Tag: PAP

Abd’ Al-Halim: The New Poor In Singapore Are Majority Malays

AsSalaam’alaikum!

This has happened before several years ago but when Al-Jazeera covered it, to hide their utter shame, the government banned the broadcast station in Singapore. At the time, there were several malay families who were kicked out of their HDB flats who had no alternative but to live in tents. The Malays were the most hard hit whenever there is any economic trouble. They are the first to be retrenched and the last to be employed. Now with the unbridled influx of foreign workers and the ongoing Islamophobia and general hatred for the Malays, even Malays with high qualification find it very very hard to get jobs. And when any Malay complain about their situation they will be told that they are too choosy or are simply not as well qualified because, this is after all, a meritocracy! This is the result of such macro-economic and socio-political mismanagement that further disadvantage the Malay-Muslims. It is a good thing that the Malays do not turn to crime as they still have not lost their faith in Islam. I worry that is a matter of time because desperate people do desperate things – Children need food shelter, proper sanitation and education.

There must be transparency in this. We need to know the racial breakdown of these people. It is also ironic to note that the PAP government had since the 60’s destroyed the kampung villages and appropriated the lands of the Malays via legislation of URA laws but now the Malays are returning to set up kampungs (villages) with a penghulu to boot. Another question is, where are the zakat (&/ waqaf) officials? Are they at ready only to collect but when there is such a clear need to disburse the funds they are not to be found?

In the early 90’s the opposition spoke about the rise of the “New Poor” in Singapore. Well, if we are not careful, the new poor will, by and large be the Malays.

Source: Ustaz Abd’ Al-Halim

October 10, 2016
Singapore Businesses Quizzed By Chinese Counterparts Over Their Stand On South China Sea Issue

Following the back-and-forth between Singapore and Chinese state-owned newspaper Global Times over the South China Sea issue, some Singapore businessmen with interests in China are being questioned by their Chinese counterparts, on where they stand on the matter.

Singapore companies TODAY spoke to are concerned that this, along with the increasingly shrill comments by Chinese netizens in response to the newspaper’s provocative articles, would eventually affect their businesses.

Restaurant chain Tung Lok Group has operations in Beijing and Shanghai. Its executive chairman Andrew Tjioe noted the nationalistic fervour in a country “where everything seems to be about politics”. “I’m hoping, though, that consumers in China are mature enough to know how to separate politics and business,” he said.

Agreeing, Mr Ho Meng Kit, chief executive officer of Singapore Business Federation, added: “If this drags on, and there’s widespread anger or hostility towards Singapore products, we’ll be concerned. The Chinese are very nationalistic. I think it’s important that Singapore’s side of the story gets heard in China as the Global Times is not balanced. We hope that the Chinese citizens get a balanced view of the situation.”

Last Tuesday (Oct 4), Members of Parliament (MPs) were briefed on the situation by the Cabinet. MPs told TODAY that concerns of businesses were reflected at the briefing and clarifications were also sought on the actual situation, beyond the rhetoric in the Chinese press.

On Saturday, the topic was also raised at an annual gathering between MPs and grassroots leaders, with Chinese clan associations in attendance.

Mr Koh Chin Yee, chief executive officer of Singapore-based think-tank Longus Research Institute, which does work on China and Asia geopolitics, had previously worked in China for nine years and has ties with the Singapore business community there.

He said: “Such talk among netizens has translated to real life debate… and has caused disturbances to businessmen operating in China. Singapore businessmen in China have told me that they get questioned about their stand on the South China Sea issue, by their counterparts in China.”

Over the past weeks, Global Times had published a series of reports critical of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s official visit to Japan last month, which sparked criticisms of Singapore among Chinese netizens. On Chinese social media network Weibo as well as on the newspaper’s websites, scores of netizens lashed out at Singapore — for example, accusing the Republic of siding with the United States and Japan over the South China Sea issue. Some also remarked that Singapore should know its place as a small country while others said they would stay away from Singapore and other countries in Southeast Asia which “oppose China”.

The Global Times reports came on the back of a public exchange of words between the tabloid and Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The newspaper claimed that the Republic had tried to push for a stronger statement on the international tribunal’s ruling on the South China Sea at the NAM summit last week in Venezuela.

This sparked a pushback from Singapore’s ambassador to China Stanley Loh, who said the claim was fabricated, false and unfounded. But the Global Times maintained its sources were credible, and said Mr Loh should urge Singapore to “conduct self-reflection” instead. In response, Mr Loh stated that the crux of the matter is that Global Times’ Sept 21 report did not accurately reflect the proceedings at the recent NAM Summit, which can be verified by the public record of the meeting.

While Singapore companies said they have not been affected adversely, at least one foreign company has claimed that earnings have taken a hit due to the South China Sea territorial disputes on business.

