Singapore Notes

Daming Sunusi, an Indonesian High Court judge running for a Supreme Court position, was quoted by Kompass in January 2013 saying, "The one raped and the rapist both enjoy it, so [we would] need to think about the death sentence." Sunusi had to apologise for inferring that rapists should evade capital punishment because victims enjoyed the act.

One who took offence at the tasteless quip was Commission for Child Protection chairman Arist Merdeka Sirait, ""It is disturbing that a judge, whose role is to protect the legal rights of women and children, could say something so audacious and consider it as a joke. He should be sacked."

Zainudin Nordin, MP of Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC, was not in a jocular frame of mind when posting on his Facebook account American writer Terry Goodkind's take on a system of government, “Gang rape, after all, is democracy in action.” Short of blaming it some mysterious administrator who might have made the post, Zainudin claims his intent was to present his view that "each decision comes with tremendous responsibilities."

Yet when queried whether he was the author of the email threat to take legal action against a netizen for highlighting his endorsement of Terry Goodkind, Zainudin would not confirm in the affirmative. Hey, even Spiderman fans know the line, "With great powers come great responsibility."

If Zainudin chooses to shirk his responsibility with the Denise He defence, it implies his powers may be just as vaporous. If he had real power, he would be able to get away with words like this:

"Repression, Sir, is a habit that grows. I am told it is like making love - it is always easier the second time! The first time there may be pangs of conscience, a sense of guilt. But once embarked on this course with constant repetition you get more and more brazen in the attack. All you have to do is to dissolve organizations and societies and banish and detain the key political workers in these societies. Then miraculously everything is tranquil on the surface. Then an intimidated press and the government-controlled radio together can regularly sing your praises, and slowly and steadily the people are made to forget the evil things that have already been done, or if these things are referred to again they're conveniently distorted and distorted with impunity, because there will be no opposition to contradict."

Zainudin embarrassed himself by aligning with the wrong camp, like when Bernie Ecclestone managed to compliment Adolf Hitler, Saddam Hussein and offend black people all in the same interview, saying how he "would love to have a good lady race driver and preferably black and Jewish too, but they might take maternity leave."

Stephen Pollard, Editor of the Jewish Chronicle, responded to the insinuation on women and religion: "Mr Ecclestone is either an idiot or morally repulsive." Ditto Zainudin Nordin.

Morbid anti-suicide pledges are flooding the internet in China according to a BBC report, written in the hope that they will prevent authorities from falsely ruling their death as suicide should they die in suspicious circumstances. "Even if I have no car, no house, no lover, no money for food, and even if I have Aids, I will not commit suicide or fall off a building voluntarily," was one typical post. The trend is interpreted as a serious lack of trust that many place in public institutions, ranging from the police to the courts.

The Financial Times (FT) report on the death of American engineer Shane Todd may suffer a loss of trust too if the Singapore Police Force (SPF)'s challenge stands up to scrutiny. At stake is the London-based newspaper's accounting of the latest version of Todd's last actions alive: "Mr Todd, 6ft tall and nearly 200 pounds in weight, fashioned a noose from a computer bag strap, hung it over his bathroom door, closed and locked the door. He put the noose around his neck, stood on a chair and jumped off."

The version allegedly told earlier by SPF to Todd's parents: "police said their son had drilled holes in the bathroom wall, affixed bolts, wrapped the strap through a pulley and over the door." The key difference between the two stories is that no Rube Goldberg configuration of drilled holes and pulley system was evident at the site of the crime scene when inspected by the parents.

The SPF is miffed because FT made no attempts to confirm with them whether the police gave different versions of the story. But it stopped short of presenting it's version of Todd's demise. An official autopsy report submitted by the SPF had ruled the death to be “asphyxia by hanging”. The fine distinction is that self induced asphyxiation is suicide, asphyxiation by a third party would be tantamount to murder.

The SPF is entrusting the coroner's enquiry starting today to establish the final story. There are no provisions for an appeal. If the decision is controversial, a serious lack of trust will be imputed on the system.

