What do Gilbert Goh and Nigel Farage(right),the leader of the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) have in common?

They are both concerned with the negative effects of excessive and uncontrolled immigration on their country's social fabric,culture and language (in the case of the UK,religion) ,and the economy as well.

And both men have been accused by critics of being xenophobic,racist and bigots.

But what is different is that while our current world's highest paid PM Lee Hsien Loong loves to hide in his ivory tower(the Istana or I Satan) and uses name calling and labelling to fend off his critics and deflect criticism of his government's immigration policies,the British PM and leader of the Tories David Cameron seemed to have gamely accepted the challenge of a televised debate with Nigel Farage and the leader of the Green Party.

In fact,an opinion poll has shown that 51% of Britons felt David Cameron would be a coward if he doesn't agree to a televised debate with Farage.

At least Mr David Cameron,despite collecting just a fraction of what our PM gets in a year,has more balls than our Pinky Lee Hsien Loong,isn't it?

FYI,the United Kingdom has 3 main TV networks (BBC,ITV and Sky) hosting 3 debates:The first is an one on one between Labour (Ed Miliband) and Tory,the second between the 3 main parties(Labour,Tory and Lib Dem) and the final one involving 5 parties (including UKIP and Green).One of the debates would take place during the election campaign.The other two before the campaign.

The UKIP is now leading in opinion polls conducted before the upcoming European Parliamentary elections,ahead of traditional main parties like the Tories,Lib Dems and Labour.Even though the party is perceived by most voters as a party of xenophobes,racists and bigots.And Nigel Farage was widely seen as the winner in a recent televised one on one debate with the Lib Dem leader and Deputy PM Nick Clegg.

Liew Chin Fu

*Comment first appeared on https://www.facebook.com/liew.chinfu/posts/452219691591436

KUALA LUMPUR — A Malaysian opposition lawmaker was charged today (May 6) with sedition over a satirical video clip that sparked protests by Islamic groups, in a move she said was aimed at weakening an opposition alliance.

Teresa Kok, a senior member of the Democratic Action Party, pleaded not guilty to producing the 11-minute clip titled Onederful Malaysia.

In the Malay language video, she interviewed three panellists on their predictions for the Chinese New Year that poked fun at a range of domestic issues. Part of the clip deemed seditious included jokes on Malaysia being a dangerous country due to kidnappings on Borneo island, and the country’s education system.

Kok said the charge against her was an attempt by the government to cripple opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim’s three-party alliance after its strong showing in general elections last year.

Anwar was convicted on charges of sodomy and in March sentenced to five years in jail. He has slammed the verdict as politically motivated and is appealing the conviction. Another opposition lawmaker was also found guilty of sedition in February, but he later died in an accident.

Kok criticised Prime Minister Najib Razak for failing to keep his promise made in 2012 to repeal the draconian Sedition Act. If convicted, she faces up to three years in prison.

“Prosecuting me over a simple political satire not only shows how hollow and insincere is the prime minister’s promise to repeal the Sedition Act. It also shows the extent of political darkness that has descended on this nation after the last general election,” Kok said.

Mr Najib’s ruling coalition won the polls in May last year, but lost the popular vote for the first time to Anwar’s opposition alliance.

More than 300 police reports have been lodged against Kok over the video. Muslim groups smeared chicken blood on a poster of Kok and other opposition leaders as well as offered a 1,200 ringgit (S$460) reward to anyone who can slap Kok for insulting the Malay leadership and Islam.

About 60 per cent of Malaysia’s 29 million people are Malay Muslims.

Watch the videos here:

Source: AP

My conservative estimate is that new citizens (less than 15 years of stay in Singapore) constitute about 10% to 15% of voters in Singapore. They will be the most crucial and critical voting block for PAP in the coming General Elections. PAP has the statistics and that is why PAP has started to shift their policy direction towards "new citizen-foreigners" specific because the winning margin for any crucial constituency is less than 5% only.

Last year alone, over 20,000 citizenship have been issued out. Thus, the deliberate promotion of "pro-foreigners" speech despite of the uproar from some Singaporeans is really a calculative move. The assumption made is that those who are against 6.9 million population are opposition supporters anyway. They can't possibly win their votes thus, it would be better for them to focus on these new citizens' votes which will be critical to their hold on to power. In fact, by doing so, the uproar from opposition supporters will become a natural push factor for new citizens to vote PAP!

Nevertheless, even if I am to contest again in next GE (I have not decided on this yet), even if I know I may just lose a lot of votes from these new citizens and eventually, lose the elections, I will stand firm on what is right and what is wrong. We should defend our sovereignty and not prostitute our Nation's dignity just for the sake of winning elections. We should not just keep quiet for fear of losing these votes from new citizens. If foreigners have broken our law, then we should stand firm to get it right. If foreigners have trespassed our sovereignty, then it is our duty to raise the red flag to defend our sovereignty. Else, we may face the similar situation that Ancient China have in the past...

Goh Meng Seng

*Article first appeared on https://www.facebook.com/notes/goh-meng-seng-singaporeanfirst/the-reason...

Recently a petition has been circulated online calling on the PM to resign over the remarks he made at a community event in AMK.

The particularly offensive lines were, “Singaporeans, new arrivals,  people who are on permanent  residence here, people who are on employment pass here, all participating in one big Singapore family…So we feel that this is a place which is special, which belongs to all of us and where we all celebrate one another’s festivals and happy events together.”  

These lines  seemed to imply that Singapore belonged to everyone living here, including expat bankers, tax dodging billionaires, even abused cheap foreign labour, rather than to the citizens whose menfolk have to give up a considerable portion of their lifetime earnings to save the PAP the cost of employing a professional army and police force. 

I and the Reform team will be visiting AMK this Saturday  so if you were angered  by these words we hope you are able to come and join us.

Strangely in this last week I have been astonished to meet two stateless people here in Singapore. By the PM’s definition Singapore belongs to them as they have been living here longer than the state has existed. It is surely special when everyone else can belong but if you are of minority descent, you can be stateless.

While at one level his remarks might appear innocuous and merely aimed at fostering goodwill between Singaporeans and our huge expat population, on another they are a kind of Freudian slip giving a clue to how the PAP really think about ordinary Singaporeans. It seems I have a psychic channel into their heads or at the least the PM’s speech writer because I had warned people about his mindset only last week. As I said in my article of 2 May, “When Immigration Stops Being The Elephant in The Room”,

“To the PAP, Singaporeans have no value in themselves. The only value is in the real estate and then only because of Singapore’s strategic position. The PAP’s ideal is to dispense with citizens altogether and just have a disenfranchised global population who come to Singapore to work and then go home or get deported without ever being a burden on State services.”

