Editor's Note: 

Low-income Singaporeans are struggling to make ends meet, with some even taking extreme steps like a mother, rejected by the government for help, killing her own handicapped son due to an inability to cope with the stress of unemployment and enormous medical bills (http://bit.ly/Zo0KQd). At the same time, rich foreigners in Singapore are willing to pay $8,000 just to kiss a famous Chinese model.
 

AHPETC REFUTES NEA’S ALLEGATIONS

Aljunied-Hougang-Punggol East Town Council (AHPETC) notes with concern the inaccuracies contained in the releases from National Environment Agency (NEA) over the last few days relating to the cleaning of two hawker centres within the jurisdiction of AHPETC.

To allay unnecessary anxiety caused to hawkers and the public due to the media reports, we enclose as Annex A, the tentative schedules for annual cleaning of the five hawker centres within our jurisdiction. At these annual cleanings, the Town Council will bear all cost related to cleaning the high areas, including all necessary scaffolding and canvas costs. This is in keeping with our obligation to clean the high areas annually, as confirmed by NEA’s Advisory of 31 May 2013.

We also wish to set out the facts as we know them relating to the cleaning of the two Bedok North markets under our charge and to refute the unfounded allegations against the Town Council.

Block 538 Bedok North Market / Hawker Centre

By way of email dated 7 Feb 2013, NEA informed the Town Council that “the Hawkers’ Association will make the necessary arrangements with their contractors on the scaffolding erection / dismantling during the spring cleaning period from 4-8 March 2013.”  We leave it to the public to judge whether any reasonable person would take the sentence to refer merely to the provision of canvas rather than the erection / dismantling of scaffolding itself, as NEA now claims. The TC took NEA’s email in good faith and left the arrangement of the scaffolding in the hands of NEA and the hawkers’ association.

We understand that the hawkers’ association themselves then approached our cleaning contractor, ATL Maintenance Pte Ltd. TC was not privy to any discussions between the hawkers’ association and ATL.

NEA claimed that the hawkers’ association had referred ATL back to the Town Council which was acknowledged on 19 February. We have checked these claims and found them to be untrue.  Our contractor informed us that the hawkers’ association had approached them for a quotation for the scaffolding, which they had provided, but nothing further was heard by our contractor.  Our property manager also confirmed that he had told the hawkers’ association that the Town Council was not involved in any private arrangements made by the hawkers’ association.

If NEA had felt that any of the above arrangements were not in accordance with requirements, NEA, being the co-ordinating agency, could have easily clarified the matter instead of perpetuating the confusion.

NEA doubted whether cleaning of the high areas was done in 2012 at the market at Blk 538. From our records, the high areas were cleaned as can be seen from the attached photographs in Annex B taken in March 2012.

Block 511 Bedok North Market / Hawker Centre

The TC’s position regarding the cleaning of Blk 538 above would also apply to Blk 511. Our property manager merely sought confirmation whether NEA would facilitate the same arrangement regarding the scaffolding as was done for Blk 538.

Role of NEA

We believe it is prudent for our Town Council to deal with NEA as the lead agency, rather than other bodies such as the hawkers’ association and the Citizens’ Consultative Committee under the People’s Association, on the cleaning of markets and hawker centres, to resolve any issues without complicating the matter further.  We trust the NEA would not want to see a repetition of such episodes and strongly urge the NEA to play a constructive role in this matter, even though the political party entrusted with running AHPETC is not related to the government. The AHPETC is committed to fulfilling all its obligations. We hope the NEA will adopt a solution-focused approach to the matter. AHPETC looks forward to the meeting with NEA on 6 June 2013.

PRITAM SINGH
VICE-CHAIRMAN
ALJUNIED-HOUGANG-PUNGGOL EAST TOWN COUNCIL

3 June 2013

Annex A – AHPETC’s tentative schedule for annual cleaning in 2013

Annex B – Photographs of high-areas at Block 538, after cleaning in March 2012

Related article: http://therealsingapore.com/content/network-marketing-mlm-business-opportunity-or-scam

As many of you may have realized, a month ago, I was pretty active in an MLM (multi-level marketing) company called "Premier Pure". Previously it was known as "Venture Era", but I won't elaborate since their widespread infamy speaks for itself. Well, I apologize to any friends or relatives I might have inconvenienced during my stay there, for I have recently called it quits and left their ranks. But as a measure of providing to the general community and the... other oblivious youths looking for some decent pocket money, I've decided to pen my two cents' worth.

1. Dishonest superiors

First and foremost, everyone should know that no matter who you're under, they're all pretty much using each other and there will always be someone lying to get under your skin. I'm not attacking everyone in the company but there was a small minority that got on my nerves. I needn't mention who they were; but what I didn't appreciate was how my upline (common terminology for 'superior' in their ranks) kept bothering me to make more appointments during a crucial academic period despite being told that I was unavailable. As I was told upon joining, it was a purely commission-based job that depended solely on the amount of effort I put into selling their products and that I was entitled to benefit from its promised flexibility.

Adding to that point, I was disgusted by how money is the common language; hidden behind a facade of "passionate sales efforts" and "teamwork-driven success". Sure, some of the higher-ups may have earned a four-figure paycheck for the more successful sales months... but trust me, no market they're dealing with is that honest. They prefer beating around the bush to achieve their desired sale quotas but I was always, personally, against cheating and foul play. Business is business, but I strongly believe that honesty can still be upheld either way. Sometimes, I think these people need to learn more about humility and mutual respect. Once, I was telling my upline more about a potential recruitment and her current work status but he brushed it all off saying he wasn't interested in anything else other than her partnership. That comment nearly blew every capillary in my body, no joke. Where's the passion in that?

And then there are some superiors who think they know everything there is to running a business (once again, I will not mention who) and constantly think that they're high up the chain. They may boast the fact that they're ranks higher, but to me most of them are still kids who're at the very most two or three years older falling under the delusions of their "business experience". Yes, I know I'm one to talk. But I've got way too much pride to let some amateur business enthusiasts step over my head and act like they've got all the authority over me. The nerve of them all. The worst is how they're always lecturing me to do unnecessary things that most people who even thrive in businesses would deem redundant and superfluous.

Needless to say, if you're called down for recruitment by said company, you're better off finding another part-time job because you'd be making a huge mistake by joining. Despite all that they preach about commission-based jobs paying higher than basic salary jobs, it all comes down to whether or not you have enough faith in their products and how well you market them. Which, in most cases, involve lots of trickery and bootlicking. So this is where I begin talking about their products.

2. Useless products

Let's face it, nobody would ever think of getting magnetic therapy products for the sake of it. Hardly anyone knows what it's for, nobody really gives a hoot about what we claim it's able to do, and there's no real practical use for it. Perhaps that's the reason why they only conduct sales within their contact base. And for something that doesn't look like it costs much to make, they're selling it at an outrageous price. I can vouch for you that these bogus therapy gimmicks don't work long-term and the people who bought it were tricked into buying based on hardly credible statistics.

During one of my sales stints, the presenter who was with me went against our agreement and began introducing the Pearl Ion Lotion: one of their claimed 'best-selling' products, to my prospect. Frankly, just by sitting through the entire presentation, I was extremely unconvinced. With no given statistics or proven results, they expected us to invest $200 on a bottle of cheap-looking lotion when there were other known established brands like L'Oreal and SK-II marketing similar products with proven results. I mean seriously, if you're going to promote an unknown skincare product then it would do everyone some justice to at least provide some statistics that look legit. I wouldn't smother something on my face if it was recommended by a person who doesn't use it themselves, would you? Guess not.

And everything else? They've also got water purifiers, oxidizers (?) and collagen. I don't even want to begin with the first two because they're pointless as hell but I think the collagen's the only product that actually looks marketable and might just work. Everyone knows about the benefits that collagen has on skin elasticity yada yada, and it's Halal-certified. It was one of the products I didn't mind marketing out. But in all honesty, nobody would buy the rest of the products unless they're being emotionally/psychologically-blackmailed by you (one of the tactics that the cheaper uplines would want you to employ) or if they just simply have too much cash floating in their pockets.

All-in-all, they may claim how successful they are in marketing their products over the past few but really; it all comes down to how skilled you are in brainwashing your prospects. Sure, they may have found more success marketing out their products during their pioneer years but people are more enlightened about MLMs now and specifically, the notoriety of Premier Pure's products. I had a lecturer who was instantly put off upon hearing that I was trying to sell her these products because she was well aware of all the trickery behind it. So working in companies like these require you to have really thick skin and a good market listing; otherwise you're nothing short of worthless. And that's a fact.