Meanwhile, there's no rush to post an anti-suicide pledge on your Facebook account. Kishore Mahbubani is saying that any objective investigation will show that the Singapore police is at least as competent, if not more competent, than the FBI. The same fella who said that poverty has been eradicated in Singapore.

If you require proof Khaw Boon Wan is no gentleman, read how he addressed Ms Sylvia Lim in his closing remarks of the MND Review "debate":
"This is self-righteous and - pardon me for saying so - arrogant. Many of us in this House have been serving Singapore for decades, long before she entered this House. Please, don't behave as if you're the only patriot in this House."

It kind of sets you thinking. Firstly, the oldest man in the House already said Singapore is not yet a nation - patriots are normally associated with nationhood. Then there's this definition of a patriot as a person who loves, supports, and defends his or her country and its interests with devotion. But how can anyone honestly do that when our country has been raped beyond recognition by members in the House who have sold it out to foreign interests, and diluted the national core to a fraction of its original composition? Even the kids of the future generation are not spared the ravaging pillage and plunder of the rapacious horde.

It was only in April 2013 that we learnt there was once a dastardly system of awarding sites in Housing Board estates to private pre-school operators based solely on the highest bid. Everybody cheered the announced intention to halt this inflationary practice. And there was the welcomed news that families with a gross monthly household income not exceeding $2,000 could actually enjoy subsidised fees as low $10 a month.

Then every body's jaws dropped. A mother of two revealed that kindergarten and childcare fees at 22 PAP community Foundation (PCF) centres in Sembawang GRC have announced hikes of not 5, 10 or 15, but TWENTY percent from January 2014. And this is how Acting Minister for Culture, Community and Youth (also PCF Executive Committee Chairman) Lawrence Wong justified it: "But the average fees will still be way below market and that's how we have maintained our fees." Leopards never change their spots. Like the Khaw Boon Wan practice with public housing prices, rates can be de-linked and re-linked to private sector numbers at their political convenience.

Thomas Paine once wrote: "These are the times that try men's souls: The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman." The patriots, who are still standing bravely in spite of all odds, deserve better.

At the watered down MND Review debate, Denise Phua, MP for Moulmein-Kallang GRC, said: "To be honest, the last thing on the minds of my fellow TC chairpersons, councillors and the staff was to fix and trip the opposition."

At least she stuck to the same word used by prime minister Lee Hsien Loong in a rally speech at Raffles place on 3 May 2006:
"Suppose you had 10, 15, 20 opposition members in Parliament. Instead of spending my time thinking what is the right policy for Singapore, I'm going to spend all my time thinking what's the right way to fix them, to buy my supporters votes, how can I solve this week's problem and forget about next year's challenges?"

But Cheong Yip Seng, 43 years at the Straits Times and retired as editor-in-chief in 2006, decided to change the offending word: "The prime minister would spend much more time than he now did, to counter the opposition." ("OB Markers, My Straits Times Story", page 424). He even wrote that it was Goh Chok Tong, not Lee, who first expressed the fear that the incumbents would have a hard time if the opposition gained more seats in parliament.

It's not a completely useless read, you do get the rare honest disclosure like ST was prepared to settle instead of going to court with NKF's TT Durai. His reasoning: "I was mindful of strong pro-NKF sentiments in powerful quarters". In particular, two ministers had come out in defence of NKF, one of whom is the self acclaimed patriotic Khaw Boon Wan, then the acting Health Minister. Based on his latest prima donna performance in parliament, he still acts.