There’s a speech writer out there who needs firing. Where has he been living. or is he just another Foreign Talent oblivious to the feeling on the ground.

The petition is aiming for  100,000 signatures or roughly 5% of the electorate calling on the PM to resign and hold fresh elections. Unfortunately even with that number it would have no weight given our Constitution and system of government.

 I agree wholeheartedly with the idea that the people should be able to recall elected officials and force them to submit to fresh elections. This should be part of a wider extension of democracy, which is becoming ever easier as nearly everyone is online. As in the US, petitions to repeal or initiate legislation should be possible as well as recalls.

I quote from that release:

The Reform Party therefore calls for a constitutional amendment to mandate the holding of a referendum if, say, 5% of the electorate signed a petition calling for it.  This could be similar to the practice in many US states. In California this allows the people to initiate laws or to repeal unpopular ones as well as the right to approve constitutional amendments.

Further debate would be needed. Recalls should probably require a much higher percentage of the electorate to be successful. In California it was 12% . Some US states require there to be allegations of misconduct which can be challenged legally before there can be a recall petition. It is unlikely therefore that they would be successful here where our courts have ruled that the citizens cannot challenge the legality of government actions unless they can prove they have suffered special damage, in the case of my action to have the IMF loan commitment declared unconstitutional.

So without any mechanism the petition is just another flight of fantasy and will have as much effect on the PAP and PM Lee as dogs howling at the moon. How can we have such advanced democratic machinery when we lack even the fundamental building blocks of a functioning democracy?  Singaporeans may be rightly angry with the PM but there is a massive  disconnect that prevents that anger  on the ground from bringing about change.

One of the causes is  the mistaken but still potent fear that people have, particularly older voters, that their vote is not secret. MARUAH estimated that about 10% of Singaporeans in the last election feared that their vote was not secret. I firmly believe that the government cannot find out how you voted. However that does not stop the PAP from playing on those fears and threatening the withholding of state resources such as HDB upgrading if the voters in a particular constituency vote against them. The surprising thing is that the PAP continue to use the same threats today as they used to illegally sway the election at Cheng San in 1997 though they have diminishing power to scare the electorate. It is for this reason that I have repeatedly called for Singaporeans to be given the freehold of their HDBs and for government control over the economy to be reduced through the privatization of Temasek and GIC.

Secondly there is the whole system of GRCs that was put in place. I have written on this subject many times before. The deliberate creation of ever larger GRCs together with the raising of election deposits to levels where only the elite could stand for election acted as a significant deterrent to having all seats contested or bringing in new blood and new ideas.

In fact in 2001 the PAP were returned to power on Nomination Day before elections were even held. while in 2006 they gained nearly half the seats unopposed. Even in 2011, where elections took place in all but one the GRC ( thank you Ng Teck Siong), the system magnified the winner-takes-all nature of the First-Past-The-Post (FPTP) method of election to such an extent that again the PAP ended up with over 90% of the seats though they got only 60% of the vote.

The major symptom of this disconnect is that people will just put up with so much.  Austerity, a lack of universal health care and free education, no true property ownership, a government which year after year makes massive surpluses but refuses to account for its performance or to share them with the people.  All this seems to come from being brainwashed by a PAP-controlled media  and education system, as well as the pressure to conform during NS, into believing mistakenly that Singaporeans are much better off than citizens of other freer countries. My father told them to wake up from their slumbers and cast off their chains. But even if they were to do that the means to translate that into more representation in Parliament and a change of government have been deliberately weakened.

So the writers of this petition are kidding themselves if they think the PAP will introduce any form of direct democracy. They have gerrymandered and manipulated the electoral process to thwart the peoples’ will. They have disenfranchised us to such an extent that the PM really believes his constituency is some kind of global expatriate rather than the people of Singapore. He prefers the company of CEOs of MNCs and global pundits to Singaporeans even though it appears he finds it difficult to string an intelligent sentence together if he is not being cosseted by his well-paid PR minders.

Forget recalls!  I would like to see a petition penned by all the alternative parties in a rare sign of solidarity. That would get some signatures. Lets start with some of the most basic requirements for democracy:

Without pushing for these basic reforms first, a call for the PM to resign and hold fresh elections is just a fruitless and frivolous exercise.

Some have criticised the petition as disrespectful to the PM. But how can we respect him when his mandate has never properly been tested? He got into Parliament on a walkover in 1991. Until 2006 his GRC was not contested. Then the WP sent a team of Young Guns there but did very little campaigning. In 2011 he only had to face a last-minute scratch team of youngsters from the Reform Party. His is the only remaining six-member GRC.  If he wants our respect he should abolish the restrictions on free and fair elections. In addition he should come out and contest an election in an SMC.

Unfortunately there is no chance that the PAP will ever willingly abolish the restrictions that tilt the playing field so much in their favour.  The PM can and will continue to laugh at us from behind the walls of his GRC while  impressing foreign pundits and MNCs  that he has found a new economic model to disenfranchise his citizens in favour of a new global elite. Until Singaporeans wake up from their suicidal resignation, the dogs will continue howling at the moon.

Kenneth Jeyaretnam

Secretary-General of the Reform Party

*The author blogs at http://sonofadud.com

Recently a petition has been circulated online calling on the PM to resign over the remarks he made at a community event in AMK.

The particularly offensive lines were, “Singaporeans, new arrivals,  people who are on permanent  residence here, people who are on employment pass here, all participating in one big Singapore family…So we feel that this is a place which is special, which belongs to all of us and where we all celebrate one another’s festivals and happy events together.”  

These lines  seemed to imply that Singapore belonged to everyone living here, including expat bankers, tax dodging billionaires, even abused cheap foreign labour, rather than to the citizens whose menfolk have to give up a considerable portion of their lifetime earnings to save the PAP the cost of employing a professional army and police force. 

I and the Reform team will be visiting AMK this Saturday  so if you were angered  by these words we hope you are able to come and join us.

Strangely in this last week I have been astonished to meet two stateless people here in Singapore. By the PM’s definition Singapore belongs to them as they have been living here longer than the state has existed. It is surely special when everyone else can belong but if you are of minority descent, you can be stateless.

While at one level his remarks might appear innocuous and merely aimed at fostering goodwill between Singaporeans and our huge expat population, on another they are a kind of Freudian slip giving a clue to how the PAP really think about ordinary Singaporeans. It seems I have a psychic channel into their heads or at the least the PM’s speech writer because I had warned people about his mindset only last week. As I said in my article of 2 May, “When Immigration Stops Being The Elephant in The Room”,

“To the PAP, Singaporeans have no value in themselves. The only value is in the real estate and then only because of Singapore’s strategic position. The PAP’s ideal is to dispense with citizens altogether and just have a disenfranchised global population who come to Singapore to work and then go home or get deported without ever being a burden on State services.”