3. Sales tactics

As many of you may have realized by now, yes, they expect you to market their products through your relatives and friends. At one point in your often short-lived career here, they'll even force you to fix appointments with relatives you're barely close to or friends who probably can't afford it. Why? Because they believe that the root to success is in "seizing every opportunity". Basically, they're so desperate to market out their stuff that they'll target just about anyone. Even your unborn sibling. Oh, I'm just kidding.

One thing that constantly tested my patience was the fact that my upline kept pushing me to make appointments and recruitments in the midst of my busy schedule. His excuse? "We were all students before, we understand. Why can some people make time to come down and make appointments and you can't?" I beg to differ, it's all a matter of compromise. I'm pretty sure that the ones who dedicate their time to Premier Pure aren't faring very well in school... and that includes the upline himself. It's also difficult to compare considering the fact that not everyone is learning the same thing. Lesson learnt, they're going to push you past your limits and let me assure you, it's not in a good way. All that aside, I'll elaborate more on my first appointment.

People would usually expect their first prospects to be really close relatives or friends, but I feel that they're stooping a little too low in fixing parental appointments first. Yes, they'll send a presenter over to your house to make sure your parents are 'aware of what you're doing' but we all pretty much know the real reason, don't we? So they're going to sit through an hour or two's worth of presentation with you and ultimately, your fate in the company lies with them. If they're sympathetic enough to buy it for the sake of giving you the stepping stones they claim you'll need, then they'll get the products for your sake. But if your parents are as logical or, in their terms, 'skeptical' like mine, they'd start throwing many questions and doubts. Thank goodness they didn't get any of them actually, the money would've been put into a better household investment. Go for a holiday or... get some really nice books or something.

What lies beyond your parental appointment is, well... appointments with everyone else you know. They'll make you sit through hours in the office just to fix more and more beat-around-the-bush appointments and deceiving your prospects into thinking you're 'actually running a business' and that you wanted to 'show a few product samples'. Their next step? Come by the prospect's house, where they'd start imposing their beat-round-the-bush sales regime. To add something a little personal, it was pretty hypocritical of my upline to advise me about punctuality when we were late for every appointment we had been to. And they were all because of him! So basically your presenter would do most of the talking, you just sit through as the dummy they'd hope would win your relatives/friends over in buying the product and that's when they'll take advantage and go overboard with 'introducing their other product ranges'. The most infuriating part, I might add, was that my upline was insistent about making payment first when there was an installment method available. It made me look like I was exploiting my aunt for her money and I felt really terrible.

So this is probably the part where people go "seriously, the company does that?". As a company run by an esteemed multi-millionaire, naturally they'd bring up the fact that "if the things we do are redundant, how were we able to survive and make it through the years?" Well, your loyalty is as good as disposable. They'll make you bother and use everyone around you until they're no longer needed, only to be dumped. That's precisely the case here. Many distributors have come and gone, and only the luckier ones actually remain... or the bold ones who gave up their education and stable careers to pursue this. Their excuse? "Leading world companies are MLM too. Take Microsoft as an example". It's a classic they're always bringing up to new recruits. But really guys, they're internationally known for marketing products that actually have a use in the household. And they're priced very reasonably. That's the total opposite of what Premier Pure is. Cheap, overpriced and not to mention useless.

Conclusion

To sum it all up, I wouldn't recommend getting a job there. As attractive as the incentives sound, they've pretty much sucked most of the local market dry. Some of my own relatives said they had this sort of encounter before and I guess it's getting old. If you're looking for a part-time job, try Starbucks or something along that line. Working for Premier Pure is genuinely a waste of your precious time. I promise you that if your prospects actually do get the products, they will not look at you the same way again. Relatives might start to dislike you, and some of your friends might even start to avoid you. I'd like to add that I was bombarded with questions about the products I sold during occasional house visits; which, over time, got on my nerves since I didn't really market it out to them in the right state of mind. And the pay I received after all the rubbish I went through? Not worth every cent.

The worst part was when I decided to go MIA on them. Some of the people around me started complaining about receiving recruitment calls and one of them actually came down to the office for it. My most obvious guess was that since they're not related to anyone in the company whatsoever except me and that my market listing was still in their possession, they used my contacts without my permission. Yet another cheap move by the upline, I reckon. Once again, need I mention that I'm one out of possibly hundreds that have come and gone, indirectly contributing to the company profits? No wonder it's still running after so long. It's nothing but a tarnished name in the industry and you might want to ponder on the fact that the company had undergone a  major name change over the years.

I admit, this post is extremely one-sided and personal; but nonetheless the experience was real. Multi-level marketing in particular is thriving in the business industry itself but with the wrong application it just never works out right. However, if you do decide to proceed with the job stint I wish you the best of luck. Here's a tip: have a lot of free time on your hands, nurture some thick skin, an extensive formal wear collection, and have utmost (but delusional) faith in their products and you're set to rumble. I've pretty much shared most of my experiences here, and I wish most of you luck in your future endeavors. Thank you for reading, you aspiring business enthusiasts, you! ;)

Firdaus E, 

Premier Pure's ex-Sales Agent

*The author blogs at http://diaryofakinkykid.blogspot.sg/

Was recently back in Singapore after being based overseas for many years. Chanced upon and subscribed to TRS Facebook page when I was abroad and read many rants about the Government's 'Foreign Talent' policies. 

Felt then that people were complaining for the sake of complaining. Could not reconcile with all the anger and frustration until I landed back in my beloved Singapore. The online scenario painted by many an exasperated netizens held much truth.

Everywhere on the island is now much more crowded than before. Uncouth and anti-social behaviours by foreigners are more evident. The general level of cleanliness around the city has also dropped. General service standard and productivity have also dropped noticeably.

Beyond the physical deterioration, I have also observed a disturbing trend emerging. Singaporeans are being pushed out of the labour market by unfair practices across all job-levels. Blue-collared workers have their wages depressed and in some cases, even employment denied because the foreigner foreman chose his own countrymen over a deserving Singaporean worker. Entry and mid-level white-collared workers are denied deserving job-promotions and career-advancement opportunities because of unfair advantages that their foreigners colleagues enjoyed. 

Even top level executive-positions are not spared as foreigner bosses/HRs/CEOs choose to bring in their own kind and/or network instead of hiring/promoting a deserving and in many instances, better-qualified Singaporeans. Heard plenty of stories from friends and head-hunters. A large oil & gas firm bringing in foreigners to fill regional management positions that capable local Singaporean managers could and would want to do. A Swiss bank parachuting executives from Zurich and Geneva into Singapore to fill management roles yearned by the local employees because the market in Europe is depressing now. A French company choosing a 60-year old French citizen with a mediocre track-record ahead of a top-performing Singaporean in his mid-40s to be the regional CEO.

Having lived and worked in different global cities, I have seen my fair share of discrimination in the labour market. American banks and financial institutions on TARP not allowed to employ non-Americans, companies in Europe are incentivised to only employ EU citizens, international banks in Japan only employs Japanese natives and even fluent-Japanese speakers are denied the opportunity to interview, only native-Spanish speakers will ever be employed in Latin America etc. These discriminatory labour practices that favour the natives are not unexpected. Afterall, it's their country and their rules. But, seeing deserving Singaporeans being discriminated in his/her own country is really shocking to say the least.

Singapore has always made meritocracy as one of our main pillars for nation-building and progress. It's a real shame that this value is being eroded by the relentless influx of foreigners, who valued kinship and people of their own skin-colour more. The Government, with its liberal foreign employment policies, knowingly or otherwise, become the perfect accomplice. This even despite the massive outcry from the populace during the GE2011, that prompted the Prime Minister to apologize on national television no less.

Alas, words are not backed up by actions. Worse, hard figures published recently showed the contrary as more foreigners are allowed to work in Singapore in the past year since GE2011. In Leadership 101, what is worse than incompetency is insincerity and betrayal. It's no wonder that this current Government is losing its credibility and whatever residual goodwill that 60.1% of the populace has decided to give it a last-chance to redeem itself.

So herein, I lay down the challenge to all TRS readers. To stop being a keyboard warrior. Instead of ranting and complaining only online, take one step further to let fellow Singaporeans see the real challenges that the country is facing.

