TR EMERITUS

From Wayang Party: The Reform Party, which has been rudderless since the passing of opposition scion Mr Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam was given a big boost when JBJ's son Kenneth joined the party and was co-opted into the party's CEC 2 weeks ago. (read article here) Mr Jeyaretnam said the timing was right and joining the party is one way to honor his father and to continue his legacy. We applaud Kenneth's move to join the Reform Party and hope that he will serve as a nidus to attract more qualified Singaporeans to join it. In a way, the Reform Party was a farewell gift left to us by JBJ. Throughout his political career, he had fought consistently to overhaul and reform the obsolete PAP system to one which is based on the rule of law, democratic principles and power to the people. The late JBJ never feared to speak up for the people even if it had led him to financial ruins brought upon him by the countless defamation suits launched by his opponents. JBJ is one deserving opposition MP we should have put in Parliament to represent us. The PAP feared him and tried ways and means to bar him from Parliament. Our parents' generation have let JBJ down. Let us make up for the tribulations he has gone through for us by giving our whole-hearted support to his son, Kenneth and the Reform Party. The Reform Party is not set up by JBJ just to make up the numbers. It is not a party which is contented to manage a HDB estate and willing to wait 50 more years to be in a position to challenge the incumbent. Why "Reform" Party? Because without reforming the entire system, it is pointless to have elections after elections to give legitimacy to the PAP to masquerade Singapore as a vibrant democracy when it is nothing more than a totalitarian fascist state. JBJ had called for reform of the political system, the judiciary, the media and many other flaws in the system put in place by the PAP to keep them perpetually in power. The younger generation of Singaporeans desire more political competition and a level playing field. We must not allow ourselves to be fooled and misled by these shenigans again. The time has come for change and we hope that Kenneth's arrival into the polical scene will be a catalyst to galvanize and united the entire opposition camp to press on with its mission to demand for greater accountability and transparency from the PAP which is seriously lacking now.  Read More →

Written by Darkness & Missy Dotty (site owner of JUST STUFF) You know what? I just took a look at my savings; did a few flash calculations and it seems, I may have to work till the day I die – welcome to the glorious age of the battery chicken – only one problem here; when I am 60 will I be working to live or living just to work? So far this is a question that government seems to side track - something tells me, it’s not nearly enough just to get corporations to hire seniors by giving them a few tax carrots; that in my view is just the proverbial tip of the iceberg. Though I am sure the free market mujahideens will disagree with me as they always do, that I am overacting - but hey, I've got to plan for the future and it pays dividends to dive in deeper into the finer details - what will work be like when I a, 60? The tough part is finding the sweet spot between age and performance and setting realistic expectations– it’s a mix of finding the right fit and goal setting. I guess if you really want to know what can go wrong when age and performance isn’t matched properly; then just pop down to your nearest golden arches to catch the latest horror story of Ah Kong and Ah Mah impersonating the glorious life of the Duracell bunny. Trust me, it wouldn’t take you very long to figure out retirees and jobs usually designed by time and motion specialist mix as well checking a gas leak with a box of matches; that’s what happens when seniors are wrongly matched with toxic jobs – they struggle; they flay; the system beats to a pulp and spits them out - it’s depressing - work becomes a veritable dungeon - a house of horrors. Yes, I know, I am probably going to get a slew of charming post in my inbox chiding me for pointing the finger at the golden arches; they’re after all so kind and caring to open up placements for retirees aren’t they? Well, that’s precisely my point, they’re not. Infact what they’re doing is condoning the glorious life of the battery chicken. Nothing is more depressing than being served by a Ah Mah dressed up in a baseball cap and sporting pig tails as she rattles off greetings that probably came out from some laminated card; like I said, the fit is all wrong. I am not suggest oldies should only be hired to play Santa Claus or quaint Samsui prototypal Bangla’s in some historical setting. Only I believe, if retirees are to turn the wheel of life meaningfully in their twilight years, there should be more effort to crave out a fit between their vintage and their job role. The Mcdonalds horror house model offers a snapshots of what can really go wrong when absolutely no ground rules are set before hand and everything is just left to the free market. My feel is government may need to step in and draw up the rough sketches of the ground rules before this can sensibly be mooted as a workable plan for corporations – it wouldn’t do to leave it to Mr Free Market. One reason why I believe the plan to get seniors back into the employment bandwagon may backfire is because I know only too well how demanding businesses can be on the human mind, body and spirit (that could explain why I regularly fake so many MC’s and prefer to work at home). Work life is hard enough even for a young man like me. If I recall back to my miserable student days in London, I was booted out of KFC, McDonalds and Burger King, all within a span of a month! Why? What was my crime? Well my