Following my presence in a recent walkabout in AMK GRC with the Reform Party (RP) and a short interview I gave, speculation has been rife that I will run as a candidate for the RP.
I knew Mr J B Jeyaretnam, the founder of the RP, both as a friend and a colleague at the Bar. He was a man who always fought for the common man and dedicated a life of service to his fellow man. I am indeed honoured to have worked with him. He set up the Reform Party before his passing and it’s indeed wonderful to see his work and vision carried on by Kenneth in trying circumstances.
I am grateful that Kenneth allowed me to volunteer my services in some small way. I have seen his dedication and commitment to the people of AMK GRC.
I see the same spirit in Roy Ngerng in wanting to serve the people and being the voice for the under-privileged in society.
I have been a lawyer for 18 years and I have always tried to serve my clients to the best of my ability. It’s a calling I take very seriously.
These few days, I have given considerable thought as to what my role and service to society must be. It is to the calling of service to the legal and judicial system but most of all a calling of service to my clients who depend on me to fight for them.
It is therefore prudent and crucial that I continue to maintain my focus on this and serve my clients diligently when I resume my legal practice shortly. It is here that my focus and service must lie.
Accordingly I have decided that my service now is best rendered in this role.
I thank the Reform Party for allowing me to witness its work and outreach up close.
I wish them, and Roy Ngerng, well in their service to the public.
Parti Tindakan Rakyat (PAP) mula memperkenalkan calon-calon barunya yang bakal bertanding dalam Pilihan Raya Umum (GE) akan datang.
Mereka adalah Ketua Kajian Matawang Asing Maybank, Encik Saktiandi Supaat, 42 tahun; Ketua Pegawai Eksekutif OUE Hospitality REIT Management Pte Ltd, Encik Chong Kee Hiong, 49 tahun; dan mantan Setiausaha Tetap Kedua (Perdagangan dan Perusahaan) Encik Chee Hong Tat (gambar bawah).
Kesemua mereka diperkenalkan kepada media dalam satu persidangan yang diadakan di sebuah kedai kopi di Blok 177, Toa Payoh Central, pagi tadi.
Each candidate contesting a Group Representation Constituency (GRC) must bring strengths to the team, and if animal activist Louis Ng was part of his team standing in Nee Soon GRC, his experience in activism and the grassroots would come in useful, says Minister for Foreign Affairs K Shanmugam.
Speaking to TODAY last night at a Meet-the-People Session at Chong Pang ward, Mr Shanmugam, however, would not confirm whether Mr Ng would indeed contest in the five-man GRC in the upcoming elections.
“If Louis was part of the team, he will bring, as you can tell, his rich experience as an activist, as someone who has advocated a variety of causes including animal rights causes,” said Mr Shanmugam, who is the People’s Action Party’s anchor minister for Nee Soon GRC and also Minister for Law.
Mr Ng, 37, the founder of wildlife rescue group Animal Concerns Research and Education Society (ACRES), has been helping out in the grassroots in Chong Pang ward since 2008, and was also present at last night’s Meet-the-People Session.
He announced his joining the PAP in October last year, when he started helping out at the Kembangan-Chai Chee ward in the Marine Parade GRC.
Recent speculation that he could stand in Joo Chiat SMC has fizzled out after it emerged that current Moulmein-Kallang GRC Member of Parliament Edwin Tong would contest there instead.
And with Mr Ng helping out at Chong Pang again, word has it he could be fielded in the ward.
“He has experience in dealing with people, engaging people and doing things for people. That spirit and that idealism will be brought for the benefit of residents,” said Mr Shanmugam.
“All his life he has trained to be that, so he brings that, if he is part of the team,” he added.
When asked about the PAP’s prospects at the upcoming polls, given that this is the first time all constituencies would be contested, Mr Shanmugam replied that it is not a matter of how many seats are contested, but a matter of who can best serve the residents.