Ask fellow Singaporeans constructive questions to trigger their logical thought process:

- Government has always emphasized that we need more foreigners for the country to stay competitive and achieve higher GDP growth. Yes, the Singaporean economy has stayed very competitive globally and our GDP at US$56,532 per capita is the highest in the world, (US$5,300 more than second-placed Norway!) according The Wealth Report 2012. Several questions to ask. How have you personally benefitted from all these economic progress? And is this US$56,532 the median income for Singaporeans? If not, why is the Singaporean's median income at US$29,500 so much lesser than the mean GDP figure?

- Economic progress and high GDP growth have a very low correlation with the quality of life of the populace. So why does the Government keep on insisting on maintaining high GDP growth? Is the Government's raison d'être (reason for existence) to improve the people's quality of life or to achieve high GDP growth? Which is the mean and which is the end? So really who benefits from the high GDP growth?

- Government keeps on emphasizing that foreigners are needed to safekeep jobs for Singaporeans. Then why is that the case that 7 out of 10 jobs created in 2011 goes to a foreigner?

- Government keeps on saying that Singaporeans do not possess the necessary skill-sets for certain jobs that MNCs in Singapore need, so foreigners need to be imported. Ask the critical question that if we keep on importing foreigners, then how can Singaporeans ever be trained to have these skill-sets? And this argument become circular the next time round in the future. Since the MNCs do not take in and train local Singaporeans in these skill-sets, it'll forever use the lack of necessary skill-sets excuse to keep on demanding for the Government to allow more foreigners in. 

- The official unemployment figure is 2%. How is this figure calculated? What is the under-employment figure for Singaporeans? What is the real cost to the nation of educating Singaporeans to such high international standards and have him/her under-employed because of unfair labour practice promulgated by foreigner bossess/HRs/CEOs?

- Why did the Government allowed in an addition of 1.5 million foreigners without adequate preparation of the transport and housing infrastructure? Complacency or incompetency? What's is the real cost to the country with such high housing cost? If people are spending a high proportion of their income on housing, the amount of disposable income left for other consumption and retirement planning would suffer. So what's the ultimate cost to the country in the long-term? And why is S$1.1 billion Singaporean tax-dollars used to increase the nation's bus capacity, subsidizing the 40% non-Singaporeans in the process?

- And the million dollar question (no puns intended). Have your life become better or worse off since the last GE?

There's an estimated 100,000 TRS readers and 200 weeks more to GE2016. If everyone of us were to share with a different fellow Singaporean these perspectives every week till the next election is called, we could in all reach out to 4,000,000 Singaporeans (not physically possible because there are only 3.285 million Singaporean). Given that there will be overlaps and that there will be Singaporeans who will not be convinced and/or converted; it will sure make a difference in shifting the 60.1% majority that the current Government scored in the last election.

So make the difference today. Take action, ask constructive questions, make your fellow Singaporeans think and be aware.

Finally, I would like to state for the record:

I am not xenophobic, I just love Singapore and Singaporeans more.

Submitted by: Adrian Ang AKA HipHopMan

Did the grassroots visit the house because they felt guilty about not helping sooner? What do you think?

It irks me when people really believe that Singapore is a rich country. Its preposterous.

Its even more depressing when these words are uttered by none other than Singaporeans themselves. Obviously they need to get other source of information rather than the MSM. I assume that is the only channel of news they are exposed to. 

We have people without roofs over their heads. We have ppl dying from inadequate medical attention due to the high medical cost. We have our older generation collecting cardboards and tin cans for sustenance. We have people skipping lunch just becoz they are saving for dinner. We have many people seeking assistance in meeting their daily expenses. How can it possibly be that Singapore is the richest nation?

Osman Sulaiman

Throughout the 1970s, many who worked for the newspapers and journals were arrested and imprisoned under the ISA. The government admits that more than 800 were arrested in that decade and 235 were detained (TODAY, 22 Nov 2011). The following are some of those in the media arrested:

Lee Mau Seng – General Manager, Nanyang Siang Pau
Li Singko – Senior Editor/Writer, Nanyang Siang Pau
Shamsuddin Tung Tao Chang – Editor in Chief, Nanyang Siang Pau
Lee Eu Seng – Managing Director, Nanyang Siang Pau
Chan Sun Choy (Chai) – Journalist, Sin Chew Jit Poh
Ngoh Teck Nam @ Wu Tek Nam – Translator, Sin Chew Jit Poh
Azmi Mahmud – Asst Editor, Berita Harian
Hussein Jahidin – Editor, Berita Harian
Arun Senkuttuvan – Journalist, Far Eastern Economic Review
Ho Kwon Ping – Journalist, Far Eastern Economic Review

They were all imprisoned without trial for months and even years. The only case that went to court was that of Lee Mau Seng in 1971. His counsel was the late Mr David Marshall. The grounds for his detention was:

“Since 1970, you as the General Manager/Managing Director of the Nanyang Siang Pau, Singapore, have consciously, knowingly and willingly veered the editorial policy of the said paper to (a) one of glamourising Communism and (b) stirring up communal and chauvinistic sentiments over Chinese language, education and culture.

The four allegations of fact were:

1. Under your management control, the Nanyang Siang Pau has deliberately and systematically instilled admiration for the Communist system. This has been achieved by presenting the Communist system as one free from blemishes. And whilst endorsing its policies, you have highlighted in the domestic news pages the more unsavoury aspects of Singapore life.

2. You have utilised the Nanyang Siang Pau to arouse communal sentiments over the Chinese language, education and culture, and created the impression that Chinese language and education are fighting desperately for survival in Singapore against a Government hostile to the Chinese.

3. In your campaign to work up disruptive and dangerous emotions, you have continuously echoed in the Nanyang Siang Pau the pro-Communist cry that Singapore’s independence was “phoney” by maliciously referring to Singapore as having undergone “150 years of colonial fetters” and that Singapore has not “in fact enjoyed political freedom”.

4. You have used deliberate falsehood to whip up communal fears and openly incite communal hatred against the Government.

The grounds and allegations were vague but exceedingly serious. Marshall argued that they were too “vague, unintelligible or indefinite” as to be insufficient to enable the applicant to make an effective representation against the order of detention. Chief Justice, Wee Chong Jin ruled that “it is not open to a court in Singapore to examine the grounds and allegations of fact”. 

Lee was imprisoned for two and a half years. He left Singapore for Canada shortly after.

Today, the MDA’s anxiety to control the internet is understandable. The government has already successfully controlled the print and broadcasting media. The internet is the only media that has yet to be subdued. If we fail to keep this media free, Singaporeans will forever be the proverbial frog beneath the shell - “Katak di-bawah tempurung.”

Join the protest at Hong Lim Park this Saturday, 8 June at 4 pm.

Function 8 LTD

*Article first appeared on https://www.facebook.com/ThatWeMayDreamAgain

Sun Xi, a graduate of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, is the typical product of Chinese-pore. The PAPpies can claim all they like that we are a multi-cultural nation. Fact is that PAPpy’s policies are actually heavily slanted towards Chinese-porean culture.

Here is Sun Xi’s full essay – Singapore: from Bilingualism to Biculturalism (full version)

Note that although he mentions other races when he talks about bi-culturalism, he talks only in the English-Chinese mode. He only makes a token mention or two about the Malay and Tamil languages, the two other main languages of Singapore. Here is a list of his Chinese bias:

1. Sun Xi attributes the rise of Singapore to First World to China’s growth. Little does he know that Singapore started its industrial revolution in 1970s, long before China opened up around the early 1990s. We were already First World when China was only in its infant stage in its industrialization.

2. He quotes Taiwan’s first Culture Minister and scholar Lung Ying-Tai to back his claim that culture determines social development. He can’t quote a Malay or Indian source?

3. Quotes Jackie Chan’s donation of his four Chinese Hui-style ancient buildings to Singapore. Another Chinese linked source. Come on, Sun Xi, where is your so called “multicultural” concept?

4. Sun Xi further quotes Business China (Singapore) that initiated to “nurture bilingual and bicultural Singaporeans to develop a cultural and economic bridge with China.”. Hmm…. yet another Chinese source. Come on. Is this guy talking about Singapore or Chinese-pore?

