Singapore Notes

The first registration exercise for Ministry of Education (MOE) kindergartens was met with a curious response. Over 196 applications were received for a total of 240 places, while at Dazhong there were only only 56 applications — less than half of the 120 places available. Soon members of parliament were mobilised to enter the heartlands for the hard sell.

School fees were set at $150 per month for locals and $300 for permanent residents. Families with a gross monthly household income not exceeding $3,500 or per capita income not exceeding $875 are entitled to subsidies, which could reduce the fee to as low as $10 (Gross monthly income < $2000, gross per capita income < $500). That level of subsidy we wish could be made available for public housing, not the arbitrary link/delink roulette in the spin.

Perhaps the lukewarm response could be attributable to horrible memories of the past. In April 2008, some 1,500 students attending 7 PAP Community Foundation (PCF) kindergartens in Woodlands saw their fees shoot up by 30 to 100 per cent.

Woodlands kindergartens in Blk 601 and Blk 875 hiked monthly fees from $50.90 to $110 per child because they will be air-conditioned. Air-conditioned kindergartens in blocks 899B, 652 and 824 increased fees from $86.60 to $110, while non-air-conditioned ones in blocks 624B and 853 ramped up from $50.90 to $95.

In less than 5 years from 2006 to 2011, PAP kindergarten prices had jumped 4 times. In 2006, the monthly fee was only $30.50, then in 2007 it went up to $50.60. Then in 1 July 2008, it was $95 a month. Then in 2010, it was $120 a month. Minister Grace Fu then defended the 20% price raise in 2011, saying the price "was lower than many operators".

Now we know there was a system then of awarding sites in Housing Board estates to private pre-school operators based solely on the highest bid. Naturally the operators passed on the increased costs to parents by raising fees. And thus culminating in the disgraceful practice of hiking PAP kindergarten prices because they were "lower than many operators". Now, that looks awfully similar to the pegged-to-private-sector formula that guarantees riches for a select few.

It's enough to make you do a double take. It is reported that Robert Prior-Wandesforde, director of Asian economies at Credit Suisse, actually said: "Singapore clearly remains the sick man of Asia... the economy continues to struggle badly."

How can that be? We are buying the pricey F-35 Lightning while our neighbours have to contend with the F-18 Hornet. Never mind if the $237-million (latest price estimate) F-35 has been banned from traveling within 25 miles of a thunderstorm, amid fears that lightning could cause its fuel tank to explode. Like those designer handbags, it's always the price tag that is the bragging factor.

And in spite of the umpteen rounds of cooling measures, the property market is doing just fine, thank you. New private home sales just chalked up an all-time high, the highest monthly sales volume since the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) began publishing monthly data in 2007. The total of 2,793 units sold beats the previous record of 2,772 in July 2009. Quite naturally, critics of Minister Khaw Boon Wan will claim he was never serious in addressing the bubble in the housing market. He was probably more concerned about losing the votes of those who had swallowed the asset enhancement poison pill, still waiting to cash in on their investment.

Even the used car sales dealers have much to cheer. Just when you thought the traffic situation will improve after the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) introduced the loan curbs in February, the congestion is back. Thanks to the 2,500 used cars which are put back on the road. That's the number Singapore Vehicle Traders Association estimates have been sold after somebody with influence arm twisted MAS into relinquishing the borrowing limits for second-hand vehicles in that were in stock before February 25, the date when the new loan limits were imposed. Some 7,000 will qualify for full loans, thanks to the 60 day reprieve afforded by MAS. The policies to reduce vehicles on the road will have to take a step back, since business volume is always top priority in our culture of greed.

Ours is a place where a void deck, the empty space nobody wants a flat to be built in, can actually be marketed for $50,000 a month. The operator who rented the site above a multi-storey car park used the excuse to charge $1,777 for a place in her child care centre. Maybe the economist was right after all, only the sick can exploit the struggling masses to such an extent.

He was no run-of-the-mill keyboard warrior blogger. Mr James Dorsey was a veteran journalist and freelance writer before appointed senior fellow at National Technological University (NTU)'s School of International Studies.

His blog post in July 2012 made mention of a rights agreement between Asian Football Confederation (AFC) and an associate of World Sports Group (WSG) which the Singapore based WSG has alleged to be defamatory. WSG's lawyers claim the information referred to was confidential and demanded for disclosure of the source.

Dorsey's position is that he is entitled to protect his sources as matter of principle as a journalist and produced a copy of the Singapore National Union of Journalists' Code of Professional Conduct to support his argument.