There’s a speech writer out there who needs firing. Where has he been living. or is he just another Foreign Talent oblivious to the feeling on the ground.

The petition is aiming for  100,000 signatures or roughly 5% of the electorate calling on the PM to resign and hold fresh elections. Unfortunately even with that number it would have no weight given our Constitution and system of government.

 I agree wholeheartedly with the idea that the people should be able to recall elected officials and force them to submit to fresh elections. This should be part of a wider extension of democracy, which is becoming ever easier as nearly everyone is online. As in the US, petitions to repeal or initiate legislation should be possible as well as recalls.

I quote from that release:

The Reform Party therefore calls for a constitutional amendment to mandate the holding of a referendum if, say, 5% of the electorate signed a petition calling for it.  This could be similar to the practice in many US states. In California this allows the people to initiate laws or to repeal unpopular ones as well as the right to approve constitutional amendments.

Further debate would be needed. Recalls should probably require a much higher percentage of the electorate to be successful. In California it was 12% . Some US states require there to be allegations of misconduct which can be challenged legally before there can be a recall petition. It is unlikely therefore that they would be successful here where our courts have ruled that the citizens cannot challenge the legality of government actions unless they can prove they have suffered special damage, in the case of my action to have the IMF loan commitment declared unconstitutional.

So without any mechanism the petition is just another flight of fantasy and will have as much effect on the PAP and PM Lee as dogs howling at the moon. How can we have such advanced democratic machinery when we lack even the fundamental building blocks of a functioning democracy?  Singaporeans may be rightly angry with the PM but there is a massive  disconnect that prevents that anger  on the ground from bringing about change.

One of the causes is  the mistaken but still potent fear that people have, particularly older voters, that their vote is not secret. MARUAH estimated that about 10% of Singaporeans in the last election feared that their vote was not secret. I firmly believe that the government cannot find out how you voted. However that does not stop the PAP from playing on those fears and threatening the withholding of state resources such as HDB upgrading if the voters in a particular constituency vote against them. The surprising thing is that the PAP continue to use the same threats today as they used to illegally sway the election at Cheng San in 1997 though they have diminishing power to scare the electorate. It is for this reason that I have repeatedly called for Singaporeans to be given the freehold of their HDBs and for government control over the economy to be reduced through the privatization of Temasek and GIC.

Secondly there is the whole system of GRCs that was put in place. I have written on this subject many times before. The deliberate creation of ever larger GRCs together with the raising of election deposits to levels where only the elite could stand for election acted as a significant deterrent to having all seats contested or bringing in new blood and new ideas.

In fact in 2001 the PAP were returned to power on Nomination Day before elections were even held. while in 2006 they gained nearly half the seats unopposed. Even in 2011, where elections took place in all but one the GRC ( thank you Ng Teck Siong), the system magnified the winner-takes-all nature of the First-Past-The-Post (FPTP) method of election to such an extent that again the PAP ended up with over 90% of the seats though they got only 60% of the vote.

The major symptom of this disconnect is that people will just put up with so much.  Austerity, a lack of universal health care and free education, no true property ownership, a government which year after year makes massive surpluses but refuses to account for its performance or to share them with the people.  All this seems to come from being brainwashed by a PAP-controlled media  and education system, as well as the pressure to conform during NS, into believing mistakenly that Singaporeans are much better off than citizens of other freer countries. My father told them to wake up from their slumbers and cast off their chains. But even if they were to do that the means to translate that into more representation in Parliament and a change of government have been deliberately weakened.

So the writers of this petition are kidding themselves if they think the PAP will introduce any form of direct democracy. They have gerrymandered and manipulated the electoral process to thwart the peoples’ will. They have disenfranchised us to such an extent that the PM really believes his constituency is some kind of global expatriate rather than the people of Singapore. He prefers the company of CEOs of MNCs and global pundits to Singaporeans even though it appears he finds it difficult to string an intelligent sentence together if he is not being cosseted by his well-paid PR minders.

Forget recalls!  I would like to see a petition penned by all the alternative parties in a rare sign of solidarity. That would get some signatures. Lets start with some of the most basic requirements for democracy:

Without pushing for these basic reforms first, a call for the PM to resign and hold fresh elections is just a fruitless and frivolous exercise.

Some have criticised the petition as disrespectful to the PM. But how can we respect him when his mandate has never properly been tested? He got into Parliament on a walkover in 1991. Until 2006 his GRC was not contested. Then the WP sent a team of Young Guns there but did very little campaigning. In 2011 he only had to face a last-minute scratch team of youngsters from the Reform Party. His is the only remaining six-member GRC.  If he wants our respect he should abolish the restrictions on free and fair elections. In addition he should come out and contest an election in an SMC.

Unfortunately there is no chance that the PAP will ever willingly abolish the restrictions that tilt the playing field so much in their favour.  The PM can and will continue to laugh at us from behind the walls of his GRC while  impressing foreign pundits and MNCs  that he has found a new economic model to disenfranchise his citizens in favour of a new global elite. Until Singaporeans wake up from their suicidal resignation, the dogs will continue howling at the moon.

Kenneth Jeyaretnam

*The writer blogs at http://sonofadud.com/

It’s the 3rd anniversary of GE2011 today and supposedly mid of current term. I randomly googled and found this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfIguU1mVIY) which summed up my rollercoaster emotions after 2 months of hard campaigning as a then-newbie. So many people came along the way to help an inexperienced politician. We started with just 2-3 persons walking daily in the first week after I was selected to lead the thrust into Joo Chiat, and it grew into a fairly large team by the end of the campaign. So many residents encouraging us along the way, getting our share of brick-brats, old friends that I found again and many new friends made, and the 5 kg I lost through the daily door-to-door house visits (Alas, the 5 kg was gained back too quickly afterwards and in the wrong places too :>).

Polling day was a mix bag of emotions: Casting my vote at St Pats first thing in morning, then moving from station to station to encourage my polling agents, bumping into residents after their voting who cheered me on, and the tense 2 hours of counting. Up one moment, down the next, and not knowing the results for certain until the last numbers were in. I was asked if I wanted a recount, because it fell just at the allowed 2% limit. I knew it was quite fruitless as I had witnessed the counting and it was impossible to have a 2% error, but we called the recount anyway just to be absolutely certain.

Then began the long drive from Victoria JC counting station to Hougang where we were to assemble for the final results with WP supporters. The two months of events and words in the daily gruelling campaign kept playing through my mind in the 30-min drive: What I could have done better that would have changed the result and the hopes of people which I could not fulfil.