5. Proceeds to mention the four main Chinese community organizations in Singapore — ie the Singapore Federation of Chinese Clan Associations, the Singapore Chinese Chamber of Commerce & Industry, the Chinese Development Assistance Council and the Business China.

Still waiting for that one single non-Chinese source…..

Sadly, that’s about all. No non-Chinese organisation or individual is mentioned. Not one at all. But then again, he is a product of PAP’s Chinese-pore, isn’t he?

The PAPpies have over the decades pretended to promote multiculturalism. In fact, they push for only one culture – the Chinese culture, and that too, Han Chinese Culture. Here are three of my past posts to support my claim that it is Han Chinese culture that the PAPpies have been forcing down on us. They give little hoot to non-Chinese culture, or for that matter, non-Han Chinese culture.

PAP’s Racist MT Policy, Part 1 – The Sidelining of other Races and Cultures
PAP’s Racist MT Policy, Part 2 – PAP is forcing Han Culture, not Chinese Culture, on us
Chinese Chauvinism Rampant at Heart of MT Issue

Conclusion -

When PAP govt says “biculturalism” it actually means the Chinese-nization of Singapore. This is very obvious in so many of the govt policies we have seen over the decades. So when Sun Xi purports in his article that biculturalism is multiculturalism that encompasses the Malay and Tamil language as well, he is talking nonsense, just like the PAPpies.

Copying and mimicking what others say and do is nothing scholarly. Sun Xi’s article tells us that the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore is nothing but a factory that produces clones of the typical PAPpy yesman. In this case, it produces the typical PAPpy Chinese-porean.

Barrie

* The author blogs at http://wherebearsroamfree.blogspot.com

Before we get into that mess let’s start with areas of common agreement. Happily we both agree that there needs to be more transparency. However Jeremy seems to accept the government’s own figures for its budget surplus which I most definitely do not.  Our government’s budget figures are not set out in the format described as  ‘best practice’ for governments by the IMF and in general use by advanced democracies worldwide.  As a result our budget contains discrepancies which makes it impossible (even for me) to decipher and gauge true values. I first alerted Singaporeans to these discrepancies in 2012 here.

Jeremy also agrees with me that one possible way to achieve transparency without privatization and public listing and distribution of shares is the Norwegian model, where the SWF is required to achieve an extremely high level of transparency and is responsible to Parliament for its performance each year. I’ll come onto Norway later because Jeremy gets mixed up by that as well.

Jeremy worries that $6 billion a year of extra spending is being unduly profligate and talks about finding savings in the defence budget to pay for it. This is despite my pointing out that the true surplus in 2012 was at least $36 billion.  I also pointed out that even the Net Investment Returns Contribution of $7 billion which is supposed to be allocated to current spending, in fact went straight back into the reserves.  The savings to be made in the defence budget are miniscule compared to the surpluses and the amount MOF likes to give away to other nations.  In any case I contend that we should be increasing our spending on defence in line with the rest of Asia not reducing it.

I was completely confused by Jeremy’s contentions that privatization (allowing public listing and trading in the shares of our SWFs) would not bring about transparency and accountability and wondered why he brings up the global financial crisis of 2008 as having some relevance to my proposals.  I do not see how this is an argument that listing the shares of our SWFs will lead to less transparency.  Also why would Jeremy would have brought up MERS as an example?  MERS (which stands for Mortgage Electronic Registry Service),  is an electronic registry operated by a privately held company (MERSCORP, Inc.) designed to track ownership rights and mortgage loans in the United States. Since this is a privately held company it is not listed on a public stock exchange.
Could it be that Jeremy simply didn’t know what is meant by the term ‘privatization’ when proposing  that we allowing public listing and trading in the shares of our SWFs.  As his arguments make no sense I am guessing that Jeremy has confused the process of ‘privatization’ with privately owned  or he may here be thinking of private equity buy outs. Jeremy is fiercely refuting a proposal that was never posited in the first place.

I don’t see how he could have made this mistake.  I even give Warren Buffet’s publicly listed company, Berkshire Hathaway as an example of how transparency is a spur to better performance in my original article.

After mixing up private and publicly listed and so forth Jeremy says that transparency did not prevent the global crisis of 2008.  Here Jeremy is correct. But did I say transparency would somehow prevent financial crises?  No, I make no claims for transparency by itself. I do not say that it will prevent future financial crises.  The cause of that crisis was indeed not a lack of transparency. If anything there was too much data, as Nate Silver makes clear in his excellent book, “The Signal and the Noise”. The problem lay in the interpretation of that data and the conflicts of interest to which certain key institutions like rating agencies were prone. These examples of willful blindness to the fallacies in the analyses by ratings firms were then compounded by the mistakes of policy makers, at least in the initial stages, which almost brought the global financial system to its knees.

There is no argument to be made that a public listing will not bring about a much greater level of transparency. Of course it will.

How about accountability? At present there is very little information available to judge the performance of our SWFs. We do not even know what the real level of assets is. What we do know is that historically there is a strong statistical correlation between the level of secrecy in an organization and the likelihood of mismanagement or fraud.

Privatization and the disclosures that would be necessary if the SWFs were listed would make it much easier to identify underperforming management. It would provide a spur in the side of management, to use LKY’s favoured term. Accountability is like everything else- we have to demand it.

By listing Temasek holdings and GIC, shareholders would be able to vote against the re-election of the board or individual directors at the company’s annual meeting if they felt that the company was underperforming. It is notable that no heads rolled after both Temasek and GIC lost a significant percentage of their value, even though they claimed to have recovered their losses remarkably quickly.

Having to publish regular audited accounts would also allow a spotlight to be shone on the way the management of these companies value their positions.  I believe that Singaporeans want to know how the PM’s wife is doing and to be able to move her on if her and her team’s performance is subpar.

Of course just as transparency doesn’t guarantee good governance so even a public listing might not prevent fraud altogether. UBS, in which GIC invested so much and lost most of its investment, is a good example. On balance, if our assets are being squandered and lost through poor investment decisions then I would rather know than not.

Nevertheless a system that allows the government and the managers of the SWFs to transfer assets into the fund at grossly undervalued levels, see “Has Temasek Found A Cure for Balding?”, is one where one should be suspicious of the performance claims by management. Notwithstanding the fact that the current CEO of Temasek got her job purely on merit, as our State-controlled media frequently remind us, privatization would also ensure a separation between management of our SWFs and the government, which is necessary to fulfill any standard good governance requirements.

Jeremy agrees with me on Norway but after that his ideas fall down because he has failed to grasp the fundamental difference between Norway’s situation and that of Singapore. The Norwegian fund has been built up by taxes and royalties on the earnings from the exploitation of the country’s gas and oil reserves. As these are exhaustible resources that, by definition, cannot be replaced, there is a strong argument that they should be represented on the nation’s balance sheet as an asset.  They belong not just to the current generation of Norwegians but also to future generations. As they are used up, they should be replaced by financial or real assets such as infrastructure investment. The current generation should only be able to draw on the income from those assets.

Singapore is a different case entirely. The assets of our SWFs represent forgone consumption by present and past generations of Singaporeans. There were no resources that were used up to earn those assets only sacrifice and austerity by Singaporeans past and present.  In other words, the sweat of your grandfather’s brow, people being denied medical treatment that is freely available in most other advanced countries and our old people, the disabled and those in single parent households having to live in hardship. I could go on but I have made the point repeatedly that our people live in wholly unnecessary austerity to accumulate surpluses that will never be spent even if they are not frittered away through poor investments.

There is no obligation to pass on these assets to future generations and it should be up to individuals to make their own decisions as to how much they want to leave (in economics we call this their intergenerational time preference function).

One can say with certainty that with productivity growth averaging at least 2% per annum in advanced countries like the US (though maybe only half that in Singapore due to the PAP government’s preference for cheap foreign labour over automation) that future generations as a whole will definitely be much richer than current generations. Likely technological advances may raise this productivity growth by several orders of magnitude.

Thus it is difficult to make a case as to why the state needs to maintain a reserve beyond what is needed for genuine emergencies or to defend the currency. At the moment the MAS has to hold down the Singapore dollar to prevent our currency appreciating too far and making our economy even more uncompetitive, so arguably it does not need to hold excess reserves.  In a succinct and admirably clear article (see here) Andy Wong also supports the contention that the reserves are much bigger than they need to be. Furthermore it has not been explained to us why we need to go on accumulating assets at the same rate nor why the PAP government is so anxious to keep postponing the CPF withdrawal age and the minimum sum.

