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Tag: Presidential candidate

  • Presidential Hopeful Farid Khan Supports Taking ASSK To Court Over Ethnic Cleansing In Rohingya

    Presidential Hopeful Farid Khan Supports Taking ASSK To Court Over Ethnic Cleansing In Rohingya

    Presidential candidate Faird Khan has thrown his weight behind a petition calling on the European Court of Human Rights to try Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi for human rights violations over the “ethnic cleansing” taking place against the Rohingya community in her country.

    Farid Khan’s personal Facebook page shared a link to a Change.org petition 3 hours ago which reads: “Take Aung San Suu Kyi to European court of human rights over ethnic cleansing in Rohingya.”

    The petition reads:

    We have had a storm of footages and reports being validateded through the media, governments, and the united nation’s inspectors such as the ex UN president Kofi Annan, current UN investigators, Theresa May, Jeremy Corbyn, BBC, Times, etc and the alike have all confirmed that the Mayanmarian government have and are persecuting and ethic cleansing the minority rohingya (Rakhine State) community and its people.

    This has to Stop!This torture is done only due to the minoritie’s faith and the particularly religion practised (Islam) which the army and the government deems it foreign to the state’s religion which is Buddhism. The Buddhist themselves such as monks are taking arms and destroying innocent beings and villages.

    Young children, women and men, the old and the disabled are all being tortured, set on fire, raped, murdered and their houses burned.

    We as the humankind have to take action and take the head of the mayanmar state Aung San Suu Kyi and the armed forces’ commander-in-chief, Ming Aung Hlaing to the International court (The Hague) I.C.J or to The European Court of Human Rights so both of them can answer to their hate crimes.The current leaders are silent but little remarks made. Last year Theresa May invited the head of Mayanmar to Downing Street for a discussion and to join her for an afternoon tea.

    This is absurd.Please bring justice back in this world and with your help we can achieve sending this message of support and expression of unity to those leaders that have no mercy. So it may change their conception. Please help us raise the fees for Human Rights Lawyers, court fees etc

    https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/hussein-mohamed

    Thank you

    Many kind regards

    your sincerely, Hussein M

    The petition has gathered 139,353 supporters as of reporting time.

    This is among the first political statements made by the aspiring presidential candidate.

     

    Rilek1Corner

     

  • Halimah Yacob: First Woman Speaker Will Be First Woman Presidential Candidate

    Halimah Yacob: First Woman Speaker Will Be First Woman Presidential Candidate

    Madam Halimah Yacob is Singapore’s first woman Speaker of Parliament and may well be its first woman President.

    The potential rise to the highest office of the land would be a far cry from the very humble beginnings of the 62-year-old.

    Her father, a watchman, had died of a heart attack when she was eight, leaving her mother to raise her and her four older siblings.

    Her mother initially sold nasi padang from a pushcart until she got a hawker stall licence. Madam Halimah would then wake before sunrise to help her before going to school.

    She attended Singapore Chinese Girls’ School and Tanjong Katong Girls’ School, and was the only one in her family to go on to university.

    She graduated from the University of Singapore with a law degree in 1978, and started work as a legal officer at the National Trades Union Congress (NTUC), where she would stay for 33 years.

    Madam Halimah Yacob receiving the Berita Harian and McDonald’s Achiever of the Year Award from Dr Tony Tan Keng Yam (centre) in 2001 while Berita Harian editor Guntor Sadali looks on. PHOTO: BERITA HARIAN FILE 

    Two years after graduation, she married her university sweetheart Mohammed Abdullah Alhabshee, a businessman.

    The couple, who are of the same age, have five children.

    At NTUC, Madam Halimah rose to head its legal services unit and its women’s development secretariat.

    She also became the first Singaporean on the governing body of the International Labour Organisation, where she sat from 1999 to 2011.

    In 2001, she earned her Masters in law from NUS.

    She entered politics the same year and was elected an MP in Jurong GRC, where she was re-elected two more times – in 2006 and 2011.

    Madam Halimah Yacob in a photo published in 1995 when she was director of NTUC’s legal services department. PHOTO: ST FILE

    Madam Halimah focused on her union work, and was NTUC’s assistant secretary-general from 1999 to 2007, before becoming deputy secretary-general from 2007 until 2011.

    In 2011, she stepped down from the post when she became an office-holder. She was appointed Minister of State in the then-Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports from 2011 to 2012, after which she moved to the Ministry of Social and Family Development.

    Madam Halimah Yacob in a photo published in 2004. PHOTO: LIANHE ZAOBAO FILE

    She stayed there till 2013 when at the age of 58, she was appointed Speaker of Parliament, becoming the first woman to hold the post.

    In interviews, Madam Halimah constantly credited her successes to the support she received from her husband, mother and family.

    She called her mother her heroine, and the day her mother died was the saddest moment of her life. It happened on the morning of Polling Day during the 2015 General Election, when she was contesting Marsiling-Yew Tee GRC.

    Despite her illustrious career, Madam Halimah is known for being down to earth and close to the ground.

    Madam Halimah Yacob at a futsal tournament at her Marsiling–Yew Tee GRC in 2016. PHOTO: BERITA HARIAN

    She has also built a reputation for being an unstinting champion of workers, women and the poor.

    In an interview with The Straits Times shortly after she was made Speaker, she said she had no plans to move out of her five-room Housing Board home in Yishun, which held many precious memories.

    This was despite expectations that she would upgrade to private property.

    She also said that living in the heartlands gave her a keen sense of what bothered people and the daily frustrations they faced if their estate was not well taken care of.