One that kept flashing through my mind was that of the retired teacher who phoned me a few days before polling to say “I have been voting for many years with my head. I now believe I must be true to my heart. I am a retiree. I wish to give you something but I have nothing to give. I can only give you my vote.” She was voting for the opposition for the first time. Hers and the hopes of many I met along the way weighed heavily on me as I delivered the short speech in that video, choked with sadness that I had to disappoint them.

I was glad though that the day ended with the major breakthrough of a GRC going to the opposition for the first time, that supposedly impenetrable fortress designed to keep the opposition from playing any big role in local politics. It led the way to two more consecutive by-election victories for the WP subsequently.

Enough of recollections on this GE2011 anniversary morning and back to the long work to build for the future.

Yee Jenn Jong
Non-constituency Member of Parliament

Source: Yee Jenn Jong’s blog

In a blog post today, Khaw Boon Wan wrote about how successful the Senior's Studio Apartment Scheme has been in supporting retirement needs.

He explained that on average, senior citizens have been able to unlock about $200,000 from the downgrading to studio apartments after paying off their old mortgages and the new studio flats.

He wrote that in the last 8 years, there have been about 7,600 studio apartments booked. Of these, 70% have been downgrades from 3 and 4 room flats.

Praising the efforts so far, Khaw Boon Wan wrote that the studio apartments have been planned well, giving an example of the recent set of studio apartments at Kampung Admiralty.

These flats are close to amenities like hawker centres, healthcare, childcare and eldercare as well as being integrated with regular flats so that seniors can choose to live near their children and grandchildren.

“We will continue to experiment and try out new layouts to see what will work best for our seniors, and to enable them to age actively where they live, in their familiar HDB town,” wrote Khaw. 

Singapore Democrats

Our post Why do we do this to our children? has garnered unprecedented attention with more than 1,000 FB shares – and counting. It shows that Singaporeans are deeply concerned about how the education system is turning our children into psychological wrecks and driving them to suicide.

To address this and other issues, the SDP is launching our education policy paperEducating for Creativity and Equality: An Agenda for Transformation on 17 May 2014.

As the title suggests, our policy focuses on developing an education system that fosters creativity and brings about a more equal society. We will be inviting Education Minister Heng Swee Keat and other MOE officials to the launch.

The emphasis on exams and streaming as well as the intense curricula in our school system not only exacts a heavy toll on our children but it also does little to advance our economy.

Singapore has to compete in a changed – and changing – world where a knowledge-based global economy demands creativity and innovation. Is our education system preparing our students for it?

The PAP says all the right things: When he was the education minister, Mr Teo Chee Hean assured us that, “What we have to do now is to go beyond teaching the basic literacy skills and focus on developing our students’ ability to think, assimilate information and knowledge, and apply this knowledge continually on their own.”

The Government even came up with catchy slogans like "Teach Less, Learn More" and"Thinking Schools, Learning Nation". The MOE tells us that it wants students to “think independently and critically” and “exercise initiative, take calculated risks, are innovative”.

Unfortunately, the rhetoric doesn't quite match the reality. The World Bank conducted a survey using the Knowledge Economy Index (KEI) to assess countries on how well their economies are adapted to, and prepared for, the knowledge economy. The top three positions, out of 146 countries, are (in order): Denmark, Sweden and Finland. Singapore ranks at only 25th.

And while we rank high on the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), the three Scandinavian countries are not far behind. In fact, Finland consistently ranks at or near the top of PISA and its education system is the most highly regarded in the world.

The important difference is that Finnish children achieve their standards without being subjected to the nightmarish experiences that our children are put through.

The KEI and PISA rankings indicate that while we drill our students hard in Mathematics and Science, the PAP's educational policies are not turning out students who are creative and have the ability to build a knowledge economy.

Academic Sudhir Vadaketh cited a financier who relocated to Singapore saying: “Although the [education] system has created many gifted technically capable people, it has done so at the cost of creativity and lateral thinking. I have found it much easier to succeed against ‘smarter’ competition in Singapore than any other country in which I have lived.”

The result is that while Sweden, Finland, and Denmark produce global companies like Ikea, Volvo, Nokia, Bang & Olufsen, Lego, Ericsson, Electrolux, etc, Singapore has little to sell to the world.

In a nutshell, we have an education system that puts an unconscionable amount of pressure on our children while doing little to prepare them for a future dependent on creativity and innovation.

For the sake of our children and the future of our economy, we need a rethink of our education system. The SDP's policy paper does this and, more importantly, draws up concrete proposals to overcome the problems of the current system and prepare us for what lies ahead.

To find out what these proposals are, join us next Saturday, 17 May 2014, for the public launch of our education policy paper.

Event: Public Launch of 'Educating for Creativity and Equality: An      Agenda for Transformation'
Date: 17 May 2014, Saturday
Time: 2-5 pm
Place: China Media Success, Action Room, #04-41 Bras Basah Complex, 231 Bain Street

Bibliography

1. Susan L. Robertson, ‘Producing’ knowledge economies: The World Bank, the KAM, Education and Development, Centre for Globalisation, Education and Societies, University of Bristol, 2008,

2. Address by RADM (NS) Teo Chee Hean, Minister for Education, at the Singapore Computer Society Annual Gala Dinner, 27 February 1999.

3. Why has Singapore failed to prepare its citizens adequately for the knowledge economy?, Sudhir Thomas Vadaketh, 17 May 2013

Source: YourSDP.org

The CPF Minimum Sum (MS) will be raised to $155,000 from July this year. The CPF Board's intention for the MS is to provide members with a monthly income of about $1000 (for those who have the entire MS in their retirement account) for 20 years from the drawdown age.

But there has been a lot of well-documented unhappiness about this MS scheme. For example, in December last year MP Lily Neo posted on her Facebook about how one of her resident was unhappy because Dr Neo "could not get CPF to allow him to withdraw his savings". During the "Free My Internet" protest at Speakers' Corner last year, I also observed a number of older men protesting with placards which read, "Free my CPF".

Prior to the introduction of this MS scheme in the year 1987, CPF members could withdraw all their savings in their ordinary account upon reaching the age of 55. The MS was $30,000 in that year. In the year 2000 the MS had risen to $65,000, or by 116 percent in 13 year. And Moneysmart pointed out in their article about how MS was further increased by 138 percent in the next 14 years, and is now at $155,000.