We can think of Singapore as being like an enormous hedge fund, though apparently with only subpar returns. A few government functions are added on, though one day a future government might want to divorce itself from the people entirely and just keep the assets! As a hedge fund, it is in an admirable situation compared to the rest of the industry. This is because it can coerce its investors into keeping their money in the fund and make withdrawals more and more difficult.  I am sure a lot of real hedge fund managers would like a similar situation.

This brings us of course to a further reason why the current situation is so unfair to the present generation of Singaporeans.  If there were no immigration then future generations would be the descendants of Singapore citizens today and one could argue that to retain a substantial pool of assets in the state’s hands for the benefit of future generations at least had some merit. As an economic liberal who believes in individual choice, I would still prefer those decisions to be made by the individual.

However, the PAP government seems determined to dilute the current generation’s stake in the SWFs by enfranchising millions of new citizens. It has been suggested that the underlying reason behind this is to maintain its grip on power. While it still has control over the people’s assets it has an enormous carrot to use to induce foreigners to become citizens and to bribe them once they do so.  We can already see that happening in a limited way with the foreign scholarship programmes that our SWFs have set up.

Thus, while I would support some form of progressivity in the distribution of shares to try and ensure that more of the assets go to those at the bottom of the wealth distribution in an effort to promote genuine equality of opportunity, as opposed to the present fake meritocracy, I do not see any rational argument why the bulk of the assets need to be held back by the state as Jeremy advocates. His self-confessed collectivist bent is not radically different from the PAP’s and does not represent genuine reform. Despite saying he wants more transparency he seems to favour keeping the status quo. While he may feel that readers may be impressed by his knowledge of simultaneous equations from O Level Maths, it does not really buttress his arguments which have shaky theoretical underpinnings and some serious fundamental errors.
Nevertheless it is great that he has come forward to provide a rationale and hopefully we can have more reasoned debate in the future.  As Jeremy is an SDP policy author, the more common ground we can establish now the better.

Kenneth Jeyaretnam

* As a blogger, KJ hopes to help imagine a model for a New Asian Nation to bring about a free and fair future for Singapore. KJ is a Cambridge trained economist who could be broadly described as from the Keynesian school. He is also a successful ex-hedge fund manager and a liberal opposition politician who contested in the 2011 General Election with his party. He is currently the Secretary-General of The Reform Party. He blogs at http://sonofadud.com.

I disagree with Mr Devadas Krishnadas’ view that the Media Development Authority’s (MDA) move to require certain websites to be licensed is progressive (“Progressive move to raise standards”; last Friday).

As I had written earlier in the year (“Let social media follow its natural, chaotic course”; Forum Online, Jan 14), it is apparent that the Government has yet to come to grips with what the Internet represents – openness and freedom of expression for individuals with independent opinions.

To hold websites to the same standards governing regulated traditional media is regressive and futile.

Mr Krishnadas claims that news reporting (online or in print) is serious business. This is only partly true.

Most websites that report or comment on local news are not run by “accredited” professionals and do not purport to report the news in the serious manner practised by traditional media.

So it is unreasonable to hold them to the same standards laid down for traditional media.

In fact, many socio-political sites do not report the news but provide commentaries on the hot topics of the day. To potentially subject them to licensing is regressive as it restricts their freedom of expression – something that is important in a knowledge-based society that values creativity and independent thought.

Mr Krishnadas also states that the public today prefers plurality rather than an authority of sources, and the new rules may compel some websites to consolidate.

This “consolidation” would be a worrisome trend and hints at stifling diverse and independent views, which goes against the grain of the Government’s consultative approach, as exemplified in Our Singapore Conversation and other mechanisms.

The Internet cannot and should not be regulated. Most Singaporeans are well-educated and able to differentiate between credible and groundless reporting. And if there is evidence that they are unable to do so, then we need to work on making them more discerning.

Online content can be seen as a grassroots-based feedback mechanism for the Government. If these views were to be curtailed, then a good way of gauging the ground sentiment would be lost.

Vincent Tan Yan Fu (Dr)

* Letter first appeared on ST Forum (4 Jun)

**TRS READER CONTRIBUTION PIECE**

Dear The Real Singapore,

I refer to my own blog http://singaporedissident.blogspot.sg/2013/05/singapore-islands-threats-to-bloggers.html where a Singaporean in exile writes brilliant articles about Singapore’s dictatorial government. As he is registered with the American Bar Association, I doubt he will concoct a lie, as his professional integrity will come into question. As usual, the government might do a cover-up, so I just thought more people can come forward and verify the truth. Following is his latest, exposing the immoral behaviour about the judge Hamidah Ibrahim in the Peter Lim case. Judge Hamidah Ibrahim's questionable moral character. Ladies and Gentlemen, Yesterday Singapore's state controlled newspaper Straits Times reports of the conviction of Peter Lim, senior government officer who ran the state security agency, Singapore Civil Defense Force, for corruption because a woman named Phang who worked in Nimrod, a company, which stood to profit from his contracts had given him a blow job.

He will be sentenced next week. Lee Kuan Yew government having engaged in this total waste of time of reporting on this seemingly insignificant matter of one woman having given a single instance of a blow job to this man, for weeks and months in their state controlled media, in great detail, describing who was it that unzipped his pants, how the blow job was executed and so on and so forth ad nasuem makes one wonder, are Singaporeans a bunch of perverts with nothing else to think about other than sex and blow jobs in parked cars? Surely, with Lee Kuan Yew's worry that Singapore is not producing enough ethnic Chinese babies (Lee does not want any Malay or Indian babies), since these two are ethnic Chinese, should they not be encouraged to have sex instead at government expense, hotel rooms at government expense. Indeed, why not have a line of ethnic Chinese women all lined up in a row, lying on their backs and ordered to produce the desired number of babies with men such as Lim who I am sure would willingly come forward and provide thenecessary exercise with or without pay. 

This case was an utter waste of time not only because it was about a blow job, which natural men would usually like unless you are gay, and something which happens every day all over the world but also significantly because it was never proven that he had given her any contract after he got the blow job. And it would be silly to assume that Lim would have given her a government contract for such an insignificant thing like a blow job which he could have had a thousand times over elsewhere for almost nothing. But I digress too much. What I wanted to say was the judge in this case Hamidah Ibrahim should look in the mirror herself before castigating this man for such high minded stuff as immoral conduct, unethical conduct as a government servant and conflict of interest. Her own conduct, which you will see, leaves much to be desired.

I know Judge Hamidah Ibrahim in so far as I was a practicing lawyer in Singapore from 1981 to 1991. I had just returned from studying law in England and started practicing law in the island. At this time this woman, an unmarried Malay Muslim was a judge as she is now in courts where Lim was convicted. I don't ever recall ever appearing in any case in her court although I appeared in the other courts there. My ex-wife, Elizabeth Veronica Charmaine Cardoza, who had returned to Singapore from California after our divorce, in 1999 or so, had then worked in the Singapore Legal Service as a government employee. At this time, she told me that she and Judge Hamidah Ibrahim were friends. My ex-wife works now in Singapore as an Adjunct Professor at Singapore National University and I believe the Management University. (Adjunct is a fancy word for temporary. It means sometimes you have work and sometimes you don't). This information about her is available on the Internet by Google. What she also informed me is that this unmarried Judge Hamidah Ibrahim had a boyfriend, a Singaporean Indian lawyer called George Pereira. Pereira was an insignificant little known lawyer who worked for some small Singaporean Chinese law firm. Today he similarly is in a small law firm with himself and a Singaporean Chinese called Pereira and Tan, GSM Building #04-02/03, 141 Middle Road, Singapore 188976. His telephone number is 63390359. In this street you see small sized law firms working their trade. At this time, I was already an open critic of the Lee Kuan Yew establishment and had already contested one or two elections as an opposition Workers Party member.

As in any fascist state like Singapore, political opponents to the regime are shunned and as Pereira was seen either as a person with no political views whatsoever or a government sympathizer, he as well as almost the entire legal profession kept a distance from me. Therefore I did not know him personally but I knew who he was. In appearance he was nothing to speak of, just an ordinarily looking fellow, short and brown in appearance with a poke marked face. His distinguishing mark is his squint eyes. One eye looks at you and the other looks at a slant.