“Who are the five, and can they run your town council? Will they be honest, or will they take your money?” he said, adding that voters would be most concerned about whether or not candidates can deliver their promises.
“Second, you are also selecting them to go into Parliament to form as part of the Government. Do you want them to be part of the Government?” Celene Tan.
The team from two opposition parties that will contest in Bishan-Toa Payoh in the coming General Election (GE) will do so under the Singapore People’s Party (SPP) banner.
Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) secretary-general Benjamin Pwee said his party is happy to contest in the five-member Group Representation Constituency (GRC) under the SPP’s banner, as requested by SPP chairman Lina Chiam.
“The (SPP) brand name is a lot more recognised here, Hamim and I also ran under the SPP the last time (in the 2011 elections). And the SPP is still very much identified with Mr Chiam (See Tong, its secretary-general),” he told the media at both parties’ first joint walkabout outside Bishan MRT Station today (Aug 11).
Mr Pwee and DPP chairman Mohamad Hamim Aliyas — who left the SPP with several others after the 2011 GE — will be among DPP’s candidates put forward for the joint team, which will be selected by both parties, Mr Pwee said.
The SPP team led by Mr Chiam in 2011 lost the contest with 43.07 per cent of the votes. Both parties agreed after last week’s talks among Opposition parties to field a joint team for Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC.
The SPP is also looking to contest in Hong Kah North, Mountbatten and Potong Pasir single-seat wards in the coming election.
The DPP is awaiting the SPP’s confirmed candidates for Bishan-Toa Payoh, and both sides will pick the “best five”, said Mr Pwee.
Both parties, which met up yesterday, are working on a joint manifesto for Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC.
Mr Pwee said some municipal issues they would highlight include the sweeping of monsoon drains and the presence of dengue hot spots.
Activists from both parties handed out flyers to the public today stating that the joint team is keen to serve and would like to hear from residents on issues such as housing, education and employment. The SPP’s central executive committee members Kumar Appavoo and Williiamson Lee, as well as members including Mr Ravi Philemon, were present today. Mrs Chiam was not at the walkabout as she was engaged in outreach at Potong Pasir, said Mr Philemon.
In a statement on its Facebook page last night, SPP said the joint team would offer voters in Bishan Toa-Payoh GRC a stronger alternative, but the partnership would not extend beyond the GRC. “The SPP will continue to put up our strongest candidates for Potong Pasir, Mountbatten and Hong Kah North SMC. Our candidates will continue to be guided by SPP’s party manifesto,” the party said.
Lui’s resignation – a sign of weak leadership from the top
“Singapore will not encourage a culture where ministers resign whenever things go wrong on their watch, whether or not they are actually to blame,” Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong was reported to have said in 2008 during the debate on the escape of terrorist suspect, Mas Selamat Kastari.
My Paper, 2008
Mr Lee was disabusing calls for the then Minister of Home Affairs, Wong Kan Seng, to step down after Mas Selamat climbed through a window at the Whitley Road Detention Centre and escaped.
Mr Wong stayed on and finally stepped down from the Cabinet in 2011, but remains a Member of Parliament (MP) till this day.
Transport Minister Lui Tuck Yew’s surprise announcement on Tuesday that he will not be contesting the upcoming elections is, despite the criticisms, the right thing for him to do.
This is in spite of the flawed principle espoused by Mr Lee – that ministers will not be asked to resign when “things go wrong on their watch, whether or not they are actually to blame.”
While Mr Lui himself did not provide a clear reason for his stepping down, it is not unreasonable to suspect that he did it out of a sense of honour – to take responsibility for the failings of the transport system these past several years – and doing so in a manner which will not be seen as setting a precedent for ministers to resign when things go wrong.
“I have put in my utmost into fulfilling my responsibilities,” Mr Lui, who first came into politics in the 2006 general election, said in his letter to Mr Lee.
