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Tag: SDP

  • Mohamed Jufrie Mahmood: Advice For PAP – No Need For Presidential Grandstanding, Just Adopt Fair And Non-Discriminatory Policies

    Mohamed Jufrie Mahmood: Advice For PAP – No Need For Presidential Grandstanding, Just Adopt Fair And Non-Discriminatory Policies

    Now that the amendment to the constitution has been passed by parliament we Singaporeans, whether we like it or not, will have to brace ourselves with the inevitability of having an “elected” Malay President who in actuality is selected. And since the bar has been set so ridiculously high no other candidate except those from the establishment would qualify to stand.

    Ironically the passing of the amendment coincides with the election of Donald Trump as the next president of the United States.
    It is not hard to guess who the Malay candidate would be in view of the scacity of qualified Malays. My guess is it would be either Puan Halimah or Encik Zainal Abidin Rasheed. Should it be Encik Zainal, who would have become Speaker had he not lost the election in 2011, would he be as proud as Donald Trump who had fought a long and bruising battle before clinching the presidency?

    Would Ebcik Zainal, assuming he is the candidate, be able to command the respect of all Singaporeans in a skewed system tailored and reserved for him?

    Would the Malays be proud of him? It would also be a slap on his face if as a Malay Muslim president he cannot even get the government to allow Muslim women in uniformed groups to dorn the tudung and rid Singapore of all forms of discrimination against Malay Muslims.
    We don’t yet know what the actual PAP agenda is for instituting this ridiculous move. We don’t need to have a Malay, Indian or Eurasion President to tell the world that we are a multi racial and not a Chinese country. People of the world are not stupid. Come to think of it why should we worry about this? Can it guilty conscience for mistreating the Malays? Is the PAP leadership trying to con and impress the Malay world. My advice is, just adopt the right policies which are fair and non discriminitory to the minorities. And stop padding up our population with large numbers of PRC aliens if you really are concerned about being mistaken as a Chinese state. Let our population grow naturally and bond as a united nation. Your logic in instituting this amendment cuts no ice. It sounds so hollow and nothing but a scam. No self respecting and dignified Malay would want to partake in the scam.

    Should Donald Trump carry out his threat to bar Muslims from entering the US Singapore’s head of state cannot even visit the country.

     

    Source: Mohamed Jufrie Bin Mahmood

  • Mohamed Jufrie Mahmood: PAP Must Stop Wayang On Elected Presidency

    Mohamed Jufrie Mahmood: PAP Must Stop Wayang On Elected Presidency

    Listening to the news about the proposed amendments to the criteria of a candidate for the elected president has made my kepala pusing.

    So complicated and confusing.

    Among other things the financial criterion is to be raised to $500 million, effectively ruling out Dr Tan Cheng Bock. And I don’t know of any Malay who can fullfil the criterion besides ex or current PAP office holders. You see how dirty the PAP is. Why can’t they save us lots of time, money and effort by admitting that for self preservation they just want someone whom they can go to bed with?

    All the wayang!

    After what they saw in the last PE, especially how close and dangerous it would be for them if their chosen horse were to be defeated, a Malay candidate of their choice would surely lose his pants even if he is an ex minister.

    Now you see the picture?

    Source: Mohamed Jufrie Bin Mahmood

  • Damanhuri Abas: Kepimpinan Melayu Tidak Berwibawa, Masyarakat Diperlakukan Sebagai Tidak Setaraf Bangsa Lain

    Damanhuri Abas: Kepimpinan Melayu Tidak Berwibawa, Masyarakat Diperlakukan Sebagai Tidak Setaraf Bangsa Lain

    Pemerintah terus memperlekehkan perasaan orang melayu dengan sesuka hati hanya kerana kepimpinan melayu yang merelakan bangsa sendiri diperlakukan sedemikian.

    Diam dari golongan pimpinan masyarakat yang terdiri daripada pemilik syarikat, pengerusi masjid, presiden/ketua persatuan, tokoh-tokoh masyarakat, golongan asatizah yg berpengaruh, golongan artis, golongan karyawan yg berpengaruh, mantan-mantan pemimpin dll., memungkinkan segala yang telah berlaku ini, kerana di mata masyarakat majmuk jelas tiada kedengaran langsung apapun suara dari golongan pemimpin melayu yg membantah mahupun menyoalkan tujuan dan kebijaksanaan tindakkan pemerintah tergesa-gesa mengubah dasar mereka dengan sesukanya. Ia memberikan persepsi palsu bahawa orang melayu menyokong perubahan dasar ini. Lebih buruk lagi, orang melayu sendiri merasakan seolah-olah pandangan luas masyarakat melayu sudah tidak penting kerana tiada sesiapa dikalangan pemimpin-pemimpin melayu yg berani menyuarakan keprihatinan mereka.