Any way my question to Judge Hamidah Ibrahim and her presumably highly moral stand, a tone of indignation and outrage, chastising Lim for the reprobate and dissolute character that she claims he is with unzipped pants and blow jobs is this; what were you doing with your boyfriend George Pereira for all those years while you were an unmarried Malay Muslim woman and a Singapore judge on top of that? Were you, Judge Hamidah Ibrahim also unzipping the lawyer George Pereira’s trousers and giving him blow jobs too? What else were you doing with George Pereira? Were you also doing somersaults in bed with him? And if you were sleeping with George Pereira, is it not a conflict of interest for a Singapore judge to be having sex with a practicing lawyer in the same jurisdiction? Is it not an ethical violation? Were you also not guilty of corruption and sent to jail as you are about to do to Lim? Furthermore beside the fact that you are a judge, you are also a Singaporean Malay Muslim. Is it not a violation of your religion for an unmarried Malay Muslim woman to be sleeping with a man, let alone an unmarried Singaporean Indian Christian lawyer? Is it not wrong for an unmarried woman to have sex and worse to have it with a non Muslim?

Let me be very clear. The words of my ex-wife to me were that he was her "boyfriend". She did not at any time say that they were having sex. She also said that they were in a long term relationship. They could still be in that relationship now, I do not know. I remember distinctly asking her why she was not marrying Pereira to which she said she did not know. I am assuming that if a couple were in a long term relationship, they would probably be having sex. Most normal people would not be content to just sing folk songs to each other.

Additionally, sometime either in 1990 or 1991, by chance I met Judge Hamidah Ibrahim and George Pereira in the Johor Bahru Railway station coffee shop. There was another person with them; I cannot remember a man or a woman. They were seated in a table and recognized me and called me. I said hello and a couple of words and that was that. I remember it to be either 1990 or 1991 because my son was with me. Since he was born in 1987, he had to be either 3 or 4 years old because he could walk with me. It couldn't be after 1991 because I left Singapore for the last time in 1991 December permanently to settle in California.

I do not know what Pereira was doing with Judge Hamidah Ibrahim with one another person in Johor Bahru Railway station. There could have been a completely reasonable explanation since there was one other person with them. Even if the judge and Pereira had not gone to a Johore Bahru hotel for hot sex, the fact that they were together away from Singapore does corroborate the fact that they were friends, and according to my ex-wife, boyfriend and girl friend.

Should not the Singapore police investigate Judge Hamidah Ibrahim? Should not the authorities be calling my ex-wife for an account of what she knew? Should not the entire career of Judge Hamidah Ibrahim be looked into, how many cases did George Pereira have with his girlfriend judge, was there corruption and who should now go to jail.

Judge Hamidah Ibrahim has egg on her face now. That is for sure. As for me, if the Singapore authorities want me to swear an affidavit under oath that all this is true, I am prepared to do it, knowing that under California law, there are severe penalties for lying under oath. I do not have to remind you that California and the USA is a law abiding country that prides itself in the rule of law. Furthermore I am also prepared to testify to the veracity of what I say over Skype or other electronic means. However I am not prepared to step foot in Singapore as I do not trust the legal system and the Kangaroo courts of Singapore.

I have so far refrained from making any reference to my ex-wife all these years. She is 60 now and best to let her live out the rest of her years in peace. But in this case I had an obligation to name her since the information came from her and the need to identity her as the source of my information.

Gopalan Nair
Attorney at Law
A Singaporean in Exile

Email: Gopalann@yahoo.com

Disclaimer: TheRealSingapore.com is a platform for users to submit content and all content remains the property of the individual contributors. The views and opinions expressed by author(s) within the website are solely that of the contributors and in no way reflects the views of TheRealSingapore.com.

As trial approaches for the man who generated national controversy over Stand Your Ground laws when he shot dead 17-year-old Trayvon Martin on a Florida street, a jury has acquitted another man under Florida’s controversial law, after he shot dead a man he caught having sex with his wife.

Ralph Wald, a 70-year-old Vietnam veteran, walked into his home around midnight, and less than ten seconds later, fired three shots at Walter Conley, according to ABC News. He told the jury he thought Conley was raping his wife when he saw them having intercourse in his home. But during a 911 call, when the dispatcher asked Wald if the man was dead, Wald responded, “I hope so!” and refused to help the man. He asked for medical help for his wife, Johnna Flores, since he thought he accidentally shot her also. He said he didn’t recognize Conley even though he had been roommates with his wife prior to her relationship with Wald, lived next door to Wald, had tattoos of Flores on his neck and back, and worked for Flores at her fencing company.

Prosecutors argued that Wald, who suffered from erectile dysfunction, killed Conley in a jealous rage, pointing out that Wald used the word “fornicate” in reports to police, and never the word “rape.”

To acquit Wald under the state’s Stand Your Ground law, Wald had to prove only that he believed his wife was being raped. It doesn’t matter that he shot immediately without taking time to assess the situation, nor that he could have likely taken other measures short of firing three shots into Conley’s head and back. Stand Your Ground laws authorize the unfettered use of deadly force where someone fears assault, without even a duty to first attempt to retreat.

Studies have shown that Stand Your Ground laws are racially discriminatory, associated withhigher homicide rates, and don’t deter crime. But even after outrage over Florida’s law in the wake of Trayvon Martin’s death, attempts to repeal and change these NRA and ALEC-backed statutes have overwhelmingly failed.

Even without a Stand Your Ground law, there are other charges and defenses for heat-of-the-moment crimes like this one with significantly lesser punishment than premeditated murder. Stand Your Ground laws, by contrast, exonerate defendants who kill without hesitation from any criminal liability at all. And it encourages the sort of cowboy justice that might empower one to believe they could take punishment into their own hands — whether it be for adultery or some other wrong — under the guise of self-defense.

*Article first appeared on http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/06/04/2095821/citing-stand-your-gr...

News reports and comments that are critical of government policies will not be targeted under the new licensing regime for news sites, as long as they are factual and not misleading, said Minister for Communications and Information Yaacob Ibrahim yesterday.

In his most extensive reply thus far on numerous concerns raised by some, including fears that the Media Development Authority’s move last week could be “the first step” towards tighter regulation of the Internet, Dr Yaacob stressed that the Government’s “light touch” approach has not changed. “Our approach has been, and remains, that the Internet is not exempt from the rules of society,” he added.

Dr Yaacob also sought to clarify the guidelines on restricted content. “Nowhere do the guidelines state that news sites cannot question or highlight the shortcomings of government policies, as long as the assessments are well-intentioned, and not based on factual inaccuracies with the intention to mislead the public,” he said.

On the perception among many in cyberspace that the new licensing regime is an attempt to limit public discourse, Dr Yaacob felt that time would prove this view wrong. “I expect that the sites will continue to operate as before,” he said. “In fact, I hope that the activists who are today making this far-fetched claim will be honest enough to admit it when the time comes.”

Yesterday was the second time in the space of a few days that Dr Yaacob had moved to address concerns over the new licensing scheme. Last Friday, he took to Facebook to address the online backlash , but many within the online community were not convinced, and a group of bloggers said they would be organising a protest on Saturday against the new requirements.

The debate on the new requirements carried on last night, when Acting Manpower Minister Tan Chuan-Jin appeared as a guest on Channel NewsAsia’s Talking Point programme and fielded phone-in questions from several callers.

The new licensing regime, which kicked in last Saturday, affects websites which have “significant reach” — defined as having 50,000 unique visitors from Singapore each month over a period of two months — and publish an average of at least one article a week on “Singapore’s news and current affairs” over the same period.

Operators of these news sites will be given 24 hours to remove content deemed objectionable by the MDA, and are also required to put up a “performance bond” of S$50,000. If they defy the order to apply for a licence, they can be fined up to S$200,000 or jailed up to three years or both.

Deregulate mainstream media? Not much of a real alternative, said Dr Yaacob

Speaking to reporters yesterday, Dr Yaacob said the MDA has been “restrained” in directing sites to take-down content. Since the class licence scheme came into effect in 1996, a take-down notice has been issued 24 times — once for religiously-offensive content concerning the “Innocence of Muslims” video last year, and the rest for prohibited content such as pornography and advertisements solicting for sex or sex chats.