With the significant investigations in the works, Shane Todd's mysterious demise, City Harvest Church court case, the unfinished business of AIM, one wishes there was an independent media in place. Cheong recognises that as the fourth estate, on par with the other three centers of power, executive branch of the government, the legislature and the judiciary. Cheong wrote Lee Kuan Yew had settled in advance the key principles of media management in a one-man-one-vote polity: "The first was that the Singapore media is not the fourth estate as it is in the West." (page 163)

That's one reason why you did not come across Sylvia Lim's discovery in the mainstream papers:

"The PAP TCs highlighted AIM’s “track record”, but based on the tender documents we have seen, AIM listed only one prior project, also a sale and leaseback. When AIM was asked to fill in a table indicating the identities of their key technical and professional staff, a line was drawn across the table with only one word typed in: “Outsourced”. "

Japanese politicians scrambled to distance themselves from mayor of Osaka, Toru Hashimoto, after he said forced recruitment of Asian women to work in military brothels had been necessary to maintain discipline among soldiers. "If you want them to get some rest, a comfort women system was necessary," he told reporters. "That's clear to anyone." That may be clear to him, just as "Gang rape is democracy in action" was crystal clear to MP for Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC, Zainudin Nordin.

Tell that to Swee Lian, author of "Tears of a Teen-age Comfort Woman", a 16 year old from Jesselton (Kota Kinabalu) forced to be a "jugun-ianfu" (army comfort women). After her parents were imprisoned and tortured to death for supporting the China Relief Fund to fight the Japs, while cowards were working for them as translators and policemen, Swee Lian was raped by the Kempeitai and sent to the army brothel as girl number 23. The inmates were referred to as "sisters" and told they were members of a "patriotic women's army" who came from Japan, Korea, China, Taiwan and the "newly liberated territories in Southeast Asia".

"Work" started at nine o'clock, with a lunch break, followed by the "afternoon session" which lasted until six in the evening. One girl estimated her "team" had to "entertain" about 600 soldiers - allowing 10 minutes per session and a 10 minute "interval" between each session - over a period of 8 hours. The math nauseated Swee Lian.

Fortunately her boyfriend, who was a member of the anti-Japanese guerrillas taking the fight to the jungles of Borneo, managed to rescue her from the brothel and found her a sanctuary in a Buddhist nunnery in Singapore, where she hid until Japan's surrender on 15 August 1945.

Prime Minister Abe was among several senior politicians who distanced themselves from Hashimoto's remarks. Meanwhile, Hashimoto attempted to justify his remarks, telling reporters that he had been referring to the atmosphere of the times, just like someone trying to put in context the outrageous quote of Terry Goodkind.

In what could be a smoking gun in the City Harvest Church court case, it was discovered that the 2 percent interest rate in the original bond documentation for a Special Opportunities Fund managed by a church member could not possibly yield $76,625. So a fudge figure of 5.05 percent was necessary to revise the tranche papers.

In the drawn out saga of the Town Council rates, the Ministry of National Development (MND) was off by "nearly S$1 million." The anonymous team there simply took the managing agent rate for 1 year, and multiplied it by 3. Ms Sylvia Lim had to remind them: "We had clearly stated earlier that the managing agent (MA) contract for the three years (2012, 2013 and 2014) provided for staggered pricing, with increase in costs factored in each year."

Mom was right all along. We have to pay attention to our math homework. But we know there's more to it than just simple arithmetic. Png was spot on when he told parliament:

"Finally, I believe whatever that was written in black and white in the AIM transaction has been reviewed by the committee but whatever intention that was written in the hearts of the people that were involved in this transaction will remain hidden for their conscience and makers to judge."

Teo Ho Pin should pay close attention to what transpired in the 2006 election, when Wong Kan Seng, with the compliance of the sycophant press, droned on and on for days about James Gomez misplacing his minority-race candidate's application forms. The episode about the closed-circuit television evidence was immortalised in a famous podcast, and Wong won his place in the history books. Or perhaps Teo may prefer to take up Lim's invite to make a report to the CPIB.

NOT the Ministry of Manpower advertisement

No wonder the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) flashed it's advertisement on telly last night again. You know, the one that has an old lady at a food court whinging about how her boss treats her. The happy ending has same lady saying "I know my rights", and the recalcitrant boss recanting, "I do it right". The stuff of fairy tales.

