TR EMERITUS

Written by Our Correspondent A PRC family of 5 was allowed to create nuisance and disorder on a SBS bus in public causing much inconvenience to other passengers right under the watchful eyes of the Singapore police. Both Chinese tabloids Shin Min Daily and Lianhe Wanbao carried a report yesterday on a PRC family who insisted on boarding a SBS bus with a wheelchair though they were told by the bus captain not to do so due to safety reasons as the bus was not equipped with wheelchair accessibility facilities. (read article here) They made a din on the bus for six hours before leaving in a cab (a 9-seat Maxi-Cab) paid for by SBS. The police was called to the scene, but they were unable to stop the public disturbance and allowed the saga to continue. Under the new Public Order Act introduced specifically to deal with such incidents, the police are vested with the power to "move" the offenders away from the scene. For some inexplicable reasons, the two police officers did not evoke the Public Order Act to stop the public unrest and was photographed to be reasoning with one of the PRC ladies and helping the elderly among them alight from the bus subsequently. [Above: Singapore police officers "escorting" the PRC offenders with another one carrying their wheelchair behind like their servant. Source of photo: Lianhe Wanbao, 18 January 2010] When interviewed by Lianhe Wanbao, 48 year old Madam Lin who worked in the media industry said angrily: “The bus did not put out any sign that forbid wheelchairs to be brought up and we did not commit any crime. So why was the bus stopped by the road and refused to fetch us home?” Madam Lin and her family had already committed a crime if not a series of crimes - they can be charged for a variety of offences under the Public Order and Nuisance Act (Chapter 184) such as causing harassment, alarm or distress to others, making excessive noise in public and of riotous, disorderly or indecent behaviour, each amounting to a fine of no more than S$1,000. If they were Singaporeans, they would probably be arrested on the spot and taken away for "obstructing" the police from discharging their duties, let alone allowed to continue their nonsense on the bus for so long. From this and previous cases, the Singapore police appears to dish out preferential treatment to foreigners. When over 200 PRC workers protested outside the Ministry of Manpower last year over unpaid wages, the police was seen standing around them and not taking any action: [The above Chinese migrants were allowed to gather and protest outside Ministry of Manpower for hours, but where were the Singapore Police? No arrests were made and their employer was forced to repay the wages owed to them. Source of photo: TNP] However, when two Singaporeans - Seelan Palay and Chiong Kai Xiong stood outside the same compound to protest against the deportation of their Burmese friends by the ruling party, they were arrested on the spot and taken away by the Singapore police within thirty minutes: [Above: Two police officers arrived immediately to arrest two Singapore citizens who risked two years of their lives in National Service and dragged them forcefully away  from the scene in handcuffs. The two were simply standing outside MOM without causing any public disturbance or obstruction to passer-bys unlike the PRC family who caused one bus to be "stranded" for 6 hours and its passengers transferred to another bus. Source of photo: Jacob's blog] [Above: Singapore citizen and NSman Seelan Palay arrested by Singapore police and taken away in handcuffs for standing outside MOM without causing any disturbance to the public. Contrast the treatment he received to that of the PRC "VIPs" - why didn't the police handcuff them immediately and still got time to "chit chat" with them for 6 hours? Source of photo: Jacob's blog] Similarly a PRC woman was allowed to "protest" at the Ministry of Education headquarters last week for the entire day till midnight demanding its staff to transfer her daughter to a top primary school. The police could have arrested her immediately to stop the ugly fiasco, but again did not do so. Yet five Singaporeans were arrested for "illegal procession" when all they did was to walk in a group from one point to another in public. The case is still ongoing after three years. Though a District Judge had already acquitted them, the Attorney-General Chambers found fit to lodge an appeal against the decision. The Singapore police is extremely efficient when dealing with locals, especially if they happen to fall on the wrong end of the political divide. But when it comes to foreigners, they seem pretty lost on what to do like how they allowed a prime suspect in the double hit and run accident at Bukit Panjang last month to "slip" through its dragnet. Such police inaction and impotence will only serve to embolden foreigners in Singapore who may get the wrong impression that as long they make enough "noise", they will be able to get away with almost anything in Singapore. Perhaps this family will soon be teaching their fellow PRC relatives and friends in Singapore on how to get a "free cab ride" from SBS and "free escort services" from the Singapore Police Force from now onwards. The Singapore police should remember that they are paid by Singapore taxpayers to serve the interests of the public and not to protect the foreigners. In this example, more than 10 passengers, some of whom were Singaporeans had to be transferred to another bus just because of the silly antics of this PRC family which could be prevented in the first place had the police decided to take action against them instead of "loitering" around them for 6 hours. Not only did they get away with the crime, they were even "compensated" with a free taxi trip home by SBS with the Singapore police "serving" as "road usherers" to help them down the bus and "escort" them to the taxi with one police officer seen carrying their wheelchair behind like a servant, making a mockery of the "rule of law" in Singapore. It is highly unlikely that this PRC household who caused disruption to public transport and inconvenience to other commuters will be charged by the Singapore police. In fact, it will not be surprising at all if the Singapore Police were to send them a letter of "apology" to soothe their frayed nerves.  Read More →