overseers and his border guard Alsatians couldn’t stand the sight of me standing still and doing absolutely nothing – Clean that Darkness! Move! Pick that up! Reverse. Forward! Turn left and right! Jump thru the hoop! I snapped one day when they told me, I had to put my hand up to go for urination breaks. Another time when I got a job in A&W working the sidewalks as a mascot bear that did the tuba-driven “Ba-Dum, Ba-Dum” jingle – I got booted out one day when a kid complained that he saw the bear in a pub gulping down Stela Artois instead of root beer while pool sharking ( what was I expected to do? Get out from my 40 kilogram polyester fur suit for a 30 min break? I took me that long too get into it!). After that I promptly switched to a sedentary job as a morgue attendant and that put an end to those pesky customer complaints. Get my drift now? My point is simply this. The constant pressure to push productivity beyond what’s humanly possible, multi-tasking, the insatiable expectation of pesky customers and the pressure to deliver value and to do more, more, can all too easily turn into a living hell. Yes I am sure, if those free market jihadist had their way, they’ve tell us all, the push for greater productivity hardly seems unreasonable. Only my point is just look at how these productivity goodies are regularly delivered? And ask yourself how does that match up with the vintage capabilities of most retirees? At the heart of issue, I think the main question boils down to whether we can trust the free market to find that happy work / life balance. Bear in mind, we’re not only talking about fair wages that’s only the tip of the iceberg. As much as we’re still on the page where we are trying to find the ideal fit in placement, capability and setting a realistic expectation for the aged. I am reminded there are dozens of small, simple hardships that can push the elderly over the edge in today’s working environment; for one everything from work manuals right up to the length and height of the customer service counter is designed more for nubile teenagers and Olympic athletes rather than oldies; no where do we even see the basic provisions to cater for failing body parts; short sightedness; the shakes; imperfect memories; machines that can be operated even if one is drowsy or even the sedentary pace which seniors usually go about their business. All these would have to be augmented. The working environment needs to be first redesigned to take stock of the physical limitations of retirees. I am not suggesting for one moment we should have someone like Eunice Olsen holding out wheel of fortune font sized alphabets to help train seniors during their induction sessions. Only if we’re not sensitive to the physical limitations of the elders, then what may very well happen is this whole idea of getting the seniors back into the workforce may turn out to be an epic rerun of the glorious life of the battery chicken – instead of deriving personal fulfillment, seniors may very well find themselves locked in horror chamber with no prospects of escape; instead of emancipation, we may very well end up with sinew snapping back-breaking work regimes which makes cotton picking in the south circa Arthur Haley’s ‘Roots’ look like one of Sumiko’s recreational pastimes. No my feel is more work needs to be done by government to prepare the ground before this whole idea can really take off – for one someone at ministry level needs to get off their fat ass and start designating senior friendly type jobs. I for one have always questioned the wisdom of employing nubile twenty something’s to impersonate a wax works in the National Library; when that same job would be more suitably performed by a senior – as I said, I don’t have much faith in the free market craving out a happy path for our seniors. Ordinary retirees I reminded need real protection from exploitation like kiddies – no matter how you cut and splice it; they will always be prime cuts for abuse and that’s a bleak fact. Neither do I believe unions in the Singapore context offer much in the way of protecting them either; if it was the US or EU, then I say, yes that’s adequate, its good to go; but in Singapore we all know unions just ape the form and elide the content. They’re at best perfunctory second fiddles who will always play the corporate tune when its expedient. And here we need to be mindful that the last thing we want to do is to revisit the hideous parody of the Victorian era just when the ignorant were regularly used and abused like rumps by big evil corporations. I am not for one moment suggesting setting the ground rules is going to be easy; it will not; for one the cost to hire retirees will be higher as special arrangements need to be factored into the workplace, but all these can be offset by creative and imaginative incentives in the form of tax rebates. It may mean we as customers have to redefine our fastidious expectations towards the whole idea of what service quality means.  In the way, one buys a bar soap from body shop that looks as if it, it came out from some kiddies handicraft class. But because we know, it’s manufactured by some cottage industry somewhere in Bihar to provide jobs to rehabilitate former sex workers – we are able to effect that all important shift and refocus away from the product to take a broader sweep of the bigger picture: how we may actually be playing a vital role in saving people and planet with our wallets – it’s precisely this new form of consumer philanthropy that will be key to smoothing the path for Ah Mah & Ah Kong to get back into the workforce. I personally don’t believe the onus can be entirely in the lap of  government. They may be able to set the ground rules; but at the end of the day, we the end user will remain the final arbiters of deciding whether this is here to stay or go. My feel is no matter what the final solution is one thing remains patently certain; no one is going to endorse a work system where the old will be reduced to a mechanized automatons to make ends meet, that’s not how the vast majority of people want our old to be treated. Retirees have given their best years to build this country from zero to what it is today and they deserve to turn the golden wheel of life in their twilight years with pride, dignity and under their own terms. That’s not too much to ask, not at all.   [This essay is written by Darkness 2009 & Missy Dotty (The site owner of Just Stuff] - This photo of me was snapped by Darkness on real film using a hasselbald camera / the cheong sam was commissioned by him from a famous tailor in Shanghai during one of his business trips to China - Dotty – The Brotherhood Press 2009 / due to our annual upgrading on our Ekunaba servers / BP will not be issuing out codex codes to help you navigate in the WWW to find your reads. For further information please get specific details on write up dates from your read club leader - The Brotherhood Press 2009]    Read More →

By Eugene Yeo In a report published on Straits Times titled "MINDEF clarifies SAF doctor's scholarship bond", the ministry said it would have preferred to keep such exchanges private out of respect for Capt (Dr) Ooi and his family. However, it said an earlier letter by the family had raised ’several issues’, and it was necessary to clarify them. (read article here) It appeared that MINDEF is insinuating that the open letter sent to the media by the Ooi family was inappropriate. I believed that the family of Dr Allan Ooi would have preferred to keep such exchanges private too. If MINDEF has been open and upfront with them in the first place, would they resort to such a desperate measure? MINDEF said a board of inquiry was convened on 11 March 2009 and it concluded that matters related to Capt (Dr) Ooi’s service ‘were managed appropriately’. I am surprised at the swift conclusion reached by the board of inquiry. May I ask MINDEF the following questions: 1. Who make up the board of inquiry? 2. How long did they take to reach the conclusion? 3. What was the conclusion? 4. How were the matters relating to Dr Ooi's service "managed appropriately"? 5. Was the family informed of the result of the inquiry. The impression given by MINDEF is that the board of inquiry was staffed by its own officers whose aim is to clear Allan's superiors of any wrongdoings rather than to investigate the matter thoroughly. Straits Times' title is both misleading and untrue. Nowhere did MINDEF clarify Allan's scholarship bond at all other than to justify the actions taken in response to Allan's request to quit SAF. The crux of the entire matter is this: Allan wrote in to SAF expressing his intention to quit and MINDEF has persistently refused to answer the key question as to why Allan was not allowed to break his bond? What constitutes "early release" under MINDEF's operating guidelines? If Allan was allowed to break his bond, he would have to serve out one year of his mandatory national service as a SAF medical officer after which he would be allowed to join the civil sector to complete his remaining 3 years of bond. There are many interpretations of "early release" and MINDEF should come clean with the public on its definition instead of hiding behind vague military jargons to evade public scrutiny. Does "early release" mean the officer can only allowed to leave SAF after a period of time? If so, how long is the duration - 2, 3, 5 or 10 years? For an officer who is determined to quit SAF, is it fair to coerce him to wait for his "early release"? All MINDEF needs to do is to tell us truthfully if Allan was allowed to break his bond. What transpired between Allan and his superiors? Was he told in no uncertain terms that he is not allowed to break his bond? What is the rationale of offering him an alternative posting within SAF when he had no desire to remain with the organization? These relevant and important questions can only be answered with an independent panel vested with the power to haul up the officers involved for questioning. MINDEF should stop obsfucating the issue by using a moral compass to denounce Allan's intention to break his bond. While it is true that Allan has the moral obligation to complete his bond, he had the means to compensate MINDEF financially for the resources they had spent on him. On the other hand, MINDEF also owes a moral obligation to its scholarship holders to ensure they have a fruitful and rewarding career in the SAF. Why continue to keep a scholar whose heart is no longer with the organization? Is it fair for taxpayers to continue paying the salary of a soldier who is dying to get out of the army? MINDEF has also failed to disclose the original terms of Allan's contract with the SAF: is there a clause in the bond that he is NOT PERMITTED to break his bond at any time in the course of his service? An unbreakable bond is tantamount to modern slavery. If there were no such clause initially, why should Allan be refused his basic human right to leave his current employment in search of a better one? Until MINDEF manage to answer these questions satisfactorily, Allan's scholarship bond will never be clarified. MINDEF should have heeded the family's wishes to allow an independent panel to be set up to investigate the matter a long time ago. Its reluctance to do so will only lead to more baseless speculations about its role in Allan's fateful decision to go AWOL and turning this sorry episode into a protracted fracas. If MINDEF truly have any respect for Allan and his family, it should address their concerns immediately instead of continuing to play a cat-and-mouse game with them. There can be no closure without answers.  Read More →