The hard truth on the ground, as demonstrated in the Shane M video, is a stark difference. The problem in propagating official lies is that truth becomes the real casualty. The MOM is not the only one at risk. The following opinion piece (unsigned) can only pull the paper's ranking lower than 149:

"In a parliamentary disclosure that took the wind out of the moral sails on which the opposition party had been coasting, he (Khaw Boon Wan) pointed that the WP, too, had turned to party affiliates in its own council management. The WP's defence - that the affiliates were supporters and not party members - was hardly convincing." (ST Monday May 20, 2013)

The believability situation is so bad that even the City Harvest Church media unit is setting up their own trial coverage because, "While we understand the mainstream media's perspective, we hope to plug possible gaps for our members." Good luck guys, the gap in credibility is now so huge, it's as good as turning into a black hole, the cosmic region of spacetime from which gravity prevents anything, including light, from escaping.

Call it another mee siam mai hum moment. The prime minister gave a big speech about safety at work, and identified the construction, manufacturing and marine sectors as places where most incidents occur. What he missed out was the Jurong East IT workplace where a 29 year old undergraduate was pummeled mercilessly like a human punching bag. Apparently the Manpower Ministry was alerted, but they proved as meek as the recipient of the heavy blows to the head. All MOM did was to remind employers to treat employees "fairly and with respect" and, as for the "unfairly treated", "they should report it to the police immediately." The Acting Manpower Minister's own pretty speech about discriminatory hiring practices was just as lame, premised on his stance that laws were not "a silver bullet that will solve all problems."

We are glad the parents did not take the law into their own hands when they confronted the violent cretin who abused their son. For all we know, one wrong move, and they could end up as subjects of a police investigation. We are glad that they did convince their mild mannered son - who had earlier denied he was the subject in the video because he did not want to blow up the matter - that might is not right, bullies need to be put in their place. Imagine the horror if the intern had been a female, who could have ended up like the Singapore core, violated multiple times by having foreign elements inserted, until a Good Samaritan like Shane M had the moral courage and guts to intervene.

Meanwhile, at the Shane Todd inquiry, some body's boast that the Singapore police is at least as competent, if not more competent, than the FBI, is starting to blow up in his own face. Ashraf Massoud, computer analyst engaged by Todd's parents, had to teach the cops a thing or two about handling evidence. The Post-it note on Shane's laptop, "Please do not enter. Please call the police" , means just that. Leave it to the professionals.

The sorry mess in our cowboy town makes you wonder who are the guys governing the place. If Singapore Inc was ever asked to fill in a table indicating the identities of their key technical and professional staff, maybe a line will be drawn across the table with only one word typed in: “Outsourced”.

In response to Ian Buruma's article in NYR ("The Singapore Way, 19 Oct, 1995") which made reference to a journalist who lost his job for writing something critical of the government, the unnamed person wrote "I am that nameless entity". That person was Janadas Devan.

Janadas took pains to elucidate that he was not an employee of any newspaper, he merely wrote a column on a freelance basis. For reasons that remain unexplained, but which were clearly not journalistic, the column was halted.

According to Wikipedia, Janadas Devan is a Singaporean journalist and a former Review Editor of The Straits Times. He is the son of C.V. Devan Nair, the third President of Singapore.

On 27 October 2007, Janadas wrote the article "377A debate and the rewriting of pluralism" in which he rebutted the outrageously homophobic parliamentary speech of Nominated Member of Parliament Thio Li-ann (she of the "anal sex is like shoving a straw up your nose to drink" infamy). In his 7 July 2007 article, "Can mum, mum and kids make a family?" Devan advocated the formation of same-sex marriages in Singapore, citing the instance of a personal female friend in the United States who had married another woman, has two healthy children and living an "otherwise normal life". As of 2008, Janadas contributed regularly to the Straits Times.

Is this Janadas Devan the ghost writer of Teo Ho Pin's long winded missive with which he attempted, again, to weasel himself out of the perverse justification of the AIM transaction? Janadas is currently Chief of Government Communications at the Ministry of Communication and Information (CGC), a role better known in the prevailing parlance of the lesser mortals as spin doctor. He will need all the penmanship skills at his command to rewrite Devan Nair's scathing epitaph for Lee Kuan Yew:

"Lee is gifted with a brilliant brain and an eloquent tongue. But the capricious gods omitted to equip him with the saving grace of that essential wisdom which makes for true greatness. And Singapore thereby missed the infinitely more potent miracle of the political and spiritual success it might so easily have provided, as a practical, living demonstration to the other unhappy, struggling, heterogeneous nations in Southeast Asia, not merely of singular economic achievement, but also of the eminent viability of a free, open, sane, and equal multiracial democracy, worthy at once of economic, political, and moral emulation."