Last week, Yum Brands — which owns KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell — attributed the company’s weak financial results in China to the spat and a United Nations tribunal ruling in July that China’s claims violate international law. Yum CEO Greg Creed said: “Anticipated tougher laps in the second half of the third quarter were compounded by an international court ruling on claims regarding the South China Sea, which triggered a series of regional protests and negative sentiment against a few international companies with well-known Western brands.”

Referring to Yum’s predicament, Tanjong Pagar GRC Member of Parliament Joan Pereira, who sits on the Government Parliamentary Committee for defence and foreign affairs, pointed out that the “risk to trade and business is real”.

“This makes it important for the Government to clarify the misreporting in the Global Times, which is exactly what our Ambassador has been doing,” she said. She reiterated that in the South China Sea disputes, as well all international issues, Singapore’s national interest “lies not in taking sides but in supporting a rule-based world order”.

Source: TODAY Online

October 10, 2016
What A Minister’s Reluctance To Be PM Says About Race In Singapore

The move on Wednesday by Singapore’s popular deputy premier to emphatically quash suggestions he wants to take over from Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong exposes the conservative ethnic consensus in the country’s leadership, despite a public clamour for greater political openness, observers say.

Public speculation about Tharman Shanmugaratnam’s fit as Lee’s successor has been swirling in recent years, and resurfaced on Monday after an independent survey showed nearly 69 per cent of Singaporeans would support the 59-year-old ethnic Tamil as the country’s next leader.

“Just to be absolutely clear, because I know there’s this talk going around… I’m not the man for PM, I say that categorically. It’s not me,” Tharman told local media late on Wednesday.

Tharman said the top job was not his ambition.

He is one of two deputy prime ministers and oversees financial and social issues. The former central bank chief took the job in 2011, having entered politics in 2001. He was finance minister from 2007 to 2015, and an education minister before that.

“I’m good at policymaking, good at advising my younger colleagues and supporting the PM, not being the PM,” he was quoted as saying.

Political observers told This Week in Asia Tharman’s comments revealed his tacit acceptance of the long-ruling People’s Action Party’s (PAP) belief that the Chinese-majority country was not yet ready for an ethnic minority leader.

“It may be that he genuinely does not want the job but it is also possible that the results of that survey have exposed the gulf between popular thinking and many of Tharman’s senior PAP colleagues on ethnicity and politics,” said Garry Rodan, professor of Southeast Asian politics at Australia’s Murdoch University.

“The PAP orthodoxy…emphasises that most Singaporeans are reluctant to support candidates from outside their own ethnic group for top leadership posts,” Rodan said.

Singapore’s resident population of 3.9 million is made up of 74.3 per cent Chinese, 13.3 per cent Malays and 9.1 per cent Indians, with others making up the remaining 3.2 per cent.

Alex Au, a prominent political blogger, said Tharman was “being a very loyal colleague”.

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“He does not wish pressure to build on his cabinet colleagues to choose certain options when it comes to leadership succession,” he said.

Singaporean leaders – including current premier Lee and his father, the late founding prime minister Lee Kuan Yew – have said the country’s conservative majority Chinese electorate had some time to go before it would accept a non-Chinese leader.

But the survey of 897 Singaporeans, commissioned by Yahoo Singapore and conducted by independent polling firm Blackbox Research, showed 73 per cent of people disagreeing that the race of the premier is an important factor.

“The poll results confirm data from other Blackbox surveys that race is not the primary criterion as a basis for choosing a preferred candidate among the Singapore public,” the polling firm said in the report.

Long-time Singapore political observer Bridget Welsh said Tharman’s popularity “stems from his support of spending for social welfare and services, and management of the economy, as well as his ability to bridge groups as a more liberal and open leader compared to his peers”.

But “as an elite-orientated party, the PAP categorically rejects selection by popular opinion,” said Welsh, a Southeast Asian politics expert at the National Taiwan University.

“Tharman is too liberal, too popular, and an ethnic minority – all features that do not fit with today’s hardline PAP,” she added.

Tharman, who concurrently served as the chief of the International Monetary Fund’s powerful policy-steering body from 2011 to 2015 while in government, grabbed the limelight at last year’s general election as he used his avuncular speaking style to take apart the opposition’s economic policies and explain the government’s position.

Video clips of his speeches at the hustings went viral on social media, spurring the hashtag “#TharmanforPM”.

Tharman led a team of legislators to sweep the five-seat Jurong district with 79 per cent of the vote in the country’s unique system of bloc voting. It was the highest winning margin in the country. The PAP won the election with 69.9 per cent of the popular vote.

But the economics-trained Tharman, with degrees from the London School of Economics, Cambridge University and Harvard University, has repeatedly denied having designs on the top job. In July last year he used a sporting analogy to describe his aversion to being premier.

“I was always, in sports, a centre-half rather than centre forward. I enjoy playing half-back and making the long passes, but I am not the striker,” Tharman told CNN anchor Fareed Zakaria in a forum.

“Unless I am forced to be, and I don’t think I will be forced to it, because I think we have got choices,” he was quoted as saying.

