TR EMERITUS

Some 15 years ago, on the 12th August 2004, Lee Hsien Loong took over from Goh Chok Tong as Prime Minister. One thing I have noticed is that the LHL increasingly likes to use his father’s name and past glory in speeches – from the GE2015 rallies to even as recently as 2018 at the appreciation dinner for the 3 ministers who had then stepped down. Despite quoting his father (who is a master at international diplomacy), LHL has a clear lack of understanding of diplomacy and geopolitics. His comments at the White House State dinner ended up angering China, which rebuked Singapore and has even seized Terex while they were transiting in HK. Furthermore unlike the late LKY, the LHL has less than stellar taste when selecting people to form his cabinet. Just need to look at the 4G ministers and their rather brainless motherhood statements (such as “you don’t need much space to have sex” and “everyone has a car”) to know how much they are living in their ivory tower. Although Singapore has since become increasingly a haven for the rich, the picture for the lower and middle-class is very much worse than before. A radical article by BBC in 2014 estimated that 400,000 Singaporeans have saved less than $5 a day after paying for all their expenses while PAP’s policies have contributed to the highs costs of living – GST, public transport increases, COE prices, and even the so-call “social enterprise” hawker centre is operating on a “$$$$” basis. LHL has no real achievement during his tenure that could be celebrated. Could we really celebrate turning Singapore into a 'Sin City' with two Casinos that resulted in more social problems which were conveniently swept under the carpet? or should we celebrate his greatest achievement to turn Singapore into the Most Expensive City in the World within such short period of time? I am even more worried when he talked about all those great infrastructure plan he had installed for us even when he is going to step down! Is he trying to justify the plan of raising GST? Despite this, I can only see how spendthrift PAP government under his leadership is all these years while neglecting social spending. All those multi billions projects that are basically straining our National Budget resulting in the need to implement additional taxes and eventually increase GST! A short addition to MRT line could run up cost to billions, which is basically too expensive by any international standards! Yet these brand new MRT lines could have breakdowns or basically faults that are signs of poor quality - not to mention how they could spend over $800K on just a small rubbish collection station with totally over priced consultancy fee! Spending $1.7B on an uninspiring, duplicated water fall in enclosed white elephant Jewel is just peanuts compared to a NO-Stated-Budget Terminal 5 which could cost billions over $10 billions with no question asked is the worse governance I have ever seen. Jewel suffered inadequate business so much so that the proud 24hr showcase has to cut short business hour for most tenants there ... and of course, these are just overpriced shopping mall tenants to begin with! Yet, PM Lee has the cheek to declare it is a “success”. I was shocked to hear him promising more mega multi billions projects after such delusional declaration! I have real reservations of their Tuas mega port because when I look at it, it will be jamming the whole limited sea space at Tuas if they really have that many ships docking. I seriously doubt the viability due to the congestion which may create more incidents. If they are not going to have that many ships docking, then we will have another Underutilized white elephant! Yet, they have the cheeks to use “increase social spending” to justify their intent to increase GST while the REAL REASON is their overspending in grand infrastructure projects! I really fear for Singapore’s future if we continue to allow such senseless overspending on huge infrastructure of grandiosity to carry on without proper checks and balances! My Dear Fellow Singaporeans, the choice lies in your votes in this coming General Elections. You will have to make the choice of whether to trust this totally spendthrift PAP government or make serious considerations on whether we need good, savvy and effective people who will ask the real tough questions from opposition to be put into parliament to check on PAP government.   Goh Meng Seng      Read More →