Devan Nair and James Puthucheary et al spent serious time in jail to free us from the shackles of British colonialism. When fathers and sons end up on opposite banks of the political divide, the expression that comes to mind is that the apple has indeed fallen far from the tree.

Yay, finally, something positive to read about Singapore, after a dismal surfeit of negative court proceedings and workplace bashing. Scientists from Nanyang Technological University (NTU) supposedly helped develop a molecule that will kill cancer cells without destroying healthy ones. Called Hamlet (Human Alpha-lactabumin Made Lethal to Tumour), the protein-lipid complex is based on a protein present in human breast milk. But why did the scientists name it after a Prince of Denmark instead of choosing a Singapore sounding label, say HAMTAM (Human Alpha-lactabumin Mainly Targeted At Tumours)?

Apparently it was a Swedish team who first discovered Hamlet in 1995. A Catharina Svanborg, Swedish microbiologist best known for her work on proteins in breast milk, sought out Professor Gerhard Grueber (Ph.D. in Biochemistry, Johannes Gutenberg-University Mainz, Germany, 1995) for his expertise in structural biology. Latter, currently an associate professor, had joined NTU in August 2005. The collaboration with the local university which started 3 years ago in 2010 was led by Prof Svanborg and Dr Manoj Puthia from Lund University of Sweden, and Prof Guber from NTU's School of Biological Sciences. Maybe if Guber had spear headed the team, the name would be more Aryan sounding, say ADOLF (Alpha-lactabumin Destroy Only Lethal Foreign cells).

Of course, if the foreigners take up citizenship in 5 to 10 years' time, the time frame within which the team hopes to develop a commercially available product, Singapore can take more credit for the fight against cancer.

Based on our past experience with ping pong paddlers, future developments can be hard to predict. In one notable instance, a PRC import took the Olympics medal and prize money and headed straight home for the Motherland. Including her kid, before he comes of age to warrant posting a financial bond to ensure he has to return to fulfill his National Service obligation.

Women in Singapore can expect to live to 85 and men to the age of 80, if the latest World Health Organisation (WHO) figures are to be believed. Problem is, WHO assumes we have the same healthcare availability and affordability of the other top 3 countries, namely Japan (female 86, male 82), Switzerland and San Marino. Even if Ah Ma and Ah Kong can scrounge up the money to see a doctor, their sprightly presence is not always welcomed.

Some residents at Toh Yi estate organised an evening meeting in February 2012 to protest the construction of 130 senior citizen studio apartments at the junction of Toh Yi Road and Toh Yi Drive. It mimicked the actions of the Woodlands group who objected to the building of an elder-care centre at the void deck of their HDB blocks. Haunting images of the notorious death houses at Sago Lane were evoked in their passioned protestations, but one suspects their fears relate more to the horror of the market value of their enhanced assets plummeting with the growing sights of so many old people still walking around their estate.

Hence the pretty billboards. Ah Ma and Ah Kong must be in the picture, you just have to look real hard.

The former president of the Singapore Table Tennis Association (STTA) was charged with criminal breach of trust for misappropriating association funds in 2005, but declined to take the witness stand to defend himself. One word that comes to mind is chutzpah, derived from the Hebrew word ḥutspâ (חֻצְפָּה), meaning "insolence" or "audacity". Choo Wee Khiang, 58, was a former Member of Parliament for Jalan Besar GRC and may be harbouring the impression that association should still carry quite a bit of weight.

