TR EMERITUS

Shinzo Abe The sudden resignation of the Japanese Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, has set me thinking again about political succession issues back home. Mr Shinzo Abe announced today that he has resigned due to a deteriorating medical condition. That must have been a very difficult but a very brave and responsible decision that he took. Back home, lhl who is a two time cancer survivor nearly fainted on stage during his 2016 National Day Rally speech. Deputy Heng Swee Keat was a stroke victim. I ask who else do we have left if anything unfortunate were to suddenly happen to either or both of them? Life can be unpredictable so let us never say never. Tharman Shanmugaratnam has made it clear on several occasions that he is not keen to accept the Prime Minister appointment. Teo Chee Hean has been seen sleeping on a number of occasions during parliamentary sessions. What about that cotton Chan? Despite his impeccable education and his very senior military ranking, too many people have publicly expressed their lack of confidence in his leadership, including me. In the words of wise Warren Buffett, "no matter how great the talent, some things just take time. You cannot produce a baby in one month by making 9 women pregnant". Furthermore, talent is often overrated. To me, the above line quite aptly describes Chan Chun Sing. For the rest of those pap 4G leaders starting with Ong YK to Masagos and everyone else in between, I consider them to be a bunch of mere grossly overpaid mediocre politicians. Among them, I consider Josephine Teo and Gan Kim Yong as those "outstanding" ones. As far as political succession in Singapore is concerned, I hope that lhl is serious enough about it and that solid plans are in place because nobody, absolutely nobody is immortal or indispensable. The late MM had done his succession planning well . Goh Chok Tong had a long runway and he had valuable guidance of a very experienced mentor too. I don't see any of those today under that useless son. Not even half. Singapore and Singaporeans deserve predictability, safety and continuity and we should never be caught with our pants down as far as political succession is concerned. Think.   Simon Lim        Read More →