The streaming of students was under the Dr Goh Keng Swee’s report published in 1979. It detailed the problems of Singapore’s education system at that time and aimed to reduce the drop-out rate. Primary students would be streamed at the end of Primary 3 into either the normal bilingual, extended bilingual or monolingual course. This took effect in 1981 and was later replaced with the labels EM1, EM2 and EM3. Secondary schools would have the Special, Express and Normal streams. Mr Goh said in his report that a single curriculum “does not take into consideration differences in absorption capacities and rates of learning of the pupils”. A sad consequence of this system was the social labeling of the students. The students who went to the Normal stream were considered to be the less capable students. During my primary school days, a different approach was adopted by the school. At that time, Singapore was still under British colonial administration. The students that failed in a year had to stay back and repeat that year. A few students in each cohort had to stay back. I consider this approach to be better. Those who cannot cope had one more year to catch up. They might be identified as "failed student" for a short while but this distinction was soon forgotten in the social mingling of childhood. It was quite likely that the slow learners would probably be those born in the later part of the year, and are several months younger than their classmates. By staying back one year, they would be a few months older than their classmates but the gap will not be wide. Some students had difficulty with the second language. Even if they fail the second language, it should be treated as just any other subject. It should not be treated as a major setback. During my secondary school days, the students did a common syllabus in the first two years and were placed in two different streams, science and arts, during the third and fourth year. I was the top student in Raffles Institution during secondary four in 1965. But I failed in the second language. The ranking of the students took the top six subjects into account. I do not like the changes in our education system made during the past few decades under various education ministers. These changes do not seem to deal with the underlying problems. They made the system very complicated for parents, students and teachers. Education continued to be stressful for many children. I hope, one day in the future, a new education minister might change back to the system that was in place when I was in primary and secondary school.   Tan Kin Lian      Read More →

PM’s talk of spending more on education reminded me that a govt scholarship can help a kid’s dream come true if there’s no Bank of Mum and Dad for the kids to draw on. —————————- “The rich are different from you and me,” Scott Fitzgerald is supposed to have said; and Hemingway is supposed to have responded: “Yes, they have more money.” ——————————————— A gal I know flew off last Thursday to the US to study in a supposedly leading university (I remember my Indonesian clients joking in the 1980s that it was a rich kids uni because so long as you had the money to pay the fees, you got in. The gal was not amused because I told her the story before she knew she was getting the scholarship: she worried that MoE might not think the uni atas enough because the u isn’t in the Ivy League or anywhere close.). She went on an MoE scholarship and will be studying music composition: her passion. When anyone mumbled the six yr bond she had to serve, I told them that it’s worth the bond. She gets to do something that is not available here and her mum would not have been able to afford the fees to any good US university. (Plan B 2.1 was to to go study in UK or Europe next yr and, I suppose part fund, her way by work by part-time there.) (The original Plan B was to go to NUS Yale: “affordable” said her mum. But that would have meant not studying music composition.) I would go on: better still, a degree in music composition is worthless. Don’t believe me? In 2017, cybercriminals hacked into Equifax’s data base and stole 145.5m U.S. consumers’ personal data, including their full names, Social Security numbers, birth dates, addresses, and driver licences. . Turned out its head of cybersecurity had little qualifications in cybersecurity. She had a masters in music composition from the University of Georgia. The gal was not amused when I told her the story. So if MoE is happy to fund her doing a worthless degree and then paying her to teach, a six yr bond is a good deal for her. The only downsides for her is that she could turn into this kind of person: Headmaster that blur meh? and she’ll be a nut case when she retires. Many yrs ago, a retired school principal told me that principals who retire often go nuts ( He was seeing a govt nut doctor) because they find that they miss terribly the ability to order staff and kids around: yes I know I assume she’ll be a principal, but she’s a scholar ain’t she? And while a sweet gal, she is bossy and pushy. Whatever, the benefits for her, doesn’t say much for prudent spending of tax-payers money though: funding a worthless degree course. Btw, remember the MoE scholar was caught in the UK with child porno on his PC? But let’s be fair: MoE did admit that a scholarship was given to a peeping-tom because the boy’s teachers got some things wrong. He was recently convicted in England for possession of child pornography. But what if the balls-up had been made by officers higher up the food chain? I mean teachers are the lowest of the low in the education food chain, or so I’ve been assured by teachers. Why we don’t buy the “explanations” of S’pore Inc To avoid another such fiasco, scholarship applicants had to undergo several rounds of interviews and a battery of psychological tests. And had to teach in a neighbourhood school for some time. They must have been an eye opener for the gal because while the family is not that well-off, she’s third generation in an elite girls school that was once considered a training ground for tai-tais. Gals went on from this school to ACS to find husbands. This gal went to RI because it was two bus stops from her home.   Cynical Investor Cynical Investor blogs at Thoughts of a Cynical Investor      Read More →