His lawyer is arguing that Choo had "derived absolutely no personal benefit" from the $8,400 that went to an assistant coach who moonlighted at Fuhua Secondary School from 2001 to 2003. Never mind if it was Choo who devised a convoluted way to make the Fuhua principal make payment to the coach. A similar logic was applied in the case when Action Information Management (A.I.M.) finagled the Town Council software deal and the MND Review Team declared that "there was no misuse or loss of public moneys in the transaction." Teo Ho Pin and Chandra Das can sit pretty because there was no money trail leading to their personal accounts, but "personal benefit" can be interpreted in many ways.

In the instance of law professor Tey Tsun Han, personal benefit includes receiving several gifts from his student, which included a limited edition Montblanc pen and tailored shirts. The guy has just been convicted of six counts of corruptly obtaining gratification. And if Tey had so much as obtained extra egg for his order of kway teow, you can bet he will be slammed with one more count of corruption.

Choo would be foolish to assume the court of public opinion would rule in his favour, the position taken by Mr and Mrs Todd after they walked out of the coroner's inquiry on their son's mysterious death. After all, Choo did lose his MP position in 1999 after pleading guilty to a charge of abetting his brother-in-law to cheat a finance company in 1990. And he did make the racist joke in parliament: "One evening, I drove to Little India and it was pitch dark but not because there was no light, but because there were too many Indians around." By today's standards, he should be in court for sedition.

You can tell Yaacob Ibrahim is still sore with the internet. How else would we ever learn that the Minister in charge of Muslim Affairs was once courting a Puerto Rican lass instead of a nice Muslim girl? Julian Assange, look out, a fatwa could be on your way anytime soon!

Ibrahim is targeting not just websites with "significant reach" - defined as having 50,000 unique visitors per month - he is aiming to amend the Broadcasting Act "with the view to ensure that any other sites which are hosted overseas but reporting on Singapore news is also brought in the licensing framework." Which means The Financial Times (FT) which reported on Shane Todd's untimely death will have to apply for a licence from the Media Development Authority (MDA) and put up a performance bond of $50,000. FT, and other overseas sites, may very soon have to comply within 24 hours any MDA directive to remove content found to be "in breach of standards".

The example of prohibited content quoted was the "gory" car crash images of an accident at Tampines Avenue 7. The video of an intern punched viciously by a supervisor with anger management issues apparently passes muster with the minister. Frankly, the real objectionable stuff is telling pork chop soup and free smoke jokes at a formal dinner gathering in Washington.

The MDA assures us that the new regulation will not apply to blogs, though adding: "If they take on the nature of news sites, we will take a closer look and evaluate them accordingly". The following picture is gory, but takes place overseas - a live birth at a hospital parking lot - nothing like the boring stuff going on in Singapore. Florida based Emily Robinson was hired by South Florida Sun Sentinel photojournalist Amy Beth Cavaretta and her husband, photojournalist Joe Cavaretta, to document the delivery of Cavaretta’s second child on last Friday. Baby was in a hurry, hence the outdoor impromptu shots. Thank God for the internet.

Robinson's pictures going viral on the internet

Look who's leaping from flood waters into hot water. Cornered by the tsunami of backlash against the proposed news website licensing requirements, Yaacob Ibrahim dismissed it in monetary terms as "just a banker's guarantee", arguing that no upfront payment is involved. The examples they cite as sites affected - Media Corp, Singapore Press Holding and Yahooo! News Singapore - all have deep pockets, but anybody with an IQ higher than the water logged minister knows that there are lots more individually operated websites that fall easily under the technical qualification of a "significant reach exceeding 50,000". Opposition MP Lina Chiam spoke for us when she asked the obvious, "How is a news website to be defined?"

This is not the first time they have insulted our intelligence, and will not be the last. There's good reason the White Paper made use of a 6.9 million figure, not 7.0. Robert M. Schindler, a professor of marketing at the Rutgers School of Business, explained that consumers “perceive a 9-ending price as a round-number price with a small amount given back.” Researchers have also found that prices ending in .99 communicate “low price” to consumers. Someone else put it this way: "I still think you need to be a moron with an IQ of 40 to miss the difference between 1.99 and 2.00." And it must be capricious of the anonymous White Paper authors to imagine that a 100,000 souls will be missed.