I am all for doing away with the MS scheme and allowing CPF members to withdraw the entire amount in their CPF ordinary account when the time comes, for the following reasons:
 

1. The money in a member's CPF account is hard-earned by the member alone. Upon reaching the withdrawal age, the Member can buy an annuity with it, or invest it in whatever way he or she wants and the Government should have no business dictating how the member should spend it. 
2. As Moneysmart pointed out in their article, wages in Singapore are unlikely to keep up with the annual CPF MS increase. 
3. Not a lot members have MS in their CPF upon reaching the age of 55. If you only receive $200 or $300 monthly from the MS scheme because you don't have enough MS, how will that support the member in having a basic standard of living in their retirement? 
4. Mr Lee Yock Suan, then-Minister for Labour, in introducing the MS scheme in 1987 said that the MS scheme is only a form of encouragement, and that it is the duty of children to look after their parents in their old age - which means that according to the PAP Government, with or without the MS scheme older people will be fine. 
5. If the Government wants older Singaporeans to live with dignity in their retirement, it should help them better plan for retirement. For example, legislation could require CPF members to buy insurance for retirement, which will guarantee him/her an income of at least $1000 upon retirement. Where the CPF member does not have enough in contribution to CPF to purchase such an insurance because his/her income is low, the Government can think of a top-up mechanism where the difference in paying for the premiums is shared by the Government and the employer of the CPF member.

We appreciate feedback, but please don’t misrepresent our efforts

I refer to your article (A PLEA TO SDP: PLEASE WORK HARDER IN SEMBAWANG GRC!) by ‘A frustrated Woodlands resident’. We thank the writer for his/her views.

However, we must also point out that there is a difference between urging the SDP to do more and making inaccurate statements. The writer says, or at least gives the impression, that the SDP does not dare to visit crowded places, that we are not serious in our effort and that we are contesting for the sake of contesting. This is wholly untrue.

The last elections was held in May 2011. In June that year, we were already on the ground meeting with residents (see here). We have continued with our ground work ever since, conducting regular and frequent walkabouts, house visits, block parties and kopi sessions over the last three years. We have posted these activities on our website and FB, and will leave readers to check them out.

We conduct walkabouts as they allow us to meet with more residents in a given period of time. Due to the nature of the activity, however, it is harder to have quality interaction with the people. We make up for this by doing house visits where we can spend more time with individual residents and households.

On top of these, we hold block parties to get to know our constituents and see if we can be of service to them. (However, we’ve have been told by a PAP-run Town Council that we cannot conduct these parties without a permit.)

The writer also refers to the by-election at Punggol East. We were out at Rivervale Mall on 6 January 2013 to meet voters and distribute flyers. That same morning we knocked on the doors of nearly 2,000 households in the constituency, that’s about 20 blocks of flats.

PM Lee Hsien Loong responded by calling for the by-election three days later.

Over the following few days, we visited 98% of the HDB households in the constituency often starting in the morning and working right through into the night. We only stopped when we decided to pull out because we did not want to risk splitting the opposition vote and letting the PAP win the election.

We are acutely aware that coming up with alternative policies and campaigning online is not enough. The only way we are going to get our message across to Singaporeans is through our walkabouts and house visits. This is why we are there at the hawker centres, along the corridors, in the kopitiams, and at the void-decks.

Singaporeans must understand, however, that elections are not a spectator sport. Our supporters cannot cheer us to victory. Parties are elected because supporters physically help out. But we do not ask our supporters to do the work while we take it easy. When our volunteers take one step, we will take ten.

Is the SDP going all out in our ground campaign? Absolutely. Can we do even more? Of course, we can. That is why we continue to put out appeals for volunteers. More volunteers means reaching out to more voters. To those of you who have responded to our appeals, we say a heartfelt thank you. To those of you who would like to help, please click here. Our next activity is on 25 May 2014.

The SDP welcomes and appreciates feedback because we learn from it and become a stronger party. But we ask that our efforts not be misrepresented.

BRYAN LIM

Head, Ground Operations

Singapore Democratic Party

SPREADING THE BENEFITS OF HIP

We refer to the Kaki Bukit Citizens Consultative Committee’s letter dated 28 Apr 2014 which has been put up on People’s Association noticeboards in the Kaki Bukit ward of Aljunied GRC. The letter states that the Aljunied-Hougang-Punggol East Town Council (AHPETC) did not nominate any blocks in the Kaki Bukit ward of Aljunied GRC for the HDB Home Improvement Programme (HIP) for 2014.

In nominating clusters of blocks for the HIP, AHPETC considers the age of the blocks as well as the need to ensure that, over time and in the interest of fairness to all residents, all wards across the Town Council are nominated for such upgrading projects. As a mature town with in excess of 700 blocks of flats, AHPETC hosts many old blocks of flats in addition to those in Kaki Bukit. The exception is Punggol East SMC, which has newer blocks that do not qualify for HIP.

For the years 2012 and 2013, AHPETC nominated various clusters in the Eunos, Hougang, Paya Lebar and Kaki Bukit wards for the HIP program. The Kaki Bukit cluster (Blocks 533 to 536) was eventually selected by HDB for 2013. For 2014, the Town Council nominated clusters in the Bedok Reservoir-Punggol, Serangoon and Paya Lebar wards for the HIP. HDB selected the clusters in Bedok Reservoir-Punggol and Serangoon wards for FY 2014.

HIP is a national programme that commenced around 2008. When the current TC management took over in 2011, many HIP-eligible blocks including those in Kaki Bukit had not yet been nominated nor chosen for HIP. The HDB has since announced that it would ramp up the HIP project, increasing the number of eligible units per year from 28,000 units to 35,000 units. Next year, we will nominate more clusters for HIP and look forward to HDB’s fair consideration of the nominations.          

ALJUNIED-HOUGANG-PUNGGOL EAST TOWN COUNCIL
9 May 2014

让所有居民都公平受惠于家居改进计划

加基武吉公民咨询委员会在阿裕尼集选区属下加基武吉选区内，人民协会的布告板上张贴一封日期为2014年4月28日的信函。该信函说加基武吉选区内没有任何一座组屋获得阿裕尼-后港-榜鹅东市镇理事会提名参与2014年的家居改进计划（HIP）。

市镇会谨此澄清，阿裕尼-后港-榜鹅东市镇会在提名组屋群参与家居改进计划时，不但考虑组屋的屋龄，同时也致力确保市镇会管辖范围内所有选区的组屋，最终都能获提名参与这项翻新计划，这样才对所有的居民公平。阿裕尼-后港-榜鹅东市镇会管辖范围内的市镇中，有700多座组屋，除了加基武吉区，其他选区内也有不少屋龄较高的组屋。当中唯有榜鹅东单选区例外，该区内的组屋相对较新，因此暂时没有资格参与家居改进计划。