    Yang lebih prinsip lagi ialah dasar baru ini sekaligus menghapuskan adanya kuasa pemeriksa keatas pemerintah yang bebas dan berwibawa dalam menjaga urusan harta simpanan negara demi kepentingan rakyat jelata. Adanya kuasa penghalang adalah genting demi memastikan tertegaknya proses mengawas dan mengawal kemungkinan berlaku penyalahgunaan kuasa oleh pemerintah.

    Sebaliknya apa yang telah berlaku ialah kekeliruan memahami matlamat utama adanya jawatan Presiden terlantik dengan alasan-alasan sampingan yang mengeruhkan isu pokok yang seharuskan menjadi tumpuan kita semua.

    Memperuntukkan jawatan Presiden terlantik untuk orang melayu demi memastikan adanya bangsa melayu menjawat kursi Presiden adalah pendekatan yang sangat bahaya. Ia kerana setelah adanya seorang berbangsa melayu menjadi Presiden terlantik, ia akan mengkaburi isu perkauman yang masih ada dan terus berleluasa bersumber daripada dasar-dasar lain pemerintah sendiri seperti sikap waspada, curiga dan tidak yakin dengan bangsa melayu secara amnya. Ini masih jelas dalam perkhidmatan negara yang terus mengamalkan dasar-dasar yang mengecualikan dan menindas peluang-peluang anak-anak melayu mendapat jawatan-jawatan yang dianggap bahaya untuk diberikan kepada orang melayu.

    Jika benar adanya diskriminasi perkauman dalam masyarakat yang menidakkan kemungkinan orang melayu menjadi Presiden terlantik mahupun apa lagi jawatan tinggi negara, ia harus dikaji sedalamnya dan akar puncanya dimusnahkan. Barulah kita jujur ingin mengatasi masalah perkauman yang masih ada.

    Kita sebenarnya diberi peluang kini dengan pengakuan pemerintah sendiri mengiktiraf adanya penindasan perkauman. Ini masanya untuk orang melayu menyuarakan keprihatinan kita sebagai rakyat Singapura atas kewujudan penindasan ini selama 50 tahun sejak merdeka.

    Orang melayu bersikap matang dan bersabar sepanjang 50 tahun melihat dan merasai sendiri penindasan yang jelas berlaku tiap kali anak-anak melayu yang menjalani perkhidmatan negara dinafikan peluang yang dinikmati kesuluruhannya oleh bangsa lain. Tidak sepatahpun suara menyoalkan kenapa anak-anak melayu diperlakukan sedemikian, apa yang jelas adalah penindasan perkauman.

    Yang bahaya lagi ialah kesan perpanjangan kepada persepsi masyarakat majmuk terhadap bangsa melayu yang telah berakar dan sebati memandang serong bangsa ini dengan waspada dan curiga. Ia menjadikan orang melayu seperti rakyat yang kurang syarat dan sentiasa diperanaktirikan. Akibatnya telah lama dirasakan dalam merata lapisan masyarakat dalam semua aspek dari pendidikan hingga pekerjaan. Inilah kesan buruk yang telah bermaharajalela selama 50 tahun ini.

    Sudah tiba masanya dengan isu perkauman jelas terbuka, untuk kita mendesak pemerintah untuk berlaku adil kepada bangsa melayu dan segara menukar dasar-dasar lain yang bersikap perkauman dan menindas peluang orang melayu dalam negara kita yang tercinta ini.

    Jika pemimpin-pemimpin melayu masih takut untuk dilihat menentang dasar pemerintah, ingatlah tanggungjawab murni anda untuk membela nasib anak-anak melayu kita yang terus menerus berdepan dengan peluang-peluang terbatas tanpa dibela sesiapa. Kita tidak seharusnya diperlakukan sebagai rakyat tidak setaraf dengan bangsa-bangsa lain di negara kita sendiri.