Au, the blogger, said Tharman’s popularity signalled that the “public is hungry for a different style of governance”.

There is a perception that he is more “approachable and intellectually flexible than some of the ministers in cabinet who perhaps because of their military background come across as rigid or inarticulate,” Au said.

Former army chief Chan Chun Sing, the current PAP whip and leader of the powerful National Trades Union Congress, is seen as one of the ruling party’s preferred candidates to be the next prime minister.

Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat, who returned to work in August after suffering a stroke earlier this year, is also seen as a contender.

In the Yahoo poll, Chan scored 24 per cent support to be a prime ministerial candidate, while Heng got 25 per cent.

Au said the current public debate on leadership succession is “a function of the moment”.

In past leadership changeovers, prime ministers’ successors were named early and had lengthy understudy.

“As the saying goes, nature hates a vacuum,” Au said. “This is causing public speculation to circulate but the window will close soon when the successor is anointed.”

Source: www.scmp.com

September 30, 2016
REACH Cancels Public Forum, Wrongly Informs That Dr Tan Cheng Bock Did Not Register

Government agency, REACH, was to organise an public forum on the Presidential Election. Presidential hopeful, Dr Tan Cheng Bock, successfully registered to participate in the forum.

I was looking forward to attending a REACH public forum on the Presidential Election set for today. Minister Shanmugam was due to speak and I wanted to hear what he had to say. I registered my attendance last week and was happy to receive a confirmation for my attendance. I was planning to attend with a few friends and family.

So Dr Tan was understandably disappointed when the forum was eventually cancelled. REACH explained that the cancellation was due to poor response. The agency also indicated that there was no registration under the name of Dr Tan Cheng Bock.

But why would someone of Dr Tan Cheng Bock’s stature lie online about registering for the event?

Turns out, he Dr Tan wasn’t. He had in fact registered under the alias ‘Adrian Tan’, which is recorded in his NRIC. He also provided all his personal details during the registration.

In response to REACH that I did not register?

I did register under my alias Adrian Tan which is in my NRIC, the registration also asked for my NRIC number, mobile, address, and occupation which I supplied. My acceptance letter is attached, as well as my alias in my NRIC.

So what really was the reason for the cancellation of the forum? Your guess is as good as mine.

Dr Who

[Reader Contribution]

September 30, 2016
Singapore Economy ‘In For A Tough Period’: Tharman

The Singapore economy is “in for a tough period that will last for a while”, said Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam on Wednesday (Sep 28).

Speaking to reporters at the launch of the Wong Fong Industries headquarters in Joo Koon, Mr Tharman noted that for 2016, “we’ve had some growth at the start but the second half will be weaker; in the lower half of the 1 per cent to 2 per cent range”.

Private sector economists surveyed by the Monetary Authority of Singapore have said they expect Singapore’s economy to grow by 1.8 per cent this year.

“First, structurally, we are now in the new mode of growth. We can’t keep growing by increasing manpower. We have to get productivity up. But even if things go well in Singapore, structurally we are talking about normal growth being 2 to 3 per cent – which is relatively good if we go by the standards of most developed economies,” said Mr Tharman.

“We are currently growing below the normal growth and that’s because of the cyclical winds that are affecting us. It’s partly because of the general slowdown of the global economy, partly because of the restructuring in China, but it’s also some sector-specific factors,” he said, adding that Singapore has to prepare for growth “below 2 per cent for a couple of years”.

GOVT’S PRIORITY TO HELP SMEs INNOVATE: THARMAN

“Now is the time for SMEs to retool during these tough times … We also have to monitor our unemployment to ensure it doesn’t become structural. We want to quickly match displaced workers with jobs, help people get back in as soon as possible. We will work with private placement providers, give incentives to match people to jobs,” he said.

Mr Tharman said it remains the Government’s priority to help innovation-minded SMEs: “We want to help SMEs to commercialise their capabilities beyond Singapore to take advantage of the growing regional opportunities.”

Wong Fong Industries in particular, is looking to take electric vehicles right to the cutting edge with Singapore’s first electric supercar that it is developing with Williams Advanced Engineering.

In recent years, the transport engineering firm has shifted gears to be more innovation-driven, moving into higher value areas such as military, specialised vehicles and electric vehicles.

“The first 50 years is about survival and profits, but going forward we feel innovation and research and development will be key,” said Mr Eric Lew, executive director, Wong Fong Industries.

The firm’s new S$30 million corporate headquarters is twice the size of its previous office and houses its new Wong Fong Research and Innovation Centre.

“With this new headquarters, we have expanded our service capability, we have expanded our Wong Fong Academy capacity and our research and development facilities. With that we are able to double the activities in the group,” said Mr Lew.

At the launch event, Mr Tharman also called for closer partnerships between research institutes and local firms, which would help focus R&D resources towards commercialisation.

Source: ChannelNewsAsia

September 29, 2016