But judge Judith Prakash ruled that Dorsey was not a journalist at the time of posting but an employee of NTU. "In any event," she said, "there is no newspaper rule in Singapore that operates to protect a journalist's sources from being disclosed. Instead, the court adopts a balancing-of-interests approach." We saw how this "balancing-of-interests" approach was acted out when the challenge to the constitutionality of Section 377A was dismissed recently. In his 92-page judgment, Justice Quentin Loh had said that in Singapore's legal system, whether a social norm that has "yet to gain currency" should be discarded or retained is decided by Parliament. In other words, Parliament 1, Courts 0.

Watergate's follow-the-money team, Woodward and Bernstein, would have been easily stonewalled in Singapore. No wonder Bromptongate had to be cracked by netizens, not our poor hamstrung mainstream journalists. Don't expect them to come through with similar journalistic revelations for AIMgate.

More horrifying than the ghastly pictures of the victims of the Boston pressure cooker bomb blast, must be this AP photo of a crowd celebrating a politician's passing.

On 3 May 1989 Margaret Thatcher had already chalked up ten years as Prime Minister. Sixteen months earlier, on 3 January 1988, she had already become the longest-serving Prime Minister of the twentieth century. (John Campbell, "The Iron Lady")

Several of her senior colleagues, even as they applauded her achievement, felt she should have chosen the moment to announce she would step down soon, when she could still have gone out in triumph. Even her husband, Denis, briefly thought he had convinced her not to stand for another election. He did not force the issue, but he had seen enough of politics to suspect that she would be hurt in the end if she stayed too long.

Thatcher was commenting on the fall of the Berlin Wall when she uttered the following words, but they could have easily been applied to human barriers too:

"The day comes when the anger and frustrations of the people is so great that force cannot contain it. Then the edifice cracks: the mortar crumbles... One day, liberty will dawn on the other side of the wall."

The "permanent" exhibition of segments of the Berlin Wall

The 5m long section of the Berlin wall, comprising slabs 251-254, was supposed to be on indefinite loan from American art lover and oil industry veteran Robert A. Hefner III, 78, and his Singapore-born wife Mei Li. On that understanding, presumably conveyed to the National Parks Board (NParks) by their good friend and former Minister for Foreign Affairs George Yeo, $2 million was spent to construct a 1400 sq m custom built glass, steel and concrete facility at the eastern bank of Bedok Reservoir Park.

After all the fanfare of the unveiling in January 2010, the Hefners now plan to move the concrete slabs back to the United States by the end of this year, to display at one of their many properties.

George Yeo himself has moved to Hong Kong to work for his new paymasters in Kerry Logistics Network. It is not known if the logistics company has been engaged for the shipment back to its original home in Oklahoma City. Also not known is whether the decision is related to a quid pro quo for the loss in Aljunied.

Then again German graffiti artist Dennis Kaun may have been scared off by the local laws about defacing wall structures. The four panels of the original drab concrete Berlin Wall are spray painted, depicting a colourful, joyful king representing West Germany (good guy) and a pale, blindfolded one who is oblivious to the wishes of his people, signifying East Germany (bad guy). Depending on the flow of politics, some thin skinned party may sue for defamation in the unforeseeable future.

NParks is on the look out for objects of interest to fill the enclosure. Now that Brompton Bikes has opened office in Singapore, they may be interested to exhibit their product range there. But then again, NParks may not wish to be reminded of that object of interest.

These are not the bullet points you like to see in a Powerpoint presentation. A Singapore Business reminded us of 8 facts about Singapore's housing and transport woes:

1 Singaporeans are experiencing greater pressure in the arenas of housing and transportation, as population density rose 20% from 2001 to 2011.
2 Commuting congestion generates stress.
3 Increasing transport cost raises cost of living.
4 Low accessibility among the low income.
5 The growth rate of housing prices is outstripping that of monthly incomes.
6 Resale flats are not accessible to the bottom 20% of young home buyers.
7 Erosion of long-term housing affordability.
8 Homelessness on the rise.

Observations about points 7 and 8 warrant further elucidation.
The official position is that housing is considered affordable if mortgages do not eat up more than 30% of income. The Housing Development Board (HDB) tracks housing affordability using the debt servicing ratio (DSR), the ratio of monthly household income to monthly housing instalments. This is a ticking time bomb as it is premised on 30-year loan repayment periods and present low interest rates. Even if rates can be artificially maintained at historic lows, it remains that 30 years of one's working life is encumbered with servicing a debt. HDB reports that the DSR rose from 18% in 2007 to 24% in 2011. Data for 2013 not disclosed.

When Kishore Mahbubani was Singapore's permanent representative to the United Nations, he boasted before the world, "There are no homeless, destitute or starving people [in Singapore]…Poverty has been eradicated." According to the Singapore Social Health Project 2013, and similar reports from Manulife Asset Management, the number of persons and families identified to be in need of shelter more than doubled from 2007 to 2010. Manulife’s analysis shows that the mere accumulation of wealth is insufficient to ensure income security in retirement, especially when the wealth is vested in concrete structures priced at arbitrary market values. The poor, it seems, will be with us always.