     

    Source: http://www.straitstimes.com/

  • In History Of Presidencies, Colour Blind Reality Of The Ordinary Singaporean Is The One Factual Highlight

    In History Of Presidencies, Colour Blind Reality Of The Ordinary Singaporean Is The One Factual Highlight

    A letter from Patrick Low on the Elected President.

    Dear Fellow Singaporeans

    Comes September 2017 we may be going to the polls to elect our 8th President reserved for the Malay race only. Notwithstanding the constitutionaI amendments passed in Parliament I am not convinced of the wisdom and logic of changing our Presidential system to ensure that a member of the minority must always have a chance to become President via rotation.

    As a Singaporean who lived through the time of our first President or the Yang di- Pertuan Negara appointed in 1959 in self governing Singapore to the 7th President elected in 2011 race was never an issue in my mind and in the minds of countless Singaporeans.
    He can be Chinese Malay Indian or Eurasian elected or appointed it did not make any difference. What matters most is the President must serve the people. If he is honest sincere and capable he will be able to unify all Singaporeans regardless of race language class and religion.

    As a 72 year old Singaporean it is my privilege to grow up colour blind even through the worst racial riots in 1951 1964 and 1965. I was a child of 6 when I first witnessed the horrors of the Maria Hertog riot from a cubicle window in Jalan Besar. Then came the 2nd and 3rd racial riot in 1964/65 when we were part of Malaysia. We were at the Cathay Cinema when racial riots broke out and we were told to go home.

    But none of these riots change our generation’s perception that in multiracial Singapore race should not matter and should never be allowed to matter certainly not in the choice of a President whether he is black white brown or yellow.

    It never occur to me that a Malay should not be the head of state in Chinese majority self governing Singapore in 1959. Neither did I have any reservation to a Eurasian President Dr. Benjamin Sheares a distinguished gynaecologist who served us well from 1971 to 1981.
    Then came our third President Mr. Devan Nair an Indian MP who came from the ranks of the PAP. He unfortunately had to leave office after 4.5 years as a result of personal health problem.

    Next came President Wee Kim Wee another appointive President who hailed from the Straits Time Press. He was a “baba” Chinese Singaporean who performed his role so well that he became known as the People’s President.

    Another well loved President was Mr. Ong Teng Cheong the first elected President in Singapore history. He was our Deputy Prime Minister before he took office but completed only one term owing to differences in perception of the President’s role as a guardian of our reserve.

    After him came the 2 term President S R Nathan a civil servant who was moderately popular with the people attending President’s Charity galas to raise funds for the people. Again race was not an issue even though the previous Indian President did not fare too well and had to leave office under a cloud.

    Now we are nearing the end of the term of Mr Tony Tan an endorsed elected Chinese PresIdent who was a former DPM in the PAP government.

    So all in all we have had 7 Presidents over 58 years. 1 Malay, 2 Indians, 1 Eurasian and 3 Chinese. Out of the seven 4 were appointed and 3 were elected. As far as the people are concerned it does not matter as long as they are men of integrity and perform the jobs well to serve the people.

    Without going into the merits and demerits of the government’s rationale for amending the Constitution to allow for a reserved Presidential Election for only members from the Malay race my main objection is that such a change violates the Singapore Constitution and undermines the daily National Pledge recited by all school children every morning that:

    “We the citizens of Singapore, pledge ourselves as one united people, regardless of race, language or religion to build a democratic society based on justice and equality so as to achieve happiness prosperity and progress for our nation”.

    If we have any regards at all to the history of our Presidencies one fact that stands out is the colour blind reality of the ordinary Singaporean. There was never any perceived notion that the Presidency must be rotated by race to ensure fairness to the minority. All the friends acquaintances and strangers I meet on the streets and in the parks in the last one year invariably dismiss race as a factor in their reckoning of what makes a good President.

    The issue of the President holding the second key to the national reserve should also not be an issue for he is surrounded by the Council of Presidential Advisors whom he has to take advice from. So whether he is Malay Chinese Indian or others the key that he holds is a collective key held by a panel of advisors nominated by the government.

    As for the financial qualifications required of a Presidential candidate it is most unlikely that the government would be able to headhunt for one who would meet all the stringent requirements.
    In fact all our past Presidents never had the experience of running a $500 million company. Where then do they get the forte to disagree with the government on opening our national coffers.
    However in raising the bars so high the government turns what should be a level playing field into a pole vault pitch ruling out the possibility of sourcing for a few good men who can genuinely understand the plight of the ordinary people and work for their welfare.

    The office sadly is in danger of becoming the precinct of the rich and powerful.

    In this day and age when governments all over the world are beginning to lose the trust of the people it is incumbent on the PAP leadership not to erode that trust further by imposing a albatross around the people’s neck.

    Given the challenge from a former Presidential candidate Dr Tan Cheng Bok that the reckoning of the first elective President does not reside in Mr Wee Kim Wee’s term but rathet in Mr. Ong Teng Cheong’s it would be prudent for the government to pause before rushing to implement it’s Reserve Presidency – an area where angels may fear to tread.

    It would also be doing itself a huge favour to hold a referendum to ascertain the wishes of Singaporeans whether race is indeed a factor in the choice of our Head of State. Afterall what is the hurry when more haste produces less speed and further undermines the trust of the people in the midst of a economic recession and a very uncertain world.

    Patrick Low
    4th April 2017

     

    Source: Soh Lung Teo from Patrick Low