在2012年和2013年期间，阿裕尼-后港-榜鹅东市镇会提名了友诺士、后港、巴耶利峇以及加基武吉区内多个组屋群参与家居改进计划。在2013年，加基武吉区的组屋群（大牌533至536组屋）获建屋局选定展开家居改进计划。2014年，市镇会提名了勿洛水池-榜鹅、实龙岗以及巴耶利峇区内的组屋群参与家居改进计划，获得建屋局选定展开家居改进计划的是勿洛水池-榜鹅以及实龙岗区的组屋群。

家居改进计划是一项于2008年开始推展的全国性计划。市镇会现任管理层在2011年接手管理市镇会时，有多座符合条件参与家居改进计划的组屋，都还未被提名或选中参与家居改进计划，当中就包括加基武吉区内的组屋。建屋局较早前刚宣布该局将加快推展家居改进计划的步伐，以便把可受惠的组屋单位从原本每年2万8000个，增加到3万5000个。明年，我们将提名更多组屋群参与家居改进计划，届时希望建屋局能公平又合理地考虑市镇会所提呈的组屋群名单。

阿裕尼-后港-榜鹅东市镇理事会
2014年5月9日

Source: http://www.ahpetc.sg/spreading-the-benefits-of-hip

The decline in global rankings of Malaysia’s public universities does not reflect the overall situation for local tertiary education, said Datuk Seri Idris Jusoh, adding that emphasis should be placed on the entire learning process rather than rankings alone.

The Second Education Minister said this in response to the failure of local public universities to make the list in the annual Times Higher Education (THE) Top 100 Universities under 50 years old.

“Rankings don’t mean everything, although we can improve (our performance). We must be realistic when aiming for a position.

Malaysia failed to get on the list of the prestigious THE rankings now into its second year. In the first rankings list in 2012, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) was ranked 98th.“If we are too focused on climbing the ranks, we may neglect the teaching and studying process,” Idris (pic) told a press conference at Universiti Putra Malaysia in Serdang today.

The bad showing comes hot on the heels of Putrajaya's claim that Malaysia has one of the best education systems in the world – better than United States, Britain and Germany.

Read the rest of the article here: http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/malaysian-varsities-...

Our education system is outmoded: It is stifles creativity and favours the rich. Yet, creativity and equality are the two factors that will determine if Singapore succeeds or fails as a nation.

In our previous post, we explained how our school system is killing the creative potential in our children and rendering our economy uncompetitive (read here). The emphasis on exams and streaming not only inflicts heavy psychological trauma on our children but also kills off creativity in them.

An equally important issue that our education system has created is inequality. Already, Singapore has one of the biggest gaps between the rich and poor. The education system exacerbates this disparity.

The PAP says that its policies are based on the concept of meritocracy. But for meritocracy to work, the system must enable fair competition. Under the PAP, power and privilege is amassed in the hands of a small group of the elite. The Economist compiled the Crony-Capitalism Index, a measure of countries where politically connected businessmen are most likely to prosper, in which Singapore ranked fifth.

The pernicious effects of inequality is maintained by our education system in at least three ways:

Private tuition. Our education process is structured in such a way that private tuition has become a necessity. This means that students from poor family backgrounds who are unable to afford such expensive tutoring are disadvantaged. As a consequence, they perform less well in exams and are placed in lower-ranked streams.

Instead of giving them a leg up, our education system puts those already at a disadvantage further down the totem pole. It is not surprising that academic failure and school drop-out rates rise dramatically among needy families. This creates a culture of poverty, perpetuating the vicious cycle.

Elite schools. Many of our elite schools are located in wealthier residential districts, making it more difficult for lower-income families to register their children in such schools. While nearly 90 percent of Singaporeans live in HDB flats, only 40 percent attend top-ranking, elite primary schools.

Of course, the government denies elite schools get better treatment. PM Lee Hsien Loong said: “I believe we can make every school a good school and we have done a lot of that to ensure that every school provides a good education for the students."

This view was challenged by Jurong West Secondary School's Vice-Principal Pushparani Nadarajah: "How many of our leaders and top officers who say that every school is a good school put their children in ordinary schools near their homes? Until they do so, parents are not going to buy it." The comment was met with applause from an audience of teachers and principals.

Pre-school. Rich parents pay in excess of $20,000 a year for their children to attend top private kindergartens in preparation for primary school whereas poorer children skip pre-school altogether because their parents can’t afford it. When a child enters Primary 1, she is expected to possess basic literacy and numeracy skills. This puts poorer children at a distinct handicap.

The Government does not provide a nation-wide pre-school programme. In fact, the Starting Well Index, compiled by the Economic Intelligence Unit which measures the availability, affordability and quality of early childhood education, ranked Singapore a dismal 29th out of 45 countries in 2012.  

To overcome these problems, we need an education system that gives all children equal opportunity to perform to the best of their abilities. To apply the analogy of a 100-metre race: Competitors will run at different speeds and hit the tape at different times, but all must start at the same starting point.

Education is the most potent tool to dismantle the current rigid and unfair elitist system and build a society where everyone begins the race at the same starting point; it is the best weapon that society can wield in its fight against inequality and poverty.

The SDP will unveil our policies to achieve this objective when we launch our paperEducating For Creativity and Equality: An Agenda For Transformation this Saturday. We invite you to join us then.

Event: Public Launch of "Educating for Creativity and Equality: An Agenda for Transformation"
Date: 17 May 2014, Saturday
Time: 2-5 pm
Venue: Chinese Success Media, Action Room, #04-41 Bras Basah Complex, 231 Bain Street, Singapore 180231

Source: YourSDP.org

Dear The Real Singapore,

I contributed this bibliography about Francis Seow to Wikipedia and I thought you should share it as well. This is what will happen to you guys if you guys continue to criticize the PAP.

Singapore is not a democratic nation at all.
 

Read his full story here:

Francis Seow (Chinese: 萧添寿; pinyin: Xiāo Tiānshòu; born 1928) is a Singapore-born American political dissident who is in exile from Singapore after lawsuits by the former Prime Minister Lee Kwan Yew. He was educated at Saint Joseph's Institution in Singapore and at theMiddle Temple in London. Seow is currently a United States citizen residing in Massachusetts, and was a Visiting Fellow at Harvard Law School.

Seow joined the Singapore Legal Service in 1956 and rose through the ranks to become Solicitor-General in 1969, a position he held until 1971. During his career he served under the administration of then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew and was appointed senior counsel to a Commission of Inquiry in the Secondary IV examination boycott by Chinese students in 1963 prior to Singapore's entry into Malaysia. For his work, Seow was awarded the Public Administration (Gold) Medal. He eventually left public service and entered into private law practice in 1972.