By Tan Keng Leng Recently, PM Lee declared that “Singaporeans will always come first” for his administration. Predictably, this announcement was met by a storm of protests both from the pro and anti-government factions of netizens. The anti-government factions denounced his declaration as just propaganda intended to divert attention from his administration’s staunchly pro-foreigner policies, while the pro-government faction denounced the anti-government faction as a bunch of ingrates who failed to appreciate everything the government has achieved. So do Singaporeans really come first for the Lee Administration, and if so, how do exactly do they come first? To arrive at a correct conclusion to the answer, it would be best to count the ways in which Singaporeans are obviously coming in first for the administration. 1. Ordinary Singaporeans will always be the first to die in war, because the foreigners and elites will flee the country. Of course, one cannot reasonably expect the foreigners to stay and fight for Singapore; after all, this is not their country. In fact, it may even be better to get rid of them entirely, because if Singapore happens to be at war with their homelands, then they may well become a fifth column against the SAF. But what about the elite? Of late, there have been a number of fatal accidents in the SAF. All the dead soldiers came from middle or lower income families; none came from the families of the elite. So what’s the reason for this? Are children of ordinary locals actually being placed in dangerous frontline positions while children of the elite are placed in safe rear-echelon positions? After all, if children of the elite are facing the same risks, then one should reasonably expect at least a few of them to get hurt in training periodically, right? No one expects the SAF to answer this question even if it was put forward to them. Even if they were to reply, it would just be the standard stock answer: Singapore is a meritocracy, and that it just so happens that the elite children are the best. But of course, if this was truly so, then many of the fatal accidents could have easily be prevented in the very first place, since they would have planned for adequate safety procedures to safeguard against them happening at all 2. Ordinary Singaporeans will always be the first to be retrenched in any recession, while job priority goes to the elite and foreigners. This isn’t just idle supposition; it is actually borne out in the current recession. One would imagine that any CEO who lost $48,000,000,000/- in failed investments would be out looking for a new job the very next day, but in the case of Temasek Holdings CEO Madam Ho Ching, it was her successor Mr. Charles “Chip” Goodyear who found himself looking for a new job after just five months instead. Exactly why was never revealed, except that it was “due to strategic differences”. A very important question that should be asked but never was is this: strategic differences over what? Selling-off of money-losing investments? Dismissal of non-performing scholars from politically-connected elite families? Diversification of investment portfolios instead of putting all of TH’s eggs into a few baskets? What? Furthermore, as a supposed “meritocracy”, the heads anyone found responsible for these blunders should roll, so where were the announced dismissals? Or was Chip Goodyear’s head the only one to roll? If this is so, then the interesting issue would be why his head should roll when he clearly had nothing to do with the debacle since he wasn’t in charge of the organization at the time. Madam Ho has since been restored to her position because according to Finance Minister Mr. Tharman Shanmugaratnam, “she’s the best person for the job”. Of course, if this was so, the question of why her resignation was even accepted and Chip Goodyear appointed as her successor in the first place should be but was never answered. One thing this bizarre incident did prove though was that the government failed to live up to its promises of “more good years”, since a prominent Goodyear did quit in a huff and leave over bureaucratic meddling in his job. The current recession has also proven something else: contrary to the government’s previous pronouncements on the issue, foreign workers are NOT a buffer against retrenchments for locals. In fact, if anything, it is the locals themselves who are serving as a buffer for the foreigners. Thousands of locals have lost their jobs, replaced by foreigners. Presumably in the same way that Temasek Holdings earned “negative profits” of $48,000,000,000/- in the recession, so too are foreign workers a “negative buffer” against retrenchments for locals. 