After a five-month-and- counting dispute between the PAP and the WP over town council management, I went away thinking that everyone had blood on their hands.
And in a way, that's as it should be. What the whole time-consuming episode has shown us is that town council management is absolutely drenched with politicking.
In one corner, we have the PAP, which sold its town councils' IT software to a $2 company owned by former MPs, which then leased its use back to the town councils, with a one-month termination clause should an opposition party take over.
In the other, we have the WP, whose long-time supporters set up a managing agent company within days of its Aljunied GRC win in 2011. This firm, FMSS, has since been awarded $26 million worth of contracts from the Aljunied-Hougang Town Council.
Some, dismayed by this, have called for a "depoliticisation" of some form of town councils.
WP MPs led the charge in calling for new restrictions to prevent town councils from selling critical assets or systems to party-linked companies like AIM (Action Information Management).
I don't see why the status quo needs to change. What is unfolding now has shown in fact that the political nature of town councils has worked as it should, that is, in allowing them to be an arena where parties, and MPs, prove their worth.
Two main arguments have been forwarded for why town councils need to be depoliticised, and neither hold much water in my view:
1. Think of the "public interest"
WP MPs have reached for highfalutin rhetoric in lamenting a lack of "fair play" and "equality" in the PAP's software company's termination clause.
Mr Pritam Singh likened it to the way opposition wards were put at the back of upgrading queues in the 1990s.
This is a false sense of injustice. The upgrading policy infringed upon Singaporeans' desire for fairness because estate upgrading is an HDB project supported by taxpayers' money - opposition voters also contribute their fair share of state revenue. In contrast, town councils are supported by contributions from residents themselves, like a micro local government. Their financial portfolios are individually managed, without state interference. (There are substantial government grants to defray operational costs, but these are handed out according to size and profile).
When town councils do their jobs well, only the residents under their purview benefit; similarly when they fail.
Constituencies should not change hands costlessly. Voting for a different political party is a momentous decision, and should come with consequences, both good and bad.
That's why town council management is a crucial component of local electability.
Fairness is not an isolated virtue defined as equality in outcomes. Whether a situation is fair or not depends on initial opportunities, not final outcomes. This brings us to the second objection:
2. The status quo is unfair to the opposition
The WP's case is that it was pushed into an untenable situation by the PAP's town council politicking.
They were faced with an abrupt termination of the IT system (owned by PAP company Aim), and had to find a new managing agent within days in order that the entire GRC did not shut down after their historic victory.
Ironing out the kinks from this transition accounted for their poor showing in the last December's town council management report, said WP chairman Sylvia Lim.
I can't be the only one to think that contrary to this telling, the WP has actually shown itself to rather thrive in the politicised atmosphere of town councils.
It managed to get long-time supporters - who happened to be experienced professionals to boot - to set up a new managing agent, named FMSS, within days of the GE to step into the breach that the PAP left. (WP MPs say that the couple who own FMSS are party supporters, not members - unlike AIM's directors, who are all former MPs. But this is a weak differentiation. It would be easy for those directors to resign from the PAP. And no one expects FMSS to continue should the PAP one day win back Aljunied GRC.)
The fact of the matter is that in a crunch, the WP showed itself to have a strong, extensive and capable network of people that it can call on to support its local presence, a testament to its position and its leadership - just like, in fact, the PAP.
That the WP can run a town council is what sets them apart from other opposition parties, and is what has made them the most successful opposition party in Singapore's electoral history.
Why does it want to now give away its competitive advantage in calling for a revamp of the way town councils operate?
If it's just to win some moral argument with the PAP, it seems akin to cutting off one's nose to spite one's face.
All political parties should be committed to a dignified handover when constituencies change hands.
A one-month termination rule is unacceptable (and it must be noted that AIM has said it was prepared to waive this had the WP asked for it, which it did not).
But otherwise, parties should be given free reign in the town council sphere. Healthy political competition in a free market is in the public interest. The WP should focus its moral energies on lambasting other actually-unfair aspects of the local political landscape, such as the system of grassroots advisors from which opposition MPs are excluded.
Leave town councils alone. There's no need to fix something that works, simply because of a phantom fear of a bogeyman named politics.
Rachel Chang
*Article first appeared on http://www.singapolitics.sg/views/town-councils-if-its-not-broken-dont-fix-it