Category: Singapore

My interview on Yahoo! Fit to Post

This is a video interview I had with Yahoo! Singapore on their news feature Fit to Post, published on 14 and 16 July 2010. I shared about why I joined the Workers’ Party and what I think the key issues affecting Singaporeans are.

This is a video interview I had with Yahoo! Singapore on their news feature Fit to Post, published on 14 and 16 July 2010. I shared about why I joined the Workers’ Party and what I think the key issues affecting Singaporeans are. The write-ups can be found here and here.

Sylvia Lim grills Home Affairs, Environment Ministers

Workers’ Party chairman Sylvia Lim asked several questions in Parliament yesterday, two of which touched on issues which have hit a raw nerve of many Singaporeans, namely the frequent flooding across Singapore and the security lapse at the MRT depot.

Sylvia LimWorkers’ Party chairman Sylvia Lim asked several questions in Parliament yesterday, two of which touched on issues which have hit a raw nerve of many Singaporeans, namely the frequent flooding across Singapore and the security lapse at the MRT depot.

Ms Lim posed a question to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Home Affairs about what role the Government plays in ensuring that security on public transport is not compromised. In response, Second Minister for Home Affairs K Shanmugam claimed that the role of the police is to only provide an ‘additional’ layer of security, when needed. He said that the primary responsibility for the day-to-day operational security of depots, stations and vehicles is that of transport operators SMRT and SBS Transit. Implicit in his statement was that his ministry is clearly not to be held accountable for the recent security breach at the MRT depot in Changi.

Ms Lim also asked the Environment and Water Resources Minister to clarify the ‘confusing statements’ in the media about the role of the barrage in the floods. The Minister said that because the barrage receives water from a large 10,000 ha network of canals and drains, areas located more centrally or further north could still be vulnerable to floods if the drains there do not have the capacity to contain water during an intense downpour.

Opposition wards achieve more with less

The Straits Times carried a commentary by one of its journalists today criticizing the Government’s handling of the Town Council Management Report (TCMR). The journalist gave the Government “at best an E -” grade for “effort”. In other words, the Government failed miserably. (In the ‘O’ levels, a ‘D’ is already a failing grade.)

My 13 June blog post, Underwhelmed by town council report, was quoted in the ST article:

Workers’ Party member Gerald Giam wrote on his blog: ‘Why does the MND suddenly feel the urge to tell residents what they should think of their town councils, and by extension, their MPs?

‘Residents are personally affected by their town council’s performance. If they feel that their MPs are not performing, they would have voted them out long ago.’

— “Perception of bias dents report’s credibility”, Straits Times, 3 July 2010.

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“You may wish to get involved in…political organizations”

It is my hope that despite the practical restrictions, with better access to alternative political ideas through the Internet, more of our undergrads will have their political awakenings while on campus, just like I did 13 years ago while studying at USC.

As I was doing some house cleaning this afternoon in preparation for the delivery of my books tomorrow, I chanced upon one of my university admission letters dated 14 March 1994. It was from one of the universities in California which I didn’t end up enrolling in. What struck me, which I had never noticed before, was this paragraph:

“From your first week on campus, you will also have the opportunity to apply your talents in areas outside the classroom. You may wish to get involved in student government, service and political organizations, academic clubs, support groups and more.”

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Where have all the engineers gone?

Have we gotten to a point where our employers and the government don’t even bother recruiting local engineers and immediately recruit from overseas? Will this not create vicious cycle whereby bright Singaporean students avoid studying engineering in university because they know that once they graduate they will have to compete with an onslaught of cheaper foreign engineers? Can we really build up and sustain a knowledge based economy without a core of local scientists and engineers driving it?

A reader forwarded me this press release from Contact Singapore, announcing that Economic Development Board and the Ministry of Manpower are hiring 250 China engineers this Saturday in Shanghai. Here’s the catch: If don’t read Chinese, too bad for you–the press release is written only in Chinese with no English translation. It is quite obvious that the ad is targeted only at China engineers, and not at Singaporeans.

My reader wondered why priority was not given to Singaporeans. I think it is a valid question to ask. Can EDB and MOM confirm that no effort was spared in recruiting locally before going to China to recruit?

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A “learning experience” for weak leaders

Is this what we pay our Ministers millions of dollars a year to do? To deflect responsibility to their subordinates when things go wrong, but bask in the limelight and taking credit for the hard work those same civil servants put in on other occasions?

To say that the past week has not been a good one for the PAP government is a gross under statement. First, was the continuation of the saga involving the break-in to the government-owned MRT train depot in Changi. Then the release of the Town Council Management Report (TCMR) provoked a much stronger than expected reaction from opposition MPs which they could not satisfactorily respond to. Finally, the most appalling was the massive flood in Orchard Road and Bukit Timah after just a few hours of rainfall, that caused millions of dollars in damages.

Although the three incidents are not connected, there seems to be a common thread running through all of them. In all of them, Singaporeans neither saw nor heard from the Cabinet ministers in charge for days on end.

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High-level Ministry departures a sign of impending election?

Perhaps one of the clearest signs that an election is looming, apart from the release of the Electoral Boundaries Report, are the sudden resignations of senior civil servants. This week, we saw one such resignation. After a game of musical chairs at the Ministry of National Development (MND) and its agencies, URA and HDB, it has emerged that BG Tay Lim Heng, deputy secretary at MND, has “left to pursue other interests”.