The Minister also explained why the Government had created a new regime, even though existing rules could be used to deal with perpetrators of explicit or racist content. Dr Yaacob put this down to a “stronger onus” on the individual licensee to report responsibly and be aware of his legal obligations. “Going by the reactions of some Internet content providers, it would appear that not all of them are fully aware of the content standards in the class licence,” he added. “This is not a major problem if they are not producing news content. But it should be a concern if, for something as important as news, they are not even aware what the baseline content standards are.”

Dr Yaacob also dismissed links charges by some in the online community that the licensing regime was drawn up after an Internet code of conduct was rejected by netizens. The code of conduct, which was first mooted in late 2011, was aimed at promoting a safer and more civil Internet environment, whereas the new licensing framework is “directed at bringing regulatory parity to news platforms”, he said.

As to suggestions by some that an alternative to achieving parity — deregulating mainstream media — be considered instead, Dr Yaacob felt this was “not much of a real alternative”. He brought up the example of New Zealand, which “has problems” with its self-regulatory system for traditional media, and has now recognised the need for a regulator to oversee both traditional and online media. “The bottom line is that they now see that even the media can operate contrary to the public interest, and they need a regulator to ensure that this does not happen,” he said.

On why there was no public consultation on the change, Dr Yaacob explained that this was because there was no “fundamental shift in policy approach” — the approach to regulating the Internet remains a “light-touch” one, he added. Wide public consultation will take place when a new policy direction, such as the possibility of regulating some overseas broadcasters targeting the Singapore market, is taken, he said.

Asked if public communication on the change could have been done better, Dr Yaacob said: “At the end of the day, anything could have been done better, but I want the online community to understand this is not an attempt to clamp down on anybody. It’s really to ensure that those in the business of reporting news do so responsibly.”

In a statement yesterday, Free My Internet, a group of sociopolitical websites and bloggers formed to protest against these new regulations, took issue with the lack of public consultation.

“The burden is on the Government to consult the public and Parliament before making sweeping changes that impact our constitutional freedoms. It is incorrect for Dr Yaacob to turn the tables on the people of Singapore by placing the burden on them to prove that this piece of legislation will be mis-applied,” it said.

Source: TodayOnline

OMFG, are these jokers for real? Get this: the MDA wants to expand the Broadcast Act. Minister for Communications and Information Yaacob Ibrahim told reporters yesterday, "We will amend the Broadcasting Act next year, with a view to ensure that any other sites which are hosted overseas but reporting on Singapore news, are also brought into the licensing framework." At the moment, the Act does not empower the government to take action against any entity that is based overseas. "But, if they are transmitting news to Singaporeans and Singapore is their target market, then we will have to do something about it," said Dr Yaacob.

Yaacob, did you pause for a moment and think about what you just said? Are you actually serious? These other websites hosted overseas, people like BBC News, CNN, Sky News, ABC, Russia Today, Reuters, CNBC, ITN, Fox, France24, Al-Jazeera etc - yeah those people, you think you are going to make them pay a bond of $50,000 and they're going to do whatever you tell them to do, such as take down a news report about how corrupt the PAP is? As if that is going to work. Why would they do that? Because you said so? LMFAO.

Let's look at the BBC News for instance, they have written negative reports on countries with poor human rights records,like North Korea, Zimbabwe and Burma all these years. There are plenty of BBC news reports to make the regimes in these country look utterly corrupt and despicable. What if Robert Mugabe or Kim Jong Un confronted the BBC and told them to stop writing negative reports of their countries - what do you think the BBC would do? They would laugh at these dictators at their attempts to influence the media outside their country and continue to report the truth from these countries. In fact, Robert Mugabe hates the BBC so much that he has unceremoniously banned them from Zimbabwe for many years and during that period when the BBC was banned from Zimbabwe, they continued to report from neighbouring South Africa whilst still sneaking over the border, often posing as tourists or businessmen to secretly film conditions in Zimbabwe and interview Zimbabweans.

Likewise, the BBC is not allowed into North Korea - but they still secretly enter North Korea and film there anyway and cover stories about North Korea from their bases South Korea and China. Do you think they care if Kim Jong Un said to them, "stop writing negative stuff about North Korea! I want you to take down all those negative stories on the BBC News website about North Korea!" It doesn't work like that.

They may threaten, "We'll stop buying your BBC programmes! We'll  stop Singaporeans from watching Top Gear! We'll close down your BBC Worldwide office in Singapore if you don't comply!" To which the BBC would probably reply, "Go ahead, we don't care. We'll just move our BBC Worldwide office in Kuala Lumpur then."

Let me know if they succeed - because I'm sure Kim Jong Un and Robert Mugabe would love to know how you stop the BBC and all these other journalists around the world from writing negative stories about their country. Yaacob, you didn't think this one through, did you? There's an old saying, engage brain before mouth. I suggest you try that when you are trying to legislate on the issue of internet media.

You know whom I blame for this? The 60.14% who voted for this bullshit. Enough already. Sudah cukup lah! If you know of a family member, relative, friend or colleague who is part of the 60.14% who voted for the PAP, tell them it is all their fault that this is happening. You have such total idiots who have no freaking clue how the media or the internet works making laws about it and this would've been funny if it wasn't the law. This shit just got real bitch, so there's no point in beingpaiseh or polite about the issue - if you know someone who is amongst the 60.14%, you must take action and engage them today. As usual, please feel free to leave a comment below. Stand up for press freedom, defend your freedom of speech and tell the PAP bastards in white to kindly go fuck themselves with a big durian. 

Pathetic lame Indian FT calls (obvious from his accent) in to support the new unpopular online rulings regarding online space and speech .

This FT cited the Bus drivers strike episode as an excuse to support the policy. This is absurd as the the PRC bus drivers strike episode first was ignited in a china forum and was conducted entirely by foreigners.

We are witnessing the effect of foreigners interfering in Singapore politics and issues and this poses a grave risk to our autonomy.

This FT is probably a permanent resident who is here temporary to make as much money as possible in Singapore before emigrating to the West or to retire back home.

The coming 2016 election may be the last window of opportunity for Singaporeans to reclaim ownership of their own nation after which their voices and votes will be diluted by the relentless influx of foreigners that they will have little influence in subsequent elections with the increasing number of new citizens voting to keep the PAP in power forever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lute3Q3ByU&feature=youtu.be

Xposed

Is the mother of 'China's top nude model' Gan Lu Lu still concerned about her daughter's singlehood? 

"It's not that she can't find one, it's just that she lacks the time", says her mother Lei Bingxia (see video below).

Bingxia adds: "She's a great girl, very naive and filial too. It's as if she's not willing to look for love."

"I hope she can find someone like me. Then I can relax and she can live the life she chooses." 

And what is her ideal son-in-law?

"He should be someone like me. He should love both my daughter and our family."

Gan Lu Lu was in Singapore for the opening of Club Lava, which paid her $40,000 for the appearance, reports The New Paper. 

She said: “I saw a handful of handsome guys in the crowd today. They are quite well-dressed and good-looking!”

Even though Lu Lu, who is currently single, did not find a suitor from her appearance at the club, she had indicated earlier that she does not mind dating a Singaporean guy and eventually marrying him.

She said before the event started: “If I get to marry a Singaporean and can become a Singaporean citizen, it would be like I struck the lottery! I would keep my eyes open for any great guys who come my way.

For more pictures: Gallery: Gan Lu Lu comes to Singapore

We like to think compulsory National Service (NS) betters us. It teaches us responsibility, doubles our chest hair, and shows us how to add creative flair when swearing. But at its core, NS is a sacrifice. It’s not so much beneficial as it is plain mandatory (like every corporate training workshop ever). Fortunately, there are some bonuses that could benefit both country and conscript. Here’s the ones they should consider:

1. More Conversions to Civilian Licenses / Certificates

This already happens for some military vocations, like drivers. If drivers clock enough miles during NS, they can convert their military driving license to a civilian license. It’s a great idea: We help the country out, and we’re indirectly improving our future workforce.

Now if it were up to MoneySmart, we’d make every effort to widen the range of civilian licenses / certificates that NS men get. That can be done by (1) getting organizations to recognize military licenses / certificates, or (2) sending NS men straight to civilian organizations for specific forms of training. For example:

• Let clerks get secretarial certification from a commercial organization
• Get the physical training instructors recognized certification, from sports or the relevant health institutes
• Get logistics certification for store men

Granted, it might mean tweaking the vocational training courses. But this sort of certification comes in handy for job searches after NS. Also, it raises employability for army regulars, should they leave for a civilian line after a long contract.