“There are those who say we should not open our windows, because open windows let in flies,” Deng Xiaoping once proclaimed in defence of his reformist vision, adding, "If you open the window for fresh air, you have to expect some flies to blow in."

Deng's context for the quote was that as China pursues growing wealth, increasing per capita incomes, and rising living standards for her people, it will also expect environmental degradation and a host of social ills including political unrest, increased crime, and a fraying social safety net.

Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam seemed to be defending not the nation, but a select coterie of the rich and ostentatious when he paraphrased Deng thus: "if we leave our windows open, you get insects flying in. Some would have a lot of bling and colour, but that’s what happens when your windows are open." It would seem, unlike Deng, Tharman welcomes those insects with open arms. Never mind if some of them are fleeing the dragnet of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), which has a cache of 2.5 million files threatening the secrets of more than 120,000 offshore companies and trusts, exposing hidden dealings of politicians, con men and the mega-rich the world over.

The secret records obtained by ICIJ provide facts and figures — cash transfers, incorporation dates, links between companies and individuals — that illustrate how offshore financial secrecy has spread aggressively around the globe to offshore hideaways like British Virgin Islands, the Cook Islands and (...drum roll...) Singapore.

Offshore patrons identified in the documents include Indonesian billionaires with ties to the late dictator Suharto who enriched a circle of elites during his decades in power. Thai official and former cabinet minister for Prime Minister Yingluck, Nalinee “Joy” Taveesin, who used Singapore-based TrustNet to set up a secret company. And there's Maria Imelda Marcos Manotoc, eldest daughter of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos, and beneficiary of a British Virgin Islands (BVI) trust which may or may not be part of the estimated $5 billion her father amassed through corruption.

When the state media initially reported on Chinese national Ma Chi's spectacular traffic accident, they dwelt mostly on his $3 million condominium in the East Coast, $400,000 BMW and the fact the speeding Ferrari was a $1.8 million limited edition car. Not how the "tall, capable, young and handsome tycoon who arrived from Sichuan province a few years ago" made his money. Tharman may promise to "try our best to keep a culture that is not one based on excesses but is one based on responsibility” but that sounds awfully like locking the barn door after the horse has bolted.

The counter for the mobile phone repair center was manned by Burmese, all of them. It was a golden opportunity to ask why the locals we came across in a recent trip to Rangoon were decorated with a yellow paste, like the red dot our own Indians adorn for ceremonial purposes. But the ladies didn't care to explain, and we didn't want to be insensitive about cultural practices.

Google provided some clues, but the enlightenment came from Zoyan Phan, author of "Undaunted".The tha na kah is a traditional face cream made from the bark of the tha maw glay, the tamarind tree. Her mother would rub a length of the bark over a smooth stone, adding water simultaneously to dissolve the bark into a yellow paste. Besides acting as a natural sunblock, tha na kah is also applied to cheeks, arms and legs to keep cool in the hot season.

Zoya's book isn't just about beauty treatments. Her story is about the Karen tribe displaced by "the most brutal dictatorship in the world". She spent her childhood dodging live bullets and bombs, and managed to escape the hovel of the refugee camps in Thailand to earn an MA at the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom. Her father was assassinated in 2008 by agents of the Burmese regime, and Zoya was also on the hit list. After the world recoiled in the horror of the 2007 "Saffron Revolution", she actually spoke with Prime Minister Gordon Brown, asking him to introduce targeted economic sanctions that would stop money from going to the generals. Money that was helping to pay for the bullets used against the monks on the streets of Rangoon. And the first class treatment of generals coming here as medical tourists to perpetuate the longevity of their dictatorship.

We don't know about the personal stories of the Burmese nationals fleeced by the "freelance recruiters", except that the first four months of their salaries are deducted for "recruitment fees", essentially making them slaves for the first period of their stay in Singapore. The practice is not unique to Burmese of course; Sri Lankans, Indonesians and Filipinos have also been exploited. It is easy to be inured to the unpleasantness of humanitarian rights abuses - until the day "our women will become maids in other people's countries, foreign workers". That's the outcome Lee Kuan Yew predicted for "a really a good dose of incompetent government." (LKY justifying million-dollar pay hike for Singapore ministers, Straits Times, 5 April 2007)

Contemporary conceptualizations of the public sphere are based on the ideas expressed in Jürgen Habermas' book "The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere". Broadly speaking, the public sphere encompasses the processes involved in political communication and the sites where the processes take place (the media, civil organisations, etc). According to democracy theorist Robert Dahl, there is an expectation that the political preferences expressed in a democratic sphere are "freely formed". That is, if we subscribe to the definition of democracy as a political system that allows political talk to take place in a relatively untrammeled way, where civil liberties provide people with the ability to express views that run contrary to the current flavour of the incumbent government.