He was later suspended from law practice for 12 months by Chief Justice Wee Chong Jin for breach of an undertaking given on behalf of his junior law partner to the Attorney-General while in private practice. Nonetheless, he was later elected a member of the Council of the Law Society in 1976 and eventually became its President in 1986.

His new appointment led to a falling out with Lee Kuan Yew after he became embroiled in the politics surrounding the role of the Law Society. He had envisaged a restoration of the role of the Law Society to, inter alia, comment on legislation that the government was then churning out without any meaningful parliamentary debate, a role which Prime Minister Lee took especial exception to. In the result, Prime Minister Lee caused special legislation to be passed depriving the Law Society of any powers to comment on any legislation unless the government specifically asks the Law Society for its comments. He ran for the Parliament of Singapore as part of the Workers' Party team that contested theEunos Group Representation Constituency in the 1988 general election. However, his team managed to secure 49.11% of valid votes, losing marginally to the PAP stronghold.

Just before the election, he was detained without trial under the Internal Security Act for 72 days, accused of having received political Campaign finance from the United States to promote democracy in Singapore. According to his account, he was subjected to torture, including sleep deprivation and intense cold air-conditioning. Later, while awaiting trial for alleged tax evasion, he left for United States for health treatment and disregarded numerous court summons to return for trial.^[1][2] Subsequently, he was convicted in absentia. These events are speculated to have been politically motivated, and part of a pattern of lawsuits and criminal proceedings against dissenters in Singapore. Despite his exile he has spoken at events organized by Singapore student societies in universities outside of Singapore.

In a 1989 interview in London, Seow told The Sunday Times that he would return to Singapore to face tax evasion charges.^[2]

On 16 October 2007, Amnesty International issued a public statement that mentioned Seow as one of two prominent lawyers who had been penalized for exercising their right to express their opinions. Amnesty International named him a "prisoner of conscience."^[3]

On October 8, 2011, Seow with exiled dissident lawyer Tang Fong Har publicly addressed a Singapore Democratic Party forum from abroad via teleconferencing.^[4] Singapore Police were investigating the legality of the event the following day.^[5]

Seow has two sons and two daughters.

Francis Seow tells his story in the semi-autobiographical To Catch a Tartar: A Dissident in Lee Kuan Yew's Prison.^[6] In the book, Seow recounts his career in the legal service, opposition politics and his personal experience of being detained by the Internal Security Department. He also accuses the government of Singapore of authoritarianism and human rights abuses under then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew. The book also contains a foreword by former President Devan Nair that is equally critical of the Singapore government. Since then Seow has written another book, The Media Enthralled, which describes how he believes the Singapore government undermined freedom of the media and turned them into pro-government mouthpieces. He is also author of Beyond Suspicion? - The Singapore Judiciary.

Background Story: YOUTH PAP MAKES ILLEGAL PARTY POLITICAL FILM?

In response to the viral video of the robotic youth pap branch members, the PAP has issued a response through their facebook page:

"Many of you might have watched the YP video clip from last year's Party Convention and have been discussing about it. 

We would like to take this opportunity to thank our YP activist for their tireless work on the ground over the years. We did not expect that our humble (raw and unpolished) in-house production would go viral like this.

We are proud of our YP folks, and what they have been doing on the ground; working hard to serve the people. Their effort was genuine and sincere. It reflects their spirit of activism – to serve our nation and to care for our fellow Singaporeans. 

Thank you again YP for your courage, dedication and hard work!"

KUANTAN: Islam is now being tested aggressively by an ideology which can be termed as "human rights-ism", warned Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak.

The Prime Minister said the ideology was like a new "religion" growing rapidly inside and outside the country.

"This type of understanding is based on humanism and secularism as well as liberalism.

"It is retrograde as it glorifies human wants and desires," Najib said at the opening of the National Quran Recital Competition here Tuesday night.

He said "human rights-ism" rejected the values of religion and etiquette, but was instead wrapped in an image of struggling for basic rights.

Najib said Islam already protected the rights of all, regardless of race, language or religion.

"However, in this age of globalisation, there are attempts to spread retrograde values such as pluralism and liberalism by linking it to Islam. It is very dangerous to our faith.

"Of course, we will not tolerate any demands for apostasy to be allowed, or for Muslims' rights to implement Islamic teachings through the Syariah Court to be denied.

"What more for deviant movements like the LGBT to be recognised and permitted," said Najib.

Source: http://www.thestar.com.my/News/Nation/2014/05/13/Najib-human-rightsism-a...

An Open Letter by the Secretary-General of the Reform Party to NUSSPA Asking Why Reform Party Were Not Invited to The Young Guns Forum 2014

18A Smith Street
Singapore 058932

16th May 2014

Mr Aw Yong Zhi Yong
Vice President (Projects)
NUS Students’ Political Association
National University of Singapore

Dear Sir,

It has come to my attention that you organised an event on 29 January 2014 entitled Young Guns Forum 2014. Four parties were invited: the Workers Party, the PAP, NSP and SDP. No invitation was extended to the Reform Party.

This was despite the fact that we fielded 11 candidates in GE2011 and our share of the national vote was slightly more than 4%. As the theme of the forum was new arrivals on the Singapore political scene then as the first new party in Singapore to contest an election for decades we were surely the perfect fit..

More importantly we are a new party with young blood and seriously new ideas, which have never been advocated before in Singapore. These include giving HDB owners the freehold of their property and listing Temasek and GIC publicly and distributing shares to Singaporeans. We were the first to point out the hollow nature of the so called Singapore economic miracle and how it is driven by a massive increase in population without any underlying rise in productivity.

Reform Party was the only party that was prepared to send a Young Guns team to Ang Mo Kio in the last election to take on the PM, in the interests of democracy. Despite the relative inexperience of the team and the lack of previous grassroots work, our contesting that constituency provoked the PM into spending close to the maximum allowed under the Parliamentary Elections Act. AMK is in the history books as being the constituency with the biggest spend of any party in GE 2011 all caused by our young guns. A real competition can only have a positive effect in encouraging new ideas.

Since GE 2011 we have remained one of the most politically active parties. Our Youth Wing is very active, not just in cyberspace, but on the ground. What is remarkable is that they reach out across the generational divide, helping both old and young victims of deliberately callous and shortsighted PAP policies.

Given the above, it is only reasonable that you provide a satisfactory explanation for why Reform Party was excluded from the forum. This is particularly important given that NUS is a government-funded state university. The PAP government already censors us in every possible way and imposes a blackout in the State media on our ideas. It would appear that they are using their power over funding to deny us a voice in the national university as well.