One of the most noticeable things about Singapore is the fact that it is probably the most Conveniently Racist place on the planet. All us pledge that we will be “Regardless of Race or Religion” and the government is famously strict on people who “stir up racial hatred.” It is drilled into the heads of every child in our school system that modern day Singapore is a wonderfully harmonious place unlike that place in the 1960s, where various ethnic communities were at each other’s throats. There’s even a “racial harmony” day where children are supposed to dress up in “ethnic costumes” and this is supposed to be a sign of how wonderful we are as a place because everyone gets along. Yet, at the same time, we are probably the most blatantly racist place around. The racism in Singapore is not the KKK, let’s bash up black and brown people that you get in the Western World. It’s the more subtle type, and in some ways its worse than the Western variety in the sense that it’s become acceptable and even sanctioned. Think about it as simply as “You’re not getting the job because you’re the wrong color,” type of racism. What makes this type of racism so obnoxious is the fact that its “acceptable.” As one of my favourite Englishmen told me – when Singapore first started its F1 race, every brown and black person ended up as cleaner, while every white and yellow person ended up in catering. It’s not officially racist but it could not be such a coincidence that every brown and black person who applied to work at the race had a strong desire to be a cleaner. Then, there was my friend, who is Afrikaans. He’s a qualified dental technician, who couldn’t get his work pass approved. Then, when he went into meet the immigration officer, he had convince them that it really was possible to be white and have the words “Africa” on your passport (apparently he was asked several times “what do they call you,” and he only got the hint when the immigration officer indicated that he was talking about skin colour.”) The latest example of Singapore’s convenient racism has come from an incident where a sales promoter at Tangs Department store was told to remove her hijab. This incident sparked a row on the issue of work place discrimination and it even went as far as having our President (who wears a headscarf or Tudong to give the proper Malay term), coming out to condemn the department store and announcing that work place discrimination was totally unacceptable. The various reports can be found here and here. I agree with the official sentiment. Work place discrimination based on race or religion has no place in the modern world. People should be free to wear their religious garments wherever they choose to. I think of the Sikh’s (or Sadars as they’re known in India), who wore allowed to wear turbans, but they had to be regulation turbans ie those in infantry wore green, black for those in armour and so on. However, there’s one slight snag to all of this, which is the fact that work place discrimination is perfectly acceptable when it’s practiced by the government. The government that is now championing the right of Muslim women to wear a headscarf on their heads, is the same government that won’t let young Malay girls wear the tudong attend mainstream schools. Apparently, our schools are secular and therefor they can’t wear signs of the religion but a department store cannot insist on the same when it comes to the work place. On a more serious note, being a Muslim is a career endangering move if you’re in the military. As former Indonesian President JB Habibie noted, there were no senior officers who were darker than yellow in the Singapore Armed Forces (A point that a Saudi deputy minister made to be during the Crown Prince visit in 2006). President Habibie’s remarks had the effect of getting the SAF to publish the names of every Malay officer with the rank of lieutenant-colonel and above and it was not long before we had our first Muslim general. However, despite this rushed public relations exercise, it’s a well-known fact that Malays are banned from certain vocations and very few of them make it to the top. The reason for this was simple. In our early days, our most likely military adversaries were likely Malaysia and Indonesia (we had Konfrantasi with Indonesia and after kicking us out, the Malaysian leadership made sure that we were aware that they could put us in our place.) Lee Kuan Yew argued that he didn’t want our Malay population to have any sense of dual loyalties should we ever get into a fight with either Malaysia or Indonesia. However, does this “discrimination” work in today’s world, where our most likely adversary is not a nation state but a cross-border terrorist group. Dealing with today’s adversary would involve working with Malaysian and Indonesian armed forces rather than against them. Its more than likely that we will need military commanders who can gel with their Malaysian and Indonesian counterparts. When you look at our current security situation, one should be inclined to ask if keeping this form of work place discrimination in the armed forces a case of just being racist for the sake of it. Let’s go back to the president, who is the champion of “non-discrimination.” In the early years of independence, it was understood that the presidency would be reserved for ethnic minorities and there was a specific need for a Malay head of state. However, in 1985, the government felt that our race-relations were harmonious enough not to reserve the office for an ethnic minority and appointed Mr. Wee Kim Wee to the job. Why was there a sudden rush to give the job to a Malay after 32-years? Then there is the issue of the fact that the public is apparently not ready for a “non-Chinese” prime minister. While Singapore’s population is predominantly Chinese and any political party would take that into consideration before fielding candidates. However, why is the PAP, the party that wrote a nation pledge based on “regardless of race” making such a big song and dance about how the public is not ready for a non-Chinese leader? Let’s ignore the fact that in the last election the most popular politician (Senior Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam) is non-Chinese and the second largest party in parliament is lead by a non-Chinese. The key question here is – as a party that espouses “regardless of race or religion, and talks about “meritocracy” shouldn’t the ruling party be fighting to ensure that a non-Chinese gets the top job if he or she is the most qualified? Even if the public is racist and not ready for a non-Chinese Prime Minister, shouldn’t the PAP be at the forefront of changing this perception and not pandering to it? Work place discrimination is wrong and the government should be leading the fight against it. However, to do so with full moral authority, it has to do all the way and not by only fighting to do it when it is convenient and pandering to racist instincts when it’s not.   Tang Li *Although I’ve been based mainly in Singapore for nearly two decades, I’ve had the privilege of being able meet people who have crossed borders and cultures. I’ve befriended ministers and ambassadors and worked on projects involving a former head of state. Yet, at the same time, I’ve had the privilege of befriending migrant labourers and former convicts. All of them have a story to tell. All of them add to the fabric of life. I hope to express the stories that inspire us to create life as it should be.      Read More →

The pandemic has disrupted the business environment around the world. Many tens of millions of jobs are lost. It will take a very long time for new jobs to be created to replace the lost jobs. My common sense tells me that there is only one solution - at least for the next few years. The working hours have to be cut by 20%. All countries have to reduce their working week by 20%, say from 5 days to 4 days of work. When the working hours are cut by 20%, businesses have to employ 20% more workers to meet their current operations. This is how the 20% of unemployed workers can have a job. When the working hours are cut by 20%, each worker will have to suffer a 20% cut in wages. There is no alternative. The employers cannot afford to increase payroll cost by 20%. They cannot survive. The 20% pay cut may force many workers to fall below the poverty line. Many families need a certain level of income to meet their financial obligations, such as mortgages and living expenses. Some of these workers have past savings to draw down. But other workers may have to rely on other sources of financing to offset the pay cut. I suggest that they should be allowed to withdraw savings from the Central Provident Fund accounts (in Singapore) or their pension fund accounts (in other countries). This may hamper their financial adequacy when they retire from the workforce, but it is a problem that will appear in 10, 20 or 30 years time. They urgently need the money now. For workers without sufficient savings in the CPF, they can borrow from the CPF and repay back from future contributions to the CPF. My proposal means that everybody will have more leisure time, i.e. 20% more non-working hours. They can pursue other social or recreational activities. They can take holidays. Eventually, the economy will start to recover and consumer demand will increase. The working hours can be increase gradually to meet the demand. Maybe, we can return to a 40 hour work week. But if we are stuck with a shorter work week, it will actually improve the quality of life for everyone. Agree or not?   Tan Kin Lian      Read More →