Yaacob Ibrahim gave a clue why Nizam Ismail had to go when he said money given to Malay Muslim organisations must be used to help the community, not "creating a platform for people to be involved in partisan politics." The Minister obviously does not subscribe to the belief that listening to diverse views, even critical and dissenting ones, is one of the processes of helping the community, one of the vaunted objectives of the ongoing National Conversation.

The chairman of the Association of Muslim Professionals (AMP), Azmoon Ahmad, had advised Nizam to part ways after separate phone calls from two Ministers (guess who?) took issue with some online comments, speaking at the Hong Lim Park, and participation in a public forum. Azmoon had to act, "Otherwise, the Government will withdraw all funding from AMP." Money may not buy happiness, but it sure does ensure compliance.

Nizam was aghast that activities in his private personal capacity was commingled with community services in his public capacity as an AMP/RIMA director. Community services which stand to benefit thousands – be they low-income families, youths at risk, students. Nizam is also leaving Suara Musyawarah, a feedback panel for the Malay-Muslim community. You would too, if feedback is commingled with kickbacks.

The other news worthy item in the public sphere is the arrest of a cartoonist for sedition, the offending copy being “Malay population… Deliberately suppressed by a racist government.”

The concept of Lèse-majesté (French, from the Latin laesa maiestas, "injured majesty") as a criminal offence goes all the way back to ancient Rome and was zealously guarded by absolute monarchs in medieval Europe. Various real crimes were also classified as lese-majesty even though they were not intentionally directed against the crown, such as counterfeiting (because coins bear the monarch's effigy and/or coat of arms). By analogy, as modern times saw banana (or mango, depending on your preference of fruit) republics emerging as first world countries, a similar crime may be constituted, though not under this name, by any offence against the highest representatives of any state. In particular, similar acts against heads of today's totalitarian dictatorships are very likely to result in prosecution.

Current instances of lese-majeste application crop up periodically in Europe, Middle East, Asia and Thailand. In the Indian Ocean state of the Maldives, 3 journalists were sentenced to life in 2002 for "insulting the president" and setting up a newsletter critical of the government. In October 2006, a Polish man was arrested in Warsaw after expressing his dissatisfaction with the leadership of Lech and Jarosław Kaczyński by passing gas loudly. An Egyptian court sentenced blogger Abdel Kareem Soliman in February 2007 to 4 years in prison for insulting Islam and President Hosni Mubarak. Swiss national Oliver Jufer, who admitted to spray-painting several portraits of the Thai king during a drunken spree in Chiang Mai, was sentenced to 10 years in prison in March 2007. He received a royal pardon subsequently and was promptly deported.

Prof Ronald Hutton of Bristol University opined on the travesty: "It was the idea that being rude about a government was a very bad idea - it hurt the government but was technically not treason because no act of rebellion was committed." But it was King Henry VIII (1491-1547) who first took personal injury one step further by passing an act which made speaking against the king treason in itself so "lese-majeste" became redundant.

Interestingly, King Bhumibol Adulyadej, Thailand’s longest-reigning monarch, may be growing tiresome of strict applications of the law. "Actually, I must also be criticized," he said in 2005. "If someone offers criticisms suggesting that the King is wrong, then I would like to be informed of their opinion. If I am not, that could be problematic... If we hold that the King cannot be criticised or violated, then the King ends up in a difficult situation." Someone else (not of blue blood) said as much decades ago, "I don't think I worry too much about what people think... In fact, criticism or general debunking even stimulates me because I think it is foolish not to have your people read you being made fun of. And we have got books circulating in Singapore written specially for this purpose by foreigners." (LKY to New Zealand academics and journalists in Christchurch on April 15, 1975)

We have had enough of bad dialogue. Enough of those politically correct utterances from staged puppets, spouting verbiage that no one is allowed to challenge without the consequence of a lawyer's letter of demand in the mail. Come on, who in real life lets another person spout off without interruption, especially when debating points he or she doesn’t agree with? It's only natural there’s a response if the parties agree and an even stronger response when the parties are in opposition. Anything else, it's plain wayang.

The task of dialogue does have responsibilities. Dialogue is supposed to:

Advance the plot
Dialogue can and should both direct and change the course of a storyline. A simple revelation, like how much does it really cost to build a HDB flat, will soothe the skeptics about the affordability of public housing. To suggest that the housing authority actually incurs financial losses, like the fairy tale of the $8 open heart surgery, merely stresses the plot and prolongs the agony of the spin.