Singaporeans are quite well-versed at keeping an eye out for the political rituals that the PAP government embarks on in the lead up to elections. This time round, the PAP is hardly even making an attempt to conceal its intentions: Glowing press reports about a Minister returning to work after his MC, positive reports about PAP town councils (especially those helmed by PM, SM and MM), negative reports on the opposition, sharp rebuttals of opposition MPs’ remarks, training of civil servants to be election officials, etc.

But perhaps one of the clearest signs that an election is looming, apart from the release of the Gerrymandering Report Electoral Boundaries Report, are the sudden resignations of senior civil servants. This week, we saw one such resignation. After a game of musical chairs at the Ministry of National Development (MND) and its agencies, URA and HDB, it has emerged that BG Tay Lim Heng, deputy secretary at MND, has “left to pursue other interests”. It was later reported that BG Tay has been appointed deputy CEO of Keppel Integrated Engineering (KIE), a subsidiary of government-linked Keppel Corporation.

Now I’ve never heard of KIE before, perhaps due to my ignorance of the local corporate scene. But it strikes me as rather odd that a guy with a likely CEP (currently estimated potential) of permanent secretary of a Ministry would quit to be a No. 2 guy in a lesser known company.

This pattern played out the same way in the lead up to the 6 May 2006 General Election. On 11 April that year, RAdm Lui Tuck Yew resigned from his post as CEO of HDB after just 10 months on the job. On 2 April 2006, Lee Yi Shyan resigned as CEO of IE Singapore. Both were fielded as PAP candidates and promptly appointed as junior ministers after the GE.

The PAP always accuses the opposition of showing up just before elections, but they overlook the fact that many of their new candidates have barely started climbing down from their ivory towers when they are fielded as candidates under the wings of powerful Cabinet ministers in a GRC (Group Representation Constituency). Although the Singapore Civil Service is supposed to be politically neutral, the PAP unabashedly uses the Civil Service as a harvest field for its political candidates, and doesn’t even bother portraying a semblance of separation of the two. For example, Lee Yi Shyan’s candidate write-up for GE 2006 started with the sentence, “Mr Lee Yi Shyan is currently the Chief Executive Officer of International Enterprise Singapore” (emphasis mine).

Mr Lee Yi Shyan is currently the Chief Executive O

So keep a watch out for further movements in the Ministries and statutory boards. They could provide a peek into whom our next millionaire ministers may be.

‘Underwhelmed’ by Town Council report

Residents are personally affected by their Town Councils’ performance. If they feel that their MPs are not performing, they would have voted them out long ago. But the two opposition MPs have been returned to office again and again for the last 18 to 25 years–longer than any other PAP MPs save one. Why does MND suddenly feel the urge to tell residents what they should think of their TCs?

It is hard to contain one’s scepticism when reading the news about the Town Council Management Report (TCMR).

The Straits Times reported on Friday:

The two best performers are Ang Mo Kio-Yio Chu Kang led by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, and Tanjong Pagar headed by Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew, according to the government’s Town Council Management Report.

The two worst performers are run by the opposition: Hougang, by the Workers’ Party’s Low Thia Khiang, and Potong Pasir by the Singapore People’s Party’s Chiam See Tong.

Isn’t it interesting that the two Town Councils (TCs) that “top” the report are the ones “headed” by the PM Lee and MM Lee, and the two “worst performers” are those headed by opposition MPs? (Technically the two Lees do not head their Town Councils. They have delegated that less glamorous job to their backbencher MPs.)

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MINDEF’s culture of secrecy

While obviously I do not expect MINDEF to be open and transparent about its military strategy, doctrine and operational plans, I don’t see why they cannot be upfront about training accidents or incidents where soldiers are seriously injured. It’s bad enough that they took two months to report the first incident, but why couldn’t they report the second incident without being asked?

A letter to the Straits Times today as well as a post by Mr Wang reflect the indignation which I feel too, regarding the Ministry of Defence’s culture of secrecy revealed in the reports about the shootings of two servicemen during a military exercise in Thailand.

On 25 May, the Straits Times reported that commando 1SG Woo Teng Hai suffered head injuries after being shot with a shotgun by a Thai villager. The incident took place on 13 March–more than two months ago. A day later, the paper reported that in fact another serviceman had been shot, this time a full-time national serviceman, PTE J. Pritheery Raj. The news of this second incident would not have occurred if not for a relative of PTE Raj calling the paper after reading the first report. The paper noted that MINDEF “admitted yesterday that another soldier had also been hurt in the same incident”.
Mindef’s failure to admit that not one, but two Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) soldiers were shot in Thailand, until a relative of the second injured soldier approached The Straits Times, has demonstrated the ministry’s basic reluctance to tell the public the truth about military casualties.
The second case also was a matter of genuine public interest, especially since a full-time national serviceman was involved.
As citizen soldiers and taxpayers, we have a right to expect that Mindef will account for all military casualties – whether in training or actual operations -where there are no national security implications.

On 25 May, the Straits Times reported that commando 1SG Woo Teng Hai suffered head injuries and lost sight in one eye after being shot with a shotgun by a Thai villager. The incident took place on 13 March–more than two months ago. A day later, the paper reported that in fact another serviceman had also been shot, this time a full-time national serviceman, PTE J. Pritheery Raj. The news of this second incident would not have surfaced if not for a relative of PTE Raj calling the paper after reading the first report. The paper noted that MINDEF “admitted yesterday that another soldier had also been hurt in the same incident”. Continue reading “MINDEF’s culture of secrecy”