3. Ordinary Singaporeans will always be the first to suffer pay cuts in a recession. The foreigners will only have their pay frozen, while the elites will get massive pay increments for being "talented" enough to come up with this solution. At the start of the recession, the government was quick to implement pay cuts. However, as they failed to announce ministerial pay cuts as well, presumably they continued to receive their over-bloated salaries. True, they did announce no bonuses or pay increments, but then again, the same applied for the “lesser mortals”. And now that the economy is picking up once more, while the government did call upon employers to restore staff salaries, they are not enforcing it. And sooner or later, they will announce the restoration of their own bonuses etc. And as for the foreigners, even if their salaries were cut, the very fact that their employee CPF contribution is only 5% means that they are far better able to absorb the impact of such cuts better than locals can, simply because foreigners earning the same basic salary as locals have a much higher take home pay. 4. Ordinary Singaporeans will always be the first to receive priority in selecting the schools of their choice. This comes after all the best schools have been reserved for the elites and foreigners of course. This statement may be an exaggeration, but not by much. Twenty years ago or so, the then-PM Lee announced the graduate mother priority scheme. In this scheme, children of women graduates who are married to other graduates would be given priority for schooling in keeping with his theories of the genetic intellectual superiority of graduate parents. There are many major flaws in this theory: for one thing, if talent and intelligence are hereditary, then one would reasonably expect the children of Oscar-winning Hollywood stars to also be as talented as their parents, but many if not most are not. For another thing, there are many geniuses whose parents came from modest backgrounds, most notably Professor Albert Einstein. Predictably, the scheme failed, because the graduate mothers who chose to register their children under the scheme quickly found themselves ostracized by their outraged friends. One can’t help but wonder about one very important point: if scholars really are so intellectually superior, then why did they fail to predict the outcome of this ill-conceived scheme? As for the foreigners, there has been much controversy in the public and debate in government circles over whether they should be given equal opportunities as locals, notably sparked off by the arrogant, sense-of-entitlement letter written by Mrs. Sweta Agarwal. The government is always going on and on about how to convince the PRs to become Singapore citizens, but really, this debate is a non-issue that proves that the elite scholars are anything but the best and brightest in the country. Locals should always be given privileges not available to foreigners, whether PRs or otherwise. If foreigners have the same benefits as locals, then why should they adopt Singapore citizenship? Conversely, if locals have no advantages in anything at all over foreigners, then why shouldn’t they be “quitters” and leave behind a country that does not appreciate them and takes them for granted instead? Since any lesser mortal can realize this, then why can’t the elite scholars? Or are they so high up in their ivory towers that the rarefied air up there has caused them to hallucinate and become delusional? Perhaps replacing them as policy planners with lesser mortals would give them a reality check if this is the case. 5. Ordinary Singaporeans will always be the first to be called upon to donate generously to the less fortunate. Whether it is for foreign disasters, needy locals or whatever, the government is always exhorting locals to keep donating even though the salaries and living standards of ordinary locals have been steadily declining. Given its huge reserves, the government can easily pay for these programs, but they refuse to. This is especially appalling when one considers that they have actually dipped into the reserves to pay for cost overruns in the two casinos. The government is always saying that they have to take actions that are good for the country and not those that are necessarily popular. Applying this logic to the above, presumably they regard a crutch mentality among the wealthy elite as being good for the country. 6. Ordinary Singaporeans will always be the first to be rejected for welfare or other benefits. A couple of years ago, the government raised GST, ostensibly to “increase Workfare assistance” to the needy, but when Dr. Lily Neo, one of the few PAP MPs who show genuine concern for needy locals appealed for assistance to be raised by at least $100/- per month, MM Lee curtly told her off for it. After much debate, the government finally settled on a $30/- increment, with 20% deduction for CPF of course. This was then followed by a massive pay increment for ministers. This was then followed by an announcement at the end of the year that per capita income had gone up substantially, meaning that the standard of living in the country had improved. What was left unmentioned was that it went up only for a few elite people, not the vast majority. Presumably this was how the GST increase was meant to benefit the needy: by using it to give themselves massive pay increments so as to raise per capita income with minimal increase in assistance for the people who truly need it, the poor. From time to time, the government says that they are well on track to provide a Swiss standard of living for the country. What they obviously