Reveal character
Dialogue cannot be bland. Characters in play should not speak in dour, colourless monotone, unless you plan a career in announcing electoral results with a robotic voice. The absence of emotional engagement when addressing the concerns of a worried generation says a lot about the sincerity of the speaker. Just avoid rabble rousing theatrics like prompting the audience to assent with a "keechiu!"

Create or increase conflict
Dialogue should shake up the status quo, not prolong the perpetuity of the ongoing injustices. The misunderstanding of multifarious parties in contention — either by accident or deliberate ploy - is only evil when by promoted by participants with separate agendas, pursuing those agendas at the expense of others. Even the authorities have issued a statement declaring that if insensitive comments are made in the heat of the moment, or by relatively immature persons who did not know better, after the investigations uncover, “a more nuanced response may follow” by the police in handling the matter.

Break up passages of action or inaction
Like fiction in a novel, too much of any element is simply too much. The audience need a break from the drone of the official spiel; repetition ad nauseam - "we are on your side" - can only put one to sleep; exposition without pause is merely regurgitation of propaganda; and constant dialogue, as would constant conversation in real life, annoys people to no end and drives them to alternative platforms like the May Day gathering.

One of the answers to the Shell Thought Leadership Question "How can a meaningful dialogue between the Government and the people be sustained" suggest that dialogue sessions should not be restricted to just "politically correct" opinions and views, and the people should be given the right to challenge the Government (Student, Tampines JC, 430 Votes). The student may wish to add a disclaimer about personal views and partisan parlance, even though that declaration may afford scant protection from whispering ministers.

The proverb, "A new broom sweeps clean", was intended to suggest that someone who is new in a particular job will do a very good job at first, to prove how competent he or she is. Too bad it doesn't seem to apply to the new army chief paid millions to run the train system. For starters, he didn't even bother to abbreviate his holiday plans when the rail system fell short again during his honeymoon period.

Neither, it seems, does it bother his buddy officers from the armed forces who signed on with the gravy train. The metallurgical crack in the rail was detected as early as 7.30 pm, but 4 hours later, the SMRT spokesman (probably one of those army guys) would only say, "We are still trying to find out more about what happened." Worse, the lame SMRT twit who tweeted at 8.30 pm, "unfortunately sometimes there are machine faults that we do not expect," failed to comprehend that a static steel rail lying on the ground is definitely not a moving machine component. Seng Han Tong, who drew lots of flak for criticising the English spoken by Malay and Indian SMRT staff, had apologised by saying that bad English should not prevent people from trying to communicate, especially in times of emergency. But that's no excuse for one of Lieutenant General Demond Kuek's expensive hires.

A cracked rail can throw a train, as in the Leeds to London derailment of October 2000 that killed 4 and injured 30. An expert at the Committee of Inquiry commissioned by the Government had actually warned that a faulty track could cause trains to derail. That real-world rail operators paid more attention to flaws on the tracks than power supply systems.

Flaws like the falling e-clips which were first reported at Commonwealth Avenue West, near the junction of Clementi Avenue 3, in February 2012. An LTA spokesman said at that time: "We have met with the engineers and maintenance staff from SMRT to discuss the measures to be implemented following these incidents. SMRT will be putting up temporary safety nets at the two stretches of the viaduct between Dover and Jurong East with immediate effect." Those disembarking at the Clementi Station will be able to verify that the "temporary safety nets" are still very much in place.

The humble e-clips are responsible for fastening the rail to the base plate so the rail cannot move vertically or horizontally. If the rail is permitted to slide through the plates then compressive or tensile forces build up to either cause a pull-apart (rail break) or a track buckle, which causes derailments. That's when the proverbial shit hits the fan.

The guy was helicoptered in to address the reliability issues of the "world class" mass rapid transit system, but instead of focusing on the uptime and safety aspects, he is proving to be another despicable determined to rip off the commuters for profit objectives.

Under his charge, ex-army officer Desmond Kuek, president and chief executive officer, SMRT has just fired a shot across the bow: SMRT warned that its profitability will be further eroded in the next 12 months by the "continuing misalignment between fares and operating costs". That has to be cryptic military code for justifying another round of fare increases.

Although revenue increased 5.9 per cent to $1.1 billion, the company's net profit declined 30.5 per cent to $83.3 million. SMRT's operational costs in the first three months of this year rose 12.9 per cent from the same quarter last year, due to higher train and staff costs. Imagine, staff costs taking as significant a bite of the operating revenue as train costs. How much are the ex-officers paid anyway?

A real cheap G-clamp

In most likelihood, SMRT will decline to disclose details of the compensation package, citing it as a matter of "transport and national security". That was the official excuse when they declined mainstream media's request for photos of the crack in the rail that brought down the train system (again) on Monday. More likely they must be trying to avoid the embarrassment of a picture of the broken section held together by flimsy G-clamps. The equivalent of the collector shoe assembly being held together by a tie-wrap. Notice the familiarity in recourse to cheap engineering solutions. Welding rods must have been too expensive an option for SMRT to consider. The section with the crack was supposed to have been checked using ultrasonic testing just last Thursday. But as real engineers know, there are ultrasonic testers and there are ultrasonic testers.