2. Increase HDB Eligibility for NS Men

As a matter of fact, no, I can’t “secure” that flat. Or any other.

Sure, two years of crawling under concertina wire and wiping your ass with leaves sucks. But you’re rewarded! You have something to be proud of: A home to call your own, one that you’ve trained to def…oh wait.

Nope. Your odds of getting a home (read: HDB flat) are pretty much the same as anyone who didn’t do NS. You have to ballot for it, and your chances are the same as theirs.

Now how’s that fair?

I mean, some of us had to eat things they don’t even allow you to touch at the Night Safari. And we commit to coming back periodically for reservist training. We do it out of love for country, and to defend a home that we apparently might not have. Not without a damned long wait.

Again, I know NS is ultimately an obligation and not a benefit. But in the interest of fairness and the nation’s overall morale, can’t we at least tweak the ballots to favour the people who’ve served?

3. Extended Medical Coverage

Hey, I got this chipped toenail in basic training and Bird’s Nest is a medical necessity.

NS has a high safety margin (or so I was told. Repeatedly, when they put the live grenade in my hand).Most Singaporeans don’t come out of it with lasting injuries.

But let’s look at the minority cases. Let’s say (touch wood and bathe in flowers) someone comes out with chronic pain, or is missing some part of his body that doctors agree should really be there.  Now his medical expenses are covered during NS, but what about after?

The condition requires constant medication, extending for a time beyond NS. Or the injury may manifest its full effects later. I have, for example, an acquaintance who lost his hearing in one ear. This happened due to an insect bite during NS, but the full consequences weren’t understood till after his run-out date (His diminished hearing was a gradual process).

He had to deal with the subsequent medical bills on his own.

Now I’m not suggesting the SAF pay for every conceivable expense. But they should pay (or provide subsidies) for ongoing injuries incurred as a part of training, even after the run-out date. Examples would include slipped discs, or fractures that require a second or third operation.

4. Subsidized Private Insurance

“Abort! Abort! My insurance agent’s watching from down there!”

NS men do have an insurance package worked out for them. But it can be taken further: How about working with big private insurers (AIA, Prudential, etc.) so NS men have access to the same policies offered to the public, but at lower prices?

There are thousands of NS Men conscripted every year.  Due to sheer bulk, there’s plenty of room for lower premiums. And if the armed forces is willing to pitch in further, they could subsidize policies for the duration of NS.

It’s win-win all around: NS men can get a policy they actually want, the armed forces will have less of a headache (when its soldiers are properly insured), and insurance salesmen can start picking out their BMWs.

Speaking of insurance matters…did you know we spend a lot of time telling people how to get better policies? Follow us on Facebook, we’ll tell you how.

5. Educational Subsidies

Yeah, I have a Phd. in aerospace engineering. But placing road cones is clearly a better way to serve my country.

I’m not talking about military scholarships and bonds. I’m suspicious of those. When I was 18 I couldn’t decide which flavour of popcorn I liked, let alone whether to be a soldier for six years.

That said, it’s obvious that soldering gets in the way of studying. Our boys will lose two years of schooling, which is bad enough. But on top of that, salary during NS is an indulgent $480 to $1,000 a month. On that pay scale, McDonald’s is like a five star restaurant.

It also doesn’t help after NS, when the typical diploma or degree course is upward of $15,000. Now considering NS men are already stalled by two years, how about a few education subsidies? It might stop them delivering pizzas to pay off the university, and nab them a degree sooner.

Even a 5% to 10% tuition fee reduction, for the first year, would make a huge difference. It might even reduce the number of deferment requests, and soften the “waste of time” arguments.

About the Author

Ryan Ong I'm the editor for MoneySmart.sg. I was a freelance writer for over a decade, and covered topics from music to super-contagious foot diseases. After I was able to walk in public again, I designed board games, taught in schools, and edited a local student paper. I took this job because I believe financial news should be accessible and fun to read. Also, because the assignments don't involve shouting teenagers and debilitating plagues. The author writes at http://www.moneysmart.sg

A group of students and young media practitioners are concerned about the new MDA licensing regime for online news sites and are urging the Minister for a dialogue to address their concerns:

PRESS RELEASE – MASS COMMUNICATION / JOURNALISM STUDENTS AND YOUNG MEDIA PRACTITIONERS CALL FOR DIALOGUE WITH MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS & INFORMATION, DR YAACOB IBRAHIM

5 June 2013

The Media Development Authority had, on 28 May 2013, made a rather unexpected announcement of a new licensing regime for online news sites which requires websites that regularly report on local news, and have significant reach to “comply within 24 hours to MDA’s directions to remove content that is found to be in breach of content standards.”

The regime, which came into effect on the 1st June 2013, also expects news sites, which meet its criteria, to post performance bonds of SGD50, 000.

This news comes at a time where citizens are calling for reforms of already stifling legislations that inhibit press freedoms, and is seen as a regressive step that exhibits a willingness to curb the free-flow of information, in favour of Singapore’s archaic practices imposing controls on the estate of the media. The out of the blue nature of this regime also nullifies the idea of the national conversation initiative, introduced by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong last year.

As young mass communications students and practitioners, this new framework concerns us as the wording of the amendment suggests that the State will have unmoderated power to muzzle not only journalists, but virtually everyone and anyone who uses the Internet. Even comments posted on websites are affected, since the MDA defines news as “news, intelligence, report of occurrence, or any other matter of public interest about any social, economic, political, cultural, artistic, sporting, scientific, or any other aspect of Singapore in any language – whether paid or free.”

This is particularly disconcerting, as the new amendments prognosticate a repressive media industry where future media practitioners will have to conform to the State’s agenda, as opposed to disseminating ethical, free, fair, and objective information.

Besides this, the regulations seem to blatantly infringe on the freedom of the press, the freedom of speech, and the freedom of expression – freedoms which define true journalistic ethics and standards.

These new regulations may also inadvertently hurt the media industry, which will result in the erosion of online discourse and analysis, causing a decreasing number of professionals entering the media industry.

We further feel that the amendments, as they stand, and the haste with which the amendments to the regulation were gazetted, display a discouraging lack of trust in citizens, and perpetuate the mentality of ‘you can speak your mind, but only if you have a license to do so’. This same lack of trust has also been extended to our audiences, as it is assumed that Singaporeans need the Government to discern between right and wrong; that Singaporeans lack the ability to think critically. This, we feel, has negative consequences on the youth of Singapore.

We read the reports on the Minister for Communications & Information’s press conference on 4 June 2013, but were not convinced by his assurances. Additionally, we find it contradictory that he has called us to trust the MDA, and yet hesitates to trust our ability to discern and analyse news content for ourselves.

We also watched Channel News Asia’s Talking Point on 4 June 2013, to see if Acting Minister Tan Chuan Jin would allay some of our concerns, but instead he reinforced the validity of our position by saying that if a blog aims to report news regularly, then it can be considered a news site.

These concerns obligate us, in our capacities as concerned young Singaporeans, to request that the Minister for Communications & Information rescind the gazetting requiring online news sites to be regulated; and if he would not, to engage us in a dialogue to explain why he cannot.

We hope that the Minister will respond positively to this invitation and address our concerns about the new licensing framework for online news sites, its impact/implications on current and future media practitioners, and reconsider the implementation of such a licensing regime.

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Signatories:

Jewel Loveenia Philemon, 20
Singapore Citizen

Nithun Nandakumar, 22
Singapore Citizen

Zachary Soh Zhao En, 18
Singapore Citizen

Anirudh Krishnan, 21
Singapore Citizen

Ng Yi Shu, 20
Singapore Citizen

Ng Jia Ni, 15
Singapore Citizen

Jeremy Jeyanth Philemon, 18
Singapore Citizen

Seamus Low, 18
Singapore Citizen

Harshini Natasha James, 18
Singapore Citizen

Elisabelle Aruldoss, 20
Singapore Citizen

Melissa Miles Tsang, 20
Singapore Citizen

Bryan Cheang, 24
Singapore Citizen

Chia Eu Jinn, 18
Singapore Citizen

Hadi Abdul, 21
Singapore Citizen

Salima Nadira Mafoot Moss Simon, 23
Singapore Citizen

Ellery Aruldoss, 22
Singapore Citizen

Kevin Ng, 25
Singapore Citizen

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                                    8333 0612

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*Submitted by Jewel Philemon