TR EMERITUS

Huge increase in CPF Minimum Sum limit to prevent massive withdrawal by baby boomers, not acceptable The CPF Minimum Sum and CPF Life schemes do not make any sense and have hurt the majority of CPF members. The PAP government is aware of this but since it has absolute power, it will not acknowledge its ‘error’. PAP MPs would of course have heard from thousands of their constituents but prefer to remain silent. MPs with this kind of attitude receiving $15,000 tax dollars monthly are correctly described as ‘jiak liao bee’. The recent contributions to the total CPF balances are really huge when seen in the perspective of past contributions. Let’s take a look at the different 5-year periods. 1989 to 1993 (amount in millions) 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 TOTAL 2,444.0 3,107.7 3,436.5 3,609.9 -522.2 12,075.9 1994 to 1998 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 TOTAL 3,977.6 6,270.0 4,078.3 4,398.3 2,370.5 21,094.7 1999 to 2003 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 TOTAL 14.7 -478.4 -566.5 1,304.1 4,001.7 $4,275.6 2004 to 2008 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 TOTAL 4,959.0 4,238.2 2,089.5 6,555.1 9,265.1 27,106.9 2009 to 2013 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 TOTAL 9,404.4 12,374.2 14,184.8 14,321.6 13,666.8 63,951.8 Source: MAS annual reports (see statistical index) 2009 to 2013 amount of increase same as preceding 20 years. Why? Last 5 year increase = total amount of preceding 20 years! From the table above, the PAP has increased CPF total contribution by about $64 billion from 2009 to 2013. This is almost similar to the $64.5 billion contributed in the preceding 20 years! PAP was aware of massive baby boomers’ withdrawal The biggest group of CPF members are those born between 1947 and 1964, known as baby boomers. But before this occurred, the government legislated the increase of CPF Minimum Sum, doubling it from $40,000 to $80,000 within only 8 years from 1995 to 2003. This appeared to be insufficient for GIC and yet another round of increase was legislated with the MS almost doubling from 2003 to 2014. Total CPF balance stood at about $96 billion in 2002. If retirees had been allowed to withdraw, CPF balances would at most have remained the same or more likely reduced. Instead, the CPF balance has increased by $163 billion to $259 billion in March! The facts do not gel with every PAP ‘clarification’. CPF = Ponzi scheme? There are striking similarities between our CPF and a Ponzi scheme: -  There is zero transparency in how and where our CPF is invested. -  Not only is the base of new CPF ‘investors’ increasing, existing members’ funds are being trapped by ever-changing policy tweaks. The government could have easily quashed such speculations with transparency but why doesn’t it? For our retirement or GIC? When the PAP says the increase is for our retirement needs, it appears to be trying to pull a fast one on us. If it was so caring and has acted responsibly, the logical action would be to increase salaries. Instead, salaries have not even kept pace with housing inflation and, worse, for low income citizens, they have remained stagnant for the past 15 years. 3 years ago, 55% of Singaporeans could not meet the CPF MS. By setting the MS limit higher, even more members will be unable to do so. So what is the real motive of the PAP? Why is PAP channeling so much CPF monies into GIC? The reasons given by the PAP really defy logic and common sense and will never be acceptable by CPF members. CPF monies do not belong to the PAP. GIC has been the recipient of an ever-increasing amount of cheap funds from our CPF. Questions: -  Is GIC unable to generate sufficient returns to pay CPF members without more funds? -  Has GIC lost too many investments during the last financial crisis and requires more CPF monies? -  Is GIC solvent? Conclusion From a CPF member’s perspective, a lot of things are not quite right. The government has been forcing citizens to save into an account for the GIC to use as and when it pleases. This also raises the question of GIC’s solvency. If the PAP was really concerned about our retirement shortfalls, the logical thing it would have done was to increase salaries or supplement retirement funds from Temasek Holdings. It did neither. The huge increase in CPF MS is clearly to prevent the massive withdrawal of baby boomers. This is not acceptable and the PAP therefore needs to return us our CPF. Phillip Ang *  The author blogs at likedatosocanmeh.  Read More →

Information board with English and Chinese text. I am writing to express my disappointment with Science Centre Singapore. One of the exhibits - Candy Unwrapped - had information boards that were written in English and Chinese. Is it becoming Science Centre PRC ? I applaud the efforts by SC to include another languages in its display boards. But the key question is if it is good enough to include Chinese translated text for the  displays? Why not Malay? Why not Tamil? are we not a multi-racial multi-language society? Are we not taught Mother tongues in school which include the other three main languages reflecting the different races in Singapore? The other issue I have with the Chinese text is that they are written in the traditional Chinese word form, and not the simplified Chinese forms. In Singapore, we learn simplified Chinese. So it is even irrelevant to cater to the learning needs of Singaporean Chinese. Then, why would the SC management allow Chinese text to be written in traditional Chinese word form? SC for Singaporeans The science centre is funded by public funds. As such, it has the social responsibility to ensure that the content presented to the public is a form that suits our society. Putting up information board with Chinese translated text only is highly unacceptable. It disregards the learning needs of our Malay and Indian siblings, and comes across as very insensitive and treads close to trying to cosy up to Chinese tourists only. Perhaps SC should review its mission - which is to serve Singaporeans first. If it is interested in tourism business, it should consider setting centres overseas, using its owns private resources. Kampong Boy *  Submitted by TRE reader.  Read More →