The guys in charge are maintaining that the crack in the MRT rail is "no risk to safety". Let's hope they don't have to eat their own words any time soon, public lives are at stake.

Two years ago today, May 2nd, Osama bin Laden was put out of his miserable existence in Abbottabad, his hiding place of choice in Pakistan. At least Hitler did us a favour of putting a bullet to his own head.

Whether you had to surrender your nifty Swiss knife because you forgot to pack it in your checked luggage, or dump the expensive aftershave or cologne because there was still 100 ml left in the bottle, we all have good reason to say good riddance to this poor excuse for a homo sapien.

Some characters are more difficult to get rid off. Like the Labour chief Lim Swee Say who said the national drive to raise productivity does not mean workers have to work harder and longer hours. He should know, he does not have a portfolio to be in charge of, yet he keeps collecting millions from the tax payers. And gloat about how his regular review of his CPF account balance make him feel rich, filthy rich.

When he talks about making jobs easier and smarter, he's not referring to your daily grind, always keeping an eye out for the foreigner who will take away your job at the slightest excuse in the name of globalisation. He's reminding you that with the abomination of the GRC chicanery and gerrymandering, it's easier and easier for him go with the flow and never worry about being voted out. Too bad he's not getting an iota smarter with each passing year. He still makes you want to reach for the mute button each time his mug pops up on the tv screen.

The clown who gave you the ridiculous "Cheaper, Better, Faster" (CBF) has come up with something more idiotic. His contribution on how Singapore should hit its productivity targets: "The first 'how' is to be CBF, the second 'how' is to make the job, make the life of the worker more ESS - easier, smarter and safer. In the context of Singapore, given our low unemployment, tight labour market, there's a third ‘how’. Beyond CBF, beyond ESS…that is to value every worker." Maybe he should start doing some real work, like fighting for the workers' minimum wage, before we put a value on his pathetic existence.

When the Memorial to the Civilian Victims of the Japanese Occupation ("The Cenotaph") was spray painted with graffiti, many were howling and baying for blood about the sacrilege of the war dead. Some of those outraged may be blissfully unaware of two living individuals who used to cosy up to the Japanese occupiers of World War II.

One answered an advertisement in the Synonan Shimbun and went to work for the Japanese propaganda department called the Hodobu. His job, deciphering intercepted cables from Reuters, UP, AP, Central News Agency of China and TASS, may have contributed to the capture, torture and death of many a freedom fighter. One of the editors, George Takemura, was pal enough to drop in in the evening and give him a packet of Japanese cigarettes from his own rations.("The Singapore Story", pg 63,64)

The other met his Jap buddy by helping him to buy fish and vegetable at the market. Soon he became errant boy of second lieutenant "Amaya-san" for pineapples and papayas (no mangoes, this was way before Michael Palmer's time). Amaya's boss, lieutenant Kokubu, treated him to miso soup and Japanese pickles. He even helped them build the Bakri memorial for Japense soldiers who died fighting there, the last major stand of British and Allied troops. Before long he was made an inspector in the Japanese police department, who hunted down the Malayan People's Anti-Japanese Army (MPAJA).

No wonder, after the Japs were finally kicked out, and he was looking for a new job, one Major McLean made clear he disapproved of the fact he was an interpreter during the Occupation and accused him of being a collaborator. McLean explained that the MPAJA had fought side-by-side with the British, fought many running battles against the Japanese throughout the Occupation. In SR Nathan's mind, the MPAJA were the bad guys, and the Japs the nice fellows. Worse, he told McLean he would carry a gun for the Eskimo rather than carry anything for the British. ("An Unexpected Journey, Path To The Presidency", SR Nathan, page 122)

Lieutenant Kokubu is on the left.

It can't be expressed clearer than this: the TCs were set up for, and fulfil(,) a political purpose.

Deputy Secretary (Development) Tay Kim Poh had his hands tied from the very beginning. Although charged with a review of the sale in 2010 of the Town Council Management System (TCMS) software belonging to the PAP Town Councils to Action Information Management Pte Ltd (AIM), he knew the parameters of his purview were not free of political agenda. When his boss told him to jump, he could only ask, "How high?"

Public attention was focused on why TCs with millions of dollars in reserves will transact business with a $2 company. With only $2 in equity, how did AIM come up with the money in 2010 to buy $140,000 of software and lease it back? There are lots of interesting details not revealed in the MND Review Report. In the 7 pages of annexes to the 37 page report, not a single page of balance sheet or profit and loss account is included. Without the disclosure of accounting data, it is difficult to verify, as the Report claims, "There was no misuse or loss of public monies in the transaction".