     

    Source: Damanhuri Abas

  • Damanhuri Abas: Malay Community Don’t Want PAP’s ‘Useless Malay President’

    Damanhuri Abas: Malay Community Don’t Want PAP’s ‘Useless Malay President’

    There is no pride for any person to be offered a token position to be a puppet to sing the tune of his or her master. To then use race as a justification when we all know it is a mere excuse to look magnanimous when in reality it is a disgusting use of racial sentiments to further political interest of a Party in power worried that someone else will open up the books.

    For God sake, discrimination exists for the last 50 years in their own institutions justified by strange ancient suspicion of an entire race that discounts the malays as untrustworthy for so-called ‘sensitive position’ in the SAF. Solve that misnomer first and be more honest to us as equal citizens of this country. Malays have sacrificed their lives in the hundreds on Bukit Chandu fighting the Japanese. If that is not enough to trust our loyalty to this land than tell us what will, instead of lying to the entire race?

    We don’t want your useless Malay president.

     

    Source: Damanhuri Abas

  • Chee Soon Juan: Results Show That Lee Hsien Loong Failed As PM

    Chee Soon Juan: Results Show That Lee Hsien Loong Failed As PM

    Public memory is short.

    That’s what the PAP is counting on to get through the economic difficulties that we’re rapidly sinking into. But forgetting the past is what will surely prolong our troubles.

    Our only hope of recovery is to remember the PAP’s past promises and figure out how and why it has failed to deliver on them.

    To do this, we have to go back to 2003 when Mr Lee Hsien Loong, then Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance, was given the task of heading the Economic Review Committee (ERC). We had just come out of the Asian financial crisis in 1997 and the dot.com-bubble burst in 2001.

    To assist him in the task, Mr Lee convened seven sub-committees and consulted more than 1,000 individuals to produce a roadmap to transform Singapore – within a 15-year time-frame – into a diversified economy “willing to take risks to create fresh businesses and blaze new paths to success”.

    By the end of the endeavour, he waxed poetic, “Singapore will have graduated into a knowledge-based, innovation-driven economy. We will be a trend-setting city-state, a creative and entrepreneurial society.”

    Now that the 15 years is nearly up, it is pertinent to ask what has been achieved. Apparently not much, according to Mr Lee himself. As he confessed this week: “We are feeling the pains of restructuring, but not yet seeing the dividends of our hard work.”

    (Actually, “we” are not feeling anything – Mr Lee continues to draw his princely salary regardless of how he performs whereas workers are facing retrenchments and wage cuts.)

    But no matter, Mr Lee insists that he is “pursuing all the right strategies” and is “confident that given time these strategies will work”.

    If these “right strategies” have produced little of consequence after 15 years – the economy, still addicted to cheap foreign labour, is anything but innovation-driven; productivity continues to be a drag on growth; our workers are the unhappiest lot in this part of the world and have been for years; income inequality remains one of the highest in the developed world; and the economy is anything but diverse (we rank 5th on the Crony-Capitalism Index) – should reason then not tell us that maybe it is time to consider ditching them and implement genuine reforms?

    The painful truth is that the outlook for this country has never been bleaker and, the PM’s blandishments notwithstanding, things will get worse under the PAP’s autocratic but directionless leadership. Many analysts have, in fact, expressed the fear that the current downturn will be protracted.

    But it wasn’t that Mr Lee did not know of the seriousness of the problems that our country faced. He acknowledged in the 2003 ERC report that the economy needed “major, fundamental changes, in strategies as well as mindsets”. To do this, he promised that “restructuring will speed up”.

    But time has proven the emptiness of that promise.

    For one thing, the PAP, through the Temasek Holdings of which PM Lee’s wife is CEO, still has its tentacles in every sector of the local economy. The massive political-corporate nexus has created a non-transparent, unaccountable and kiasi corporate bureaucracy that is anathema to a culture at one with creativity and risk-taking.

    Second, if Mr Lee’s call for a knowledge-based economy is real, then why is he hanging on to the decrepit practice of controlling the mass media?

    Third, if the intention is to “change mindsets”, then why are our workers still forbidden from independently organising themselves and our people prohibited from freely gathering and speaking up? Mindsets, if it needs to be said at all, cannot be changed by fiat.

    After a decade-and-a-half of the PAP’s experiment, the results are in and it is plain that Mr Lee’s attempt at economic restructuring has failed. The reasons are not hard to evince.

    The question that Singaporeans must ask is: How much more of Mr Lee’s “restructuring pains” must we endure before we are willing to change?

     

    Source: www.cheesoonjuan.com