When I was a student I believed them. And now that I am old I stopped believing. There is a sense of betrayal when they lie to you, especially when they use it for what you trusted to be the nation’s interest, instead it was a political game, an insidious self-interest deed that has brought about a national pathological psychology that took us decades to realize.
And now that we know, we have to first expose all their lies, the facts, all the different traits in the stories, so that a true narrative is laid before Singaporeans.
1. I am amused that our DPM Tharman (2001), while he said categorically that he believed that those arrested in the so called Marxists Conspiracy were just social workers, he gave the caveat that he had no access to the intelligence files. So, if even our DPM is not allowed to access intelligence files how can an ordinary citizen ever know the truth? Were they arrested as communists or for supporting opposition parties?
2. “Goh Chok Tong, who was deputy prime minister at the time [of the 1987 'Marxist conspiracy'], revealed in an interview for the 2009 history of the PAP, Men in White, that his Cabinet colleague S. Dhanabalan ‘was not fully comfortable with the action which we took’. This, Goh said, was a reason for Dhanabalan’s eventual shock resignation from government.
3. Law lecturer Walter Woon, who would later assume the post of Attorney-General, said in a 1991 interview with the Straits Times that “As far as I am concerned, the government’s case is still not proven. I would not say those fellows were Red, not from the stuff they presented. I think a lot of people have this skepticism.”
When such people who are so close to the government doubts their actions, I think it says it all. For those PAP supporters, realize that these so called PAP integrity is not a transparent face but with multiple shadows that is not reflected in the mirror.
You think you can sleep well because you are capitalists, managerial class, harvesting the cheap flow of labor and capital? You think is alright that the government gives falsehood because they give you security and work? But the devices of such a government is no different from the devices of a dictatorship, didn’t Hitler lifted Germany out of depression and instill in them confidence after a devastating WW1? Hitler revived a Germany in depression, even Britain and France intellects were enamored by Hitler’s efficiency.
But the price of such a government will run its course to our ruin, for in their lies and falsehoods, they setup seeds for their own destruction, that is Newton’s 3rd law of physics: For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. That opposite reaction is citizens presenting the light that is hidden in secret agendas and files, civic societies that challenge government policies, hell, people don’t even believe the NEA’s data on the haze. This distrust will eventually erode our cohesion and our ruin.
BK
*Comment first appeared in: Talk: The Enduring Consequences of Operation Coldstore