But there was an interesting revelation on page 2:

In 1994, the Housing & Development Board (HDB) informed the TCs that it would cease HDB's IT system support used by all TCs. This was to be effected by 1996 as part of HDB's handover of responsibilities and functions to the TCs. The PAP TCs decided to aggregate their demand and called for an open tender in 1994 for the development, installation and maintenance of a Town Council Management System (TCMS) software. AIM participated in the tender and was awarded the contract to develop this first generation TCMS.

In 2003, the TCs called an open tender to develop and maintain the second generation TCMS. This was awarded to National Computer Systems Pte Ltd (NCS). AIM did not participate in the tender.

So, we are given to believe, way back in 1994, AIM actually had the manpower and resources to develop, install and maintain the first generation TCMS. And if AIM had served TCs well, why did it not participate in the 2003 tender? So many questions, so few answers. BTW why did the MND Review Team members choose to be anonymous?

Named after Charles Ponzi, a Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that pays unrealistic returns to its investors from their own money or the money paid by subsequent investors. The latter explains why Bernard Maddox could get away with it for so long (federal investigators believe the fraud began as early as the 1970s). When the high returns to the earlier investors could no longer be sustained, it was the money from the subsequent investors that perpetuated the scam until the mathematics no longer hold.

In our context, the lure of asset enhancement has given licence for the authorities to inflate public housing prices, via the mechanism of linking to private property rates and some mysterious accounting entity called "land reserves". Whatever the sleight of hand, sufficient numbers have subscribed to the snake oil, and 20+ year old houses which used to cost $20,000 are switching hands at $400,000 or more. The market's the ceiling.

The sad part of the episode is that the younger generation will have to perpetuate the shady exercise by taking the role of the subsequent investors in the Ponzi scheme of things. Why should they be mired in a fraud just because earlier investors drank of the Kool-Aid?

Caught between a rock and a hard place, the Minister for National Development could do the morally right, and effect a proper spring cleaning. He should be aware that many of the younger generation will be coming of voting age in 2016.

Unfortunately, instead of roaring into action, the mouse squeaked. Khaw Boon Wan told participants at an Our Singapore Conversation (OSC) dialogue on housing that he wants to lower the prices of flats by just "a few percent" over the next few years. His (selected) audience was objecting to selling back new flats only to the the Housing Board as this would limit the profit home owners can make. These are obviously not the needy people in dire need of shelter. Or assistance from public subsidy to stay out of the rain.

"If you want to sell a flat for $700,000 or $800,000, how can we stop you? No way". He says that, in accordance to his principle, he does not oppose the idea of subsidised EC (executive condominiums) owners making a tidy sum when they sell their units. To be rich is glorious, Deng Xiaoping would be so proud. Social inequality, Gini coefficient, all will have to take a backseat while this man is in charge. That's the golden rule in play: He who holds the gold, makes the rules.

Not the "Gentleman" move

It would appear to all and sundry that heaven and earth are being moved to protect Teo Ho Pin from the malodour of AIMgate. For starters, the official mouth piece, now ranked 149th by Reporters Without Borders in the latest World Press Freedom Index, tried its darndest best to put a shine on the fallacious MND Review of a sordid saga. Teo was not the first to receive a get-out-of-jail-free card.

In June 1992, Tharman Shanmugaratnam, then Administrative Service Officer, was in the center of the storm concerning a leaked flash estimate of economic growth for the second quarter of 1992. The subsequent Official Secrets Act (OSA) investigation finding prepared by the ISD put the blame squarely on Tharman as the originating source, with recommendations that could torpedo his high flying civil service career. Kingmaker Lee Ek Tieng, then Managing Director of MAS, gathered support from other power brokers like Goh Keng Swee, J.Y. Pillay and Lim Kim San to neuter the ISD report. The complete list of those lobbied reads like a name dropper's wet dream, all spelt out in delicious detail in Ross Worthington's "Governance In Singapore," starting from page 155.

Twenty two long months after the publication of the flash estimate in the Business Times, the case was finally prosecuted, with an apriori arrangement that a non-custodial sentence would be considered. Tharman would be fined only $1,500, an amount that would ensure him free from impediment to stand for election.

Teo is not Tharman of course, but the stakes are also high. The last headache they need is another by-election.

Workers’ Party chairman Sylvia Lim is doing her job by filing an adjournment motion on the town councils review for the next Parliamentary sitting on 13 May 2013. The initiative will give her at least 20 minutes to air the public's perspective , “... time to articulate what we think are critical aspects of the review of town councils, and in particular the transactions MND was looking at as well." Let's hope she's a fast speaker, as the spectrum of shenanigans in the AIM transaction can easily fill a whole book. George Bush had a shoe thrown at him, the Gangnam Style dancer deserves to be whacked with a hefty volume.