Jim Sleeper voiced his concerns in the Huffington Post in 2012 (see link) over the new Yale-NUS liberal arts college and lack of political freedom on campus:

“My suspicions only intensified as I conversed online with Kenneth Jeyaretnam, secretary general of Singapore’s small opposition Reform Party, which is constrained and sometimes harassed by the slick, duplicitous, and steely ruling People’s Action Party…He [Jeyaretnam] also recounted that when he was invited last year to speak at candidates’ forums at the National University of Singapore and other Singapore universities, each invitation was rescinded at the last minute. Would that happen again, I wondered, now that Pericles had spoken?

Jim Sleeper now has his answer. As far as debate on campus is concerned, it is the same old same old story and We the Reform Party and our Youth have been excluded as usual.

Yours faithfully,

Kenneth Jeyaretnam
Secretary General

In 2008, Mr Lee Kuan Yew told the media that “without [foreigners], the jobs will not be there to begin with.” Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong reiterated this view in 2011: “Without the foreign workers, we would not have attracted [investments].”

The irony is that these statements are the gravest indictment of the PAP's education policy.

The party has had more than half-a-century – uninterrupted – to educate the populace. Yet, it has not been able to equip our people with the talent, knowledge, and creativity to ensure the survival of our economy without having to depend on foreigners.

And not only are Singaporeans unable to generate jobs for our own people, local talent is leaving the country in alarming numbers. In the report, Mr Lee Kuan Yew pointed out that about 1,000 Singaporeans are leaving the city-state for other countries every year – and the number is growing.

He added that “every year, there are more people going abroad for their first or second degree” and many of them are not coming back. These people make up the top 4 or 5 percent of skilled Singaporeans that our economy needs.

How did we come to such a state where our education system cannot keep our best and brightest at home or, after they leave, attract them back?

This signal failure is causing Singapore and our people great harm and putting the future of our nation in peril. But instead of taking a good, hard look at where it has gone wrong with its education policies, the PAP has decided to bring in foreigners to replace us.

The gambit has already roused much anger among the people. Because of the influx, the cost of living has climbed while the quality of life has slid. The social friction between locals and foreigners will, sooner or later, erupt in the ugliest of ways, and the presence of such huge numbers of foreign nationals is a threat to our national security.

The SDP has drawn up an alternative population plan in our paper Building A People. The proposed measures will, in the immediate term, tighten up the Government's lax immigration policy.

For the longer-term, we need to put in place an education system that will foster creativity in our people and prepare ourselves for the 21st-century global economy – one where we depend on the skills and talent of Singaporeans to generate good-quality jobs for Singaporeans; where, even without foreigners, we can still attract investments; and where Singaporeans who have left will want to come home to to educate their children.

We will spell out measures to achieve the above goals in our launch of our education policy paper Educating for Creativity and Equality: An Agenda for Transformationtomorrow, 17 May. Please join us.

Here's another irony. Despite all that has happened, Mr Lee Hsien Loong says that the PAP has “far-sighted leadership who can anticipate problems, plot a safe path through the dangers and find new ways to maximise our opportunities.”

Singapore Democrats

Source: YourSDP.org

Ten ways the PAP rule Singaporeans:-

1. Fear - the government uses fear to knock down dissent for five decades through ISA and police intervention. But people are fighting back abeit cautiously. Dissidents are also often painted by the mass media as hooligans and trouble makers though some are beginning to see them as heroes.

2. Intimidation - when someone goes too far out, the government will use the law to sue that individual so that the opposition is kept in check. This is however sparingly used nowadays than during the LKY regime. More and more people thus are pushing the boundaries nowadays to try and test the political water.

3. Low wages - many people struggle to make a living so much so that they have little energy left to go against the regime. A population with about 40% earning $2000 and below also feels powerless to retaliate against tyranny and dictatorship. Self esteem is low when one earns so little and often he also feels powerless.

4. Dependency - the government uses a system of dependency to keep the general population in check. Many people queuing for subsidised BTO flats dare not vote against the regime for fear that their preference is found out as it is pereceived that voting is not secret. The CPF withdrawal system for retirement is one way the ruling party tries to control the population but people are now fighting back in anger.

5. Curtailment of information - the mass media is tightly controlled for many decades so the general population reads what the government wants it to see. But the internet is slowly reversing that advantage.

6. Division - the government rules by dividing the population into different races and religions. Every country in the world wants to unite the country into one but not ours as it serves the government to have a disunited population so it can be better ruled. Needless to say, our minorities races suffer immensely from this exploitation.

7. Tripartism - the government controls the unions by introducing the pro-employer tripartite movement so that workers' rights are nullified. Employers collaborate indirectly with the government to make sure our system works like an animal farm-like one whereby the master rules over its subjects like slaves. Without a proper union to fight for workers, many are often left alone to fend for themselves helplessly.

8. Internet brigades - the government realises that they are losing out in the social media arena and launches its own internet brigades (IBs) to try and win back the propaganda game. Its foreseeable that the IBs will get fiercer closer to general election and cyberbullying at its worse.

9. Votes buying - the government intends to sell the country out by offering almost 200,000 new citizenships to foreigners so that they can vote them back into power election after election. Its dictatorship at its worse and many foresee that by 2030, there will be more converted citizens than naturally born ones. Thus, the next election is seen as significant and even regime-changing.

10. Power pool - power is seen focused on a few individuals and they rule the country tightly without any interference. Our Prime Minister controls the counry and his wife the world's richest sovereign fund. However, many have predicted that our Prime Minister may not be able to hold on to power when his father passes on. This remains to be seen but something that many Singaporeans will like to see happen sooner rather than later.

Gilbert Goh

During his presidential address marking the start of a new parliamentary session, Tony Tan said that Singapore should not implement populist measures as these will weaken Singapore.

He said that what Singapore needs now is to "maintain constructive politics".  He elaborated that the government already puts the nation and the people first.

"In many countries, the hurly-burly of politics has resulted in short-term populist measures, and sometimes gridlock and paralysis," he said.

However, he implied that Singapore is doing well because the government can make bold decisions for the future of Singapore.

Dr Tan explained that sometimes public debates about certain issues will get heated but we can't let differences pull us apart. Instead, we need to hold a "long-term perspective for the common good".

He was speaking in Parliament to open the 2nd half of the 12th parliament's term. 

During his speech, he also laid out six broad goals for the Singapore government: strengthening safety nets, enhancing retirement adequacy, supporting families and communities, creating a better quality life for Singaporeans and opportunities for adults to have a fulfilling career, and enabling young Singaporeans to fulfil their potential.