Prof Michael Hor - he was rejected by NUS to become its law dean but was later accepted by HKU instead. In a media interview which was published on ST today ('Law dean on his move to Hong Kong', 3 Aug), Law Dean of the Hong Kong University (HKU), Professor Michael Hor Yew Meng, noted that there is "certainly a perception that after a certain level, only people with the right kind of politics will make it" in Singapore. Such a perception, whether right or wrong, is widespread and needs to be corrected, he said. Professor Hor used to served in the Singapore's legal service in the 1980s before spending the next 25 years teaching at the National University of Singapore (NUS). Last November, HKU announced that they have chosen Professor Hor to be its law dean ('Prof, passed over by NUS, becomes law dean at HKU'). He took over from Prof Johannes Chan Man-mun last month, who had been law dean of HKU for more than a decade. When the announcement was made, he gave an interview with the Hong Kong media: Essential to any faculty, indeed any university of any note, is the protection of the freedom of thought and conscience, of speech and expression, of assembly and association, and with it the freedom of academic endeavour. Prof Hor was selected after two rounds of a worldwide search by HKU. According to Singapore news reports [Link], Prof Hor was seriously being considered to assume the position of NUS law dean at one time. In an interview with the Straits Times published in September 2009, then NUS law dean Prof Tan Cheng Han even cited the names of his possible successors: NUS’s Prof Michael Hor and Prof John Phillips from King’s College London. Eventually, in late 2011, NUS announced that Prof Simon Chesterman, who is the son-in-law of President Tony Tan, would take over Prof Tan as the new NUS law dean with effect from January 2012. Prof Chesterman, who is an Australian, joined the NUS law faculty as an associate professor only in 2007. Prof Chesterman later said that he had been approached in 2008 for the dean’s post and that, in fact, he had turned it down as he had just joined the faculty and had not attained full professorship. With regard to the selection of law dean, NUS said that the school’s Dean Search Committee had invited applications in November 2010 and looked for possible candidates through 18 top international law schools and identified about 60 possible candidates. NUS explained that eventually, the committee unanimously recommended Prof Simon Chesterman for the deanship, which was “approved by the NUS Board of Trustees”. At the time of Prof Chesterman’s appointment, NUS Deputy President Prof Tan Eng Chye said that Prof Chesterman “has the necessary experience and drive to make one of the top law schools in Asia even better”. When Prof Hor was asked by ST why he was "deemed not good enough for Singapore"? His answer is a diplomatic "I don't know". In any case, he told ST that he has been settling quite well since taking up his new post in HKU a month ago. "The faculty is supportive. The job is quite different from what I was doing in Singapore, where I was just a rank-and-file academic," he said cheerily. Noting that "NUS will never be as strong in North-east Asia, and the same for HKU in South-east Asia", he said the 2 rivals should look at collaborating instead. On whether he has discussed such plans with his former colleagues, he says with a laugh, "No, but it'd be easy. I know them so well!" Currently, HKU's law faculty is top in Asia, two spots ahead of NUS' in the QS World University Rankings. Prof Hor critical of some aspects of Singapore laws Prof Hor has been known to be critical of some aspects of the law. In particular, he has scrutinized the nature of section 8B(2) of the Internal Security Act. The Internal Security (Amendment) Act 1989 introduced section 8B(2), which is an ouster clause providing that no judicial review of orders made under the ISA shall be available save in relation to questions relating to the procedural requirements of the ISA. In other words, an ouster clause essentially is an attempt by the legislature to prevent an act or decision by a public authority from being challenged before the courts. Such clauses thus serve as a signal to decision-makers that they may operate without fear of intervention by the courts at a later stage. In Teo Soh Lung vs MHA, the Court of Appeal declined to address the constitutionality of section 8B and, in particular, how section 8B(2) should be interpreted. In his book Constitutionalism and Subversion – An Exploration published in 2009, Prof Hor described the judiciary’s reluctance to address these points as “an elegant piece of judicial ‘kung fu’.” Prof Hor obtained his first degree at NUS, and followed it up with a Bachelor of Civil Law at Oxford University. He also holds a Master of Laws degree from the University of Chicago.    Read More →