I totally agree with "Petulant Child" in her article ('Why I am unsupporting the Workers’ Party').
In fact, I think she does not go far enough. The WP has utterly failed my expectations. In the future, I will only cast my vote to any opposition MP who meets these criteria:
1) Willing to serve - Don't care about backlash on career, personal or family reputation
I don't understand why good calibre people are afraid to serve as opposition MPs. Yah .. your career will be affected - if you are in the public or GLC sector, you can say goodbye to any promotions. Chen She Mao was dropped as a director of SMU after he openly joined the opposition. Your personal reputation will be dragged through the mud - Vincent Vijeysingha was publicly outed by Vivian Bala. Your family may kneel down and beg you not to go down this path.
But hey, I take it for granted that if you truly love the country, none of these are too small a sacrifice.
2) Excellent debater, sharp, quick-thinking, very thick-skin :
I want someone who can be like we bloggers. Everyday there's some news, we will jump on it and criticise. I want someone like that - everyday criticising. I know that Parliament convenes only once a month, and there is a protocol to follow. I DON'T CARE!! If MRT breaks down, I want my MP to blare about it. If a Casey incident flares up, I want my MP to blare about it. Then and only then, will I say that he is earning his keeps.
And I don't care about Parliamentary protocols. Ng Eng Huat asked the Education Minister about foreign students grants and essentially the Minister gave him a non-answer. My opposition MP must then jump in and reply and tear the Minister apart. I don't give a damn whether or not it is his turn to speak, or that the Speaker did not allot him time. It does not matter. This is what I mean by thick-skinned.
And I also don't care if the ST or Mediacorp does not give any publicity about the questions or speeches he makes. It is my opposition MP's responsibility to feed me with the news. It is not my responsibility to followup on Facebook to read his speeches. I want to be spoon-fed -- it is my right as a citizen!!!
3) Must be someone solid on the ground :
Oh .. on top of being a good debater, skilled PR, blogger .. he must also have good contact on the ground lah. After all, most Singaporeans don't follow the news as closely as netizens. So he must go round to each HDB blocks, every weekend to meet the people. Otherwise, people will say he only knows how to talk, or he only knows how to make policies online but don't know how to work the ground.
4) Must know how to run a town council :
He must know how to run a town council. Everyone knows that PAP will play dirty - the minute PAP loses, no cleaning service company in town will be willing to tender to clean the opposition's GRC because if they do that, PAP will sever all ties with that company. So this person must be as good as LTK - in other words, have his own connections to pull a ready team of cleaners to do the work overnight. Otherwise, the people will say - eh, you take over the ward, how come the place so dirty ??
5) Not only know how to run a town council, he must be a super-accountant, a qualified CPA :
Not only must he know how to run a town council immediately after the elections, he must also be able to keep the accounts clean too. I don't care if PAP sells the software to a $2 company like AIM -- I don't care, means I don't care, OK? I don't care if PAP refuses to allow the former auditor to speak to the current auditor. I don't care if PAP leaves no clue about how the opening balances arise and what the details are.
In financial accounting, software enterprise migration is normally a major undertaking. It typically takes 9 months to 1 year to get a transition and even then hitches occur.
I don't care about all these. He must be able to do it overnight. He must be able to magically understand the details of all the things PAP is witholding from him. KBW said that any off the shelf software can be used - and I belive him. (Incidentally KBW said he paid $8 for his heart surgery and I also believe him. And KBW said that actually, 6.9million people can still be a very comfortable place to live if you plan in advance for it, and I also believe him. And when KBW was health minister, he said that never again will a shortage of beds in public hospitals occur and I also believe him).
6) Every member of his team must be of the same high calibre.
I know that when it comes to PAP, nobody gives a damn about what Tin Pei Ling says. Or that Raymond Lim has not even opened his mouth even once since GE2011 in Parliament. That's PAP.
When it comes to the opposition, I want everyone to be of high calibre and meet the requirements (1) to (5) that I spelt out above. I don't care that each person has his own personalities - some are introverts, some are extroverts, some are comfortable in chinese, some in English. If I can be a blogger and make noise on the Internet everyday, I want my MPs to be as vocal too. If I can do it, why can't they ?
7) The party must be willing and able to take over and run the country immediately :
I don't want that party to say he'll be a "co-driver" - I hate that word. I don't want that party to say they're not ready to form the next govt - if you're not ready, then please get out of my elitist face.
I don't care that none of them have governing experience. I don't care that most of them have not learnt to work together as a team, because the GE is suddenly called and they're chosen as candidates at the last minute. All these inconvenient facts do not matter to me.
I WANT THEM TO SAY THEY ARE READY TO FORM THE NEXT GOVT - just say it lah!! And please have a good answer ready, when the PAP then ask you - so, who will be Finance minister? And whoever you said will be the Finance minister, will then have his background scrutinized upside down. Please make sure your background meets all the criteria (1) to (6) above, and at the same time, you've very senior level experience managing a company.
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Phew ... er .. Petulant child .. how about you and I form a political party to contest in GE2015 ??? Shall we start our block visit this Saturday? Where you want to go? Lets have a nasi padang first, before that, OK? I heard there's a stall in Tampines, very cheap, cost only $2.50 one.
JG
TRS Contributor