failed to mention was that by that, they meant a Swiss cheese standard of living for the country, with all the cheese, the good parts in other words, going to the elite and foreigners, and all the holes being left for ordinary locals. The government justifies its refusal to provide welfare benefits because they claim that it will cause the poor to develop a crutch mentality, and yet at the same time, they encourage locals to donate to private charities (see #6 above) when this will also create a crutch mentality in them. Further contradicting themselves, the government has also announced a series of programs to integrate foreigners with locals. So it would appear that the government doesn’t want to support locals with a crutch mentality, but is all too happy to support foreigners with the same crutch mentality. Obviously they have forgotten that locals from low income families pay taxes, serve NS and vote too. Perhaps they should be reminded of it by losing a few GRCs. 7. Ordinary Singaporeans will always be the first to bear the brunt of massive housing cost increases. According to several ministers, including MND Mah Bow Tan, HDB will always provide affordable housing for locals. The problem though, is that affordability is a subjective matter. For example, to Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates, a US$20,000,000/- mansion is affordable. To a middle manager earning Sg$5,000/- a month, this is an insane price to pay for a house. Likewise, to a government minister earning Sg$1,000,000 a year or more, a HDB flat costing upwards of Sg$400,000/- is affordable, but to a local couple whose joint income is Sg$4,000/- per month or less, they will need to slave away for 30 to 40 years to pay off their mortgage loans, with little if anything to support them in their twilight years. The government claims that their calculations are based upon a per capita salary of Sg$7,000/- per month, or in other words, Sg$14,000/- per month for a married couple. Given that many if not most ordinary locals earn only a third of that amount, this of course means they will need more than three times as long to pay off their housing loans, not including the interest. This clearly shows just how out of touch with reality the policy makers have become. But then again, what can one possibly expect from people whose idea of raising the standard of living in the country is to raise per capita income for the people in the country by giving themselves massive pay increments? 8. Ordinary Singaporeans will always be the first to be given priority for dirty, low-paid, dangerous jobs such as road sweepers, toilet cleaners, construction workers etc. This is because the best jobs are reserved for the elites while the good jobs are reserved for foreigners, "otherwise they won't want to come". In fact, the government has even stated that it. Exactly why was never explained. After all, if it is really “in the strategic interests of the country for locals to fill these posts” as claimed, then shouldn’t it all the more be in the strategic interests of the country to employ only locals in the utilities industry, considering that trouble in this sector will result in the country being shut down and cut off from the outside world? Furthermore, given the high accident rate in the construction and shipbuilding industries, are foreign governments actually threatening to ban their nationals from working in these industries unless industrial safety standards are tightened? Is this the real reason why it is in the strategic interests for locals to fill these posts? There is another issue here. Given the government’s frequent claims that Singapore is a meritocracy, then why should jobs be reserved for anybody at all? Shouldn’t all jobs be opened to competition instead? Or are these elites and foreign talents so good that they can only perform when their jobs are secure and they are free from competition and under no threat of losing their jobs? 9. Ordinary Singaporeans will always be the first to be blamed for such blunders as the escape of Mas Selamat Kastari or the Geylang Serai food poisoning debacle. In fact, several government ministers did say Singaporeans have become complacent, which is why these events occurred. How exactly ordinary locals are at fault for them though was never detailed. Terrorist mastermind Kastari’s escape came about because the commander of the Whitley Road Detention Center (an elite scholar) where he had been incarcerated kept ignoring repeated reports of the danger posed by the design of the toilet he escaped from, while his Nepalese Gurkha guards left him unattended in the toilet. How ordinary locals caused this potentially catastrophic incident through their complacency and negligence when no ordinary locals were ever involved in it remains a mystery. The Geylang Serai Indian rojak food poisoning case was caused unsanitary conditions within the market, and according to government officials, “failure of the victims to wash their hands after using the toilet”. If this is so, then this would be the first ever known incident of people eating Indian rojak with their bare hands. How they are able to withstand the sizzling hot oil on the fritters or the scalding hot gravy they are dipped into without the use of a fork is an intriguing question. A more intriguing question though is this: what were the Aljunied CCC and the NEA doing all the time before the incident that the market and food center should be in such unsanitary conditions, and why weren’t they ever publicly taken to task for it? 10. Ordinary