If you follow what has been happening in Aljunied since the General Election in 2011, you will see that these things are not coincidences.
From the leasing of 26 plots of land in Aljunied and the leasing of 6 plots of land in Hougang to the People's Association almost immediately after the GE, to the AIM saga, to the hawker centre dirty ceilings, to now this (and more in between), you see a pattern.
And a lot of it involve the grassroots organisations.
It really is a shame that the GROs and the volunteers in them have become caught in the politics of it all. There are so many well-meaning, sincere and very hardworking volunteers in the GROs who do not deserve to be put in such positions.
To have elected MPs go to "grassroots leaders" and also "grassroots advisers" for approval or get "letters of support" to hold community events or to use plots of land in their own constituency makes a mockery of our political system.
Effectively, the MPs (particularly opposition ones) are left at the mercy of unelected, volunteer "grassroots leaders", and to "grassroots advisers" in opposition wards who invariably are the ones whom the MPs defeated in open contests of elections.
In other words, these "grassroots advisers" were already rejected by the people, and who are no longer accountable to the people.
Yet, they hold such power over the people's elected MPs.
And seriously, do we really believe that the Ang Mo Kio town council, of which Lee Hsien Loong is a member, should go beg their grassroots leader in the CCC for a "letter of support" in order to even be able to apply for a permit to hold trade fairs in AMK central, for example?
Ministers and Members of Parliament are somehow deemed incapable of managing a trade fair or a community event so much so that they have to seek the "support" of a "grassroots leader" in order to even apply for a permit?
It is a bloody joke.
The grassroots volunteers deserve better than to have their name and work sullied by the PAP's petty and destructive politics.
We Singaporeans too deserve a fair system where those we elect are respected and are not subjected to behind-the-scenes shenanigans such as removing terms from applications forms mysteriously and without explanation.
Let us work together to clean up this dishonest system manufactured by the PAP which is also hurting well-meaning Singaporeans who give of their time in the grassroots to serve the community and to help their fellow citizens.
Singapore can and should be better.
Why is it so hard to just be honest and fair?
Andrew Loh
*Article first appeared on https://www.facebook.com/andrewlohhp