Eight times Australian National Champion and Commonwealth Games Men’s Singles silver medalist (2006), William Henzell, lambasted Singapore for sending a “professional team” - the politically correct descriptive for "mercenary" - to Glasgow that was largely made up of PRC-born players. “I don’t think what Singapore does is in the spirit of the Games,” Henzell whinged. “It’s disappointing to see.”
Henzell touched a raw nerve. You see, what Singapore does is not exactly in the spirit of nation building either. Bringing in hordes of foreign players into the workforce, some with doctored and dubious paper qualifications, and calling them talents. Gong Li and Eduardo Saverin may have signed on, but they only add to the rarefied list of multi-millionaires, not the types doing the grunt work like having to bear arms to defend a country. At time of jumping ship, the Brazilian-born resident of Singapore was reputedly joining a growing number of people giving up U.S. citizenship ahead of a possible increase in tax rates for top earners.
Minister for Culture, Community and Youth Lawrence Wong celebrated the "achievements of Singapore" on his Facebook page, "especially our table tennis team which continued to dominate". Fortunately he did mention by name the ones who rightfully deserve our congratulations: Joseph Schooling (swimming), Hoe Wah Toon (gymnastics), Danny Chrisnanta and Chayut Triyachart (men's badminton doubles), Derek Wong (singles), Teo Shun Xie (gold medalist, 10m air pistol) and Jasmine Ser, who brought home a gold for women’s 50m rifle, 3-positions. That's the politically correct thing to do.
Tattler
*The writer blogs at http://singaporedesk.blogspot.com/