Singaporeans will always be the first to get the spurs stuck into their hides for being lazy. No less than MM Lee had said this. He even went on to declare that Singaporeans prefer to spend time on sports and other enrichment activities whereas China nationals spend time in libraries. Perhaps one should give him the benefit of the doubt here; he is an octogenarian after all. It’s only natural that he should forget that it is the government itself that demands that Singaporeans should participate in sports and other enrichment activities, and that their academic performance (and chances to be admitted into good schools) would be graded accordingly because the government wants locals to be all-rounded and not merely academics. Curiously though, foreign students, in particular the PRCs, seem to be exempted from this requirement, which is why they can spend all their time studying and in the library. In fact, the government even provides them free English lessons so that they can bridge the gulf in English standards between themselves and locals. Whether they can actually compete with the local students should they be equally encumbered with all these CCA requirements is a good question. The answer is, probably not, since they cannot even compete with the locals in English, the fundamental building block of the local education system, without CCA requirements and free additional English lessons. But then again, given that their positions in good schools have been reserved for them, they don’t need to care about such things either. After a careful analysis of all the ways in which Singaporeans will always come first for the government, it appears that the pro-government faction is correct. Ordinary Singaporeans do always come first for the government exactly as they claim. It just isn’t coming in first in a positive way.   Other articles by Tan Keng Leng: >> Open letter to PM Lee expressing unhappiness at his pro-foreigner policy  Read More →

Written by Our Correspondent Buoyed by a booming market, the Cash Over Valuation (COVs) of resale HDB flats are shooting through the roof with the owners of a 4-room flat in Bishan asking for a COV of S$100,000. "The COV is too low. There are those who are asking for S$50,000 to S$60,000. There was one offer which was close, about $95,000. We are not in urgent need to sell. In a way, it's to test the market. If we sell, we sell. If we don't sell, we will just continue to stay," the owners told Channel News Asia. With continued strong demand for resale flats contributed partly by the relentless influx of foreigners into Singapore, home owners are asking for higher COVs to make a profit from the sale of their properties. Based on the latest HDB figures, 78 per cent of home sales transacted in the third quarter of last year were above valuation, a 22 percentage-point jump from the second quarter of last year's figure of 57 per cent. The median COV jumped from S$3,000 in the second quarter to S$12,000 in Q3. The situation is further exacerbated by the limited supply of new flats which force buyers to fork out more for them as public housing is a basic necessity in Singapore. Two newly launched Build-to-Order (BTO) projects in far flung places like Choa Chu Kang and Buangkok were more than five times oversubscribed, an indication of how serious the housing shortage has become. According to figures from HDB, only11,046 flats were build between the years 2006 - 2008 compared to some 55,515 flats were built between 2001 – 2005.  There were more than 90,000 PRs and 20,000 new citizens in the year 2008 alone. It is obvious that the number of flats built by HDB were grossly inadequate to make the demand of a rising population leading to the sky-rocketing of prices, with that of resale flats hitting a record high in June last year. Though National Development Minister Mah Bow Tan admitted that he was "caught off guard" by the astronomical prices, he continues to insist that there are sufficient number of flats to meet the demand and that HDB flats remain "affordable" to Singaporeans. In a dialogue session with Yew Tee residents two days ago, Law Minister K Shanmugam said he had a "hunch" that Singaporeans are the "culprits" for the continued rise in the prices of HDB flats without substantiating his statement. As usual, HDB has declined any interention in the market saying that it does not control resale flat prices as they are the result of negotiations between willing buyers and sellers. It added that intervening in COV means forcing people to buy and sell at fixed prices. While prices of public housing have ballooned, the average wages of ordinary Singaporeans have not caught up with it and they risk being plunged into a lifetime of debts just to service the hefty mortgage loans of these over-priced 99-year leasehold flats.   Related articles: >> Shanmugam: Singaporeans likely culprits for driving up HDB flat prices >> Mah Bow Tan: HDB flats remain affordable >> Means testing for PRs to buy resale flats >> Immigration and public housing: should the govt or people plan ahead? >> Grace Fu: hard to predict demand for housing >> Indonesian PR bought 4-room flat at $653,000 >> Mah Bow Tan asks home buyers to be realistic >> PAP MP blames young couples who cannot get a flat for not planning ahead >> Home affordability: HDB versus the public >> Demand vs supply: so many applicants, so few flats >> Number of applicants exceed number of flats >> HDB to increase supply of flats >> Mah: don’t compare with prices in the past >> ERA: 40 per cent of HDB flat buyers are PRs  Read More →