The latest 2013 World Press Freedom Index prepared by Reporters Without Borders dispensed with weightage of dramatic political developments, focusing instead on the attitudes and intentions of governments towards media freedom in the medium or long term.

Finland, the Netherlands and Norway are sitting pretty on top of the pile because they had distinguished themselves as countries that actually respect media freedom.

The real bad guys are Somalia (175th, -11), Syria (176th, 0), Mexico (153rd, -4) and Pakistan (159th, -8), places where journalists and netizens do get physically killed in the course of practising their craft. 2012 was apparently the deadliest ever registered by Reporters Without Borders in its annual roundup. Tanzania (70th,-36) sank more than 30 places because a journalist was shot while covering a demonstration and another was murdered within 4 months.

Burma (151st, +18) has gotten out of its rut in the bottom 15, where it lingered every single year since 2002, probably because the generals stopped gunning down monks in Saffron robes. The enlightened approach to Aung San Suu Kyi and the sincere attempts at reforms must be paying off.

No violence was inflicted on journalists in Singapore, unless someone wants to make a hullabaloo out of the loss of tenure for one academic. Compared to what happened at Tahrir Square, the outing at Hong Lim green was a walk in the park. Even the 200+ Malaysians who defied local laws to stage an illegal assembly near the perennially puking Merlion were treated with kid gloves.

Murder and public mayhem can't be reason for Singapore's ranking dropping 14 points from 135th to 149th. One clue was Japan (53rd, -31) tumbling down the chart because of censorship of nuclear industry coverage and its failure to reform the “kisha club” system. A kisha club (記者クラブ kisha kurabu) is a chubby Japanese news-gathering association of reporters that limits access by domestic magazines and the foreign media, as well as freelance reporters, to press conferences. Also, Argentina (54th, -7) fell amid reports of a new law regulating the broadcast media. So, was it self censorship or impending threats of muscling the social media, cartoons included, that gave the little red dot a rotund black eye? Imagine, if the Sticker Lady had printed "Press For Freedom" instead of "Press Until Shiok" on her labels, she could have been clasped in irons instead of being slapped with 240 hours of community service.

Business Times reports former Member of Parliament (MP) Cynthia Phua has just joined real estate consultancy Knight Frank Singapore as its executive director of retail services. Madam Phua was once a general manager of NTUC Fairprice Co-operative's real estate business unit, the partisan employer who has a proclivity to provide jobs for party stewards like Desmond Choo (deputy director of industrial relations and the National Transport Workers Union) and Ong Ye Kung (former deputy secretary-general).

Singapore's first woman full minister and former minister in the Prime Minister's Office, Lim Hwee Hua's third posting since leaving politics was independent non-executive director with Ernst & Young's Global Advisory Council. She also joined private equity firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts as adviser (October 2011) and Jardine Cycle & Carriage as non-executive director (July 2011).

Phua and Lim were part of the team that was turfed out of Aljunied in the May 2011 General Elections. Phua and Lim were also partners of a shameful episode in May 2009.

The 17-year-old boy may have been intellectually challenged, but even with his low IQ he could sense his mother was shabbily treated when she approached the MP for an appeal to the HDB which was in the process of repossessing her flat. Phua was standing in for Lim, then travelling abroad on some junket. The low EQ MP added injury to injury (he suffers from thalassemia, a blood disorder that renders him weak and sickly) when she addressed him aggressively: "Who are you? What are you doing? Why aren't you working?"

He expressed his frustration on the way out by slamming a folding chair against an inanimate glass door, but not sufficiently violent to break it or cost expensive damage. That night the police arrested him.

A week later, mother brought a hand written apology from his son to Lim, back from her overseas trip, begging for mercy. Lim, alien to the milk of human kindness, was not moved: "'I made it very clear to (the mother) that this is unacceptable behaviour. It is not justifiable in any circumstance. There's no excuse to be violent."

If there was a follow up to The New Paper report , it can't be well distributed. Lim and Phua may have moved on, but the fate of the youth, and her mother struggling to survive on her cleaner salary of $400 a month, probably did not warrant a mention in the mainstream media.

A Disgraceful Episode

The Party Goes On

The Curious Case Of Mr Dorsey

Letting Go

Indian Giver

We Don't Need This

Not All Flies Are Treated Equal

Unpleasant Reminders

Guided Democracy In Play

The King Is Not Amused

Dialogue — The Speech of Fiction

The Crack In The System

Same Old Same Old

He Will Not Be Missed

Sleeping With The Enemy

Another Dog And Pony Show

The Golden Rule

An Inconvenient Truth

Press Freedom Update

Moving On