The upcoming General Election, he said, “provides an opportunity for me to step back from politics without causing major disruption to Government at the end of its term.”
Without a clear reason for his decision, speculations will surface and indeed they have.
“Was subjected to daily incessant attacks but carried on doing his duty, calmly, and with equanimity,” Law Minister, K Shanmugam, said on his Facebook page. “Could not have been easy for him and his family to be subjected to such incessant and frequently unfair attacks. Many in his position will naturally ask why should they subject themselves to this.”
Mr Shanmugam’s remarks stand in contrast to that of his fellow PAP MP and Mayor of Central Singapore CDC, Denise Phua.
Ms Phua, who is Mr Lui’s colleague in the soon-to-be-defunct Moulmein-Kallang GRC, said the latter “took the brunt of public anger” but “took criticisms and online flaming in his stride, and quietly focused on resolving problems on the ground.”
Nonetheless, to place the blame on criticisms, incessant or not, is simplistic and misguided.
While no one would argue that ministers nowadays do in fact face vocal criticisms from the public, one must also look deeper into the cause.
And as far as Mr Lui’s situation is concerned, there are many issues which have led to such vocal criticisms – and one of these is the lack of accountability from those who are in charge of the transport system, despite all the years of failures, delays, disruptions, and breakdowns.
For example, no one in the oversight regulatory body, the Land Transport Authority (LTA), has been taken to account for its failure to ensure maintenance work was carried out regularly and adequately.
The LTA website says, “LTA regulates and oversees all three main modes of public transport (taxis, buses and trains) and ensures that they meet safety and service standards.”
A committee of inquiry held after the two massive breakdowns in December 2011 concluded that “maintenance lapses [were the] main cause of [the] train breakdowns.”
“Lapses in the way SMRT maintained its rail system were key contributory factors behind last December’s MRT breakdowns, a high-level inquiry has concluded,” the Straits Times reported back then.
In the first half of this year alone, there were five major MRT service disruptions, which were close to half the total last year.
And just last month, another massive breakdown affected some 250,000 commuters.
Yet, no one has been held to account for all the years of disruptions – not even Saw Phaik Hwa, the former CEO of SMRT.
Instead, she was made the highest-paid SMRT CEO at the time, for two years running, taking home a paycheck of S$1.85 million before she resigned in 2012.
But her salary has been dwarfed by that of her successor Desmond Kuek, who has seen his pay doubled – from about S$1.2 million to $2.25 million – in the space of just 3 years, and making him the highest-paid SMRT CEO ever.
And transport fares continue to rise, despite the billions of dollars which have been poured in, and which will be poured into the public transport operators.
It also doesn’t help that even the former chairman of the Public Transport Council, which regulates fares, slammed commuters for expecting higher standards without wanting higher fares.
Straits Times, May 2014
So, given these and many other issues, is it any wonder that the man at the helm has become the target of unhappiness?
And isn’t it simplistic for the likes of the Law Minister to point to so-called “unfair attacks” by the public to explain one possible reason for Mr Lui’s stepping down?
Mr Lui has done the honourable thing – whether he felt he had done his best or whether he felt he had failed to resolve the transport problems – by stepping down.
For this, perhaps the man ought to be applauded.
At least he does not make excuses for himself, or lays the blame on critics or “unfair attacks”.
If indeed Mr Lui decided to step down because of these “unfair attacks”, then the blame really should be on the weak leadership from the top which shields those directly responsible for failures.
Ironically, it is Mr Lui who seems to have held himself to a higher standard than that of the Prime Minister, who has not shown the gumption to take his ministers (and others) to task but instead shields them with ill-conceived arguments – that “Singapore will not encourage a culture where ministers resign whenever things go wrong on their watch, whether or not they are actually to blame.”
This can only breed even more distrust and give rise to more criticisms.
Just look at the Auditor-General’s Office recent report on its audit of government ministries and statutory boards – has anyone been similarly held accountable?
