So why are we having the casinos now? To get jobs for 35,000 people. I can bet you the gambling addiction will in future send more than 35,000 people to ruin. Counting bankrupt addicts and their family members. And this number will grow and grow with time, but the 35,000 jobs will stagnate. To help these people find jobs you ruin a larger number of people.
I read Lily Neo's speech in Parliament and was filled with rage at the thought -- there are the poor people and there are the high salaries of the rich. I am not one of these rich. Retired without pension. Coupled by the fact that an old retainer of ours (meaning someone who had worked for us at home for his whole life) was sick together with his wife. Two people who would be bankrupted by it. We contributed a five-figure sum to help out.
The PAP are right in recognising that it is not the poor fighting for themselves now. The middle class and rich can recognise how terrible is their plight and where injustice lies and are putting their money where their mouth is. There are MPs who give their MP earnings to the poor. I hear Lily Neo is one of them.
I hate to report that I have been shooting my mouth off to PAP MPs who came calling. "You just wait. You won't know what has hit you when the results are out!" I let loose about arrogance, over earnings, my Dad and his poor pay. When MM said something about this generation having forgotten about the Old Guard and what they did, I wanted to say, the Old Guard didn't pay themselves fabulous sums of money, and they didn't start casinos, or let Mas Selamat escape or foul up the roads with traffic.
But they started abortion. And we gave it to my Dad at meal-times and my mother said he had better leave the PAP, and the poor man kept quiet and never let on his own stand on the matter. Look, if I can let MM know my mind regarding abortion {he replied saying he wanted people to have their choice, but lowered the permitted period for abortion from 6 to 3 months} do you think I want to make a show of knowing him well or his family?
What I am able to do is -- disagree with him, tell him so, but in nice terms. I don't have to hate him or the PAP. Right now I feel we have won our right to speak our minds without having to bear grudges and hate anybody at all. Or be rude to them when you do not agree.
One thing Singaporeans have not really fully cultivated yet is being magnanimous. I count myself guilty too sometimes. How to disagree without being disagreeable? It simply makes a bad show of ourselves and after that nobody will listen to us.
Joan Hon
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