In another pathetic attempt to justify their incompetence - some will say outright deceit - MDA quoted the example of an article on the "Innocence of Muslim" video which they asked Google to block. Well, last we heard, Google still obliges if they think their content policy is violated. But it is doubtful they will act on the nebulous grounds that MDA is proposing. While Google may do no evil, the same cannot be said of MDA, or Yaacob Ibrahim. Latter should learn from the sixth point of the 10-point corporate philosophy of Google which says, "You can make money without doing evil."

Even assuming that the policy makers had intended good - that they actually have an honest bone in their body, Muslim, Buddhist, Christian or other - they should be mindful of the potential harm they are inflicting on a future generation. Recall Marcus Antonius's speech to the crowd of Romans after Caesar was murdered ("Julius Caesar", Act 3, Scene 2): "The evil that men do lives after them; The good is oft interred with their bones."

Does it look like this guy is trying to crack you up?

Call it another crack in the system. No, we don't mean the latest crack that caused another delay in the south-bound train service between Yio Chu Kang and Ang Mo Kio. And this crack was not at the welded joints, for which a contractor was prematurely named in a preliminary assessment as the party involved in all cracks that appeared at welded joints.

This time the crackheads wear blue uniforms. Sergeant Muhammad Kaldun Sarif had testified in open court he decided not to dust for finger prints or take DNA swaps at a crime scene because he "made a preliminary assessment" of suicide. It must be the kind of stirring Singapore police initiative that Kishore Mahbubani lauded as "at least as competent, if not more competent, than the FBI".

Ambassador to the United States Ashok Kumari Mirpuri proved just as competent, buttressing Sgt Khaldun's tenuous presentation by explaining that police protocol were operational guidelines, and were not prescriptive. In other words, SOPs (standard operating procedure) are for wimps. The Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) training officer who used one smoke grenade too many and killed Private Dominique Sarron Lee must have been operating on the same guiding principles. Now you appreciate why Singaporeans are weary of rushing in to help someone lying on the street. A giddy sergeant may "make a preliminary assessment" of assault, and taser you first, ask questions later.

The good ambassador was objecting to the ABC and Fox News coverage of the Shane Todd coroner's inquiry. For reporting on Singapore news, these two could potentially face the wrath of Media Development Authority (MDA), when latter gets their Yaacob Ibrahim inspired licensing act in place. Which means MDA will demand the story to be removed within 24 hours, or forfeit their S$50,000 performance bond. Ambassador Ashok sent his letter to Associated Press, which was copied to Washington Post and CBS, meaning ABC and Fox News are not the only news agencies updated of the cracks in our system. The Americans must be wondering what kind of crack is smoked in our little red dot.

On a tragic note, dengue claimed its first life when a youth was prematurely discharged from Tan Tock Seng Hospital (TTSH) inspite of their doctor's assessment that his platelets were still low. The prescription given was to go see a General Practioner to monitor his blood count.

The horny law professor from the National University of Singapore (NUS), Tey Tsun Hang, has been sentenced to a jail term of 5 months and ordered to pay a penalty of S$514.80, a figure presumably rounded to the nearest 10 cents, since nobody in Singapore accepts the 5 cent coin anymore.

The precision of the fiscal punishment to two decimal points makes you wonder what kind of judges are sitting on the bench. The amount reportedly includes the balance of a dinner bill and the cost of two tailored shirts. First off, has the GST been accounted for? Assuming the tailored shirts were really made to measure, their quality (material and workmanship) will have to depend on whether the dinner was held at a hawker center, food court or fancy restaurant. Some press reports mention a Garibaldi dinner, but kopitiams are so up market nowadays it's hard to tell. And whatever happened to the iPod and Mont Blanc pen? The duty free shop at Kuala Lumpur International Airport departure terminal (at Gate C) had a special offer for the latter at $400, but the Raffles City outlet carries more expensive models. Maybe the portable media player and writing instrument turned out to be made in China variants, and could explain why the prof gave her a B grade instead of an A. And why it would be embarrassing to record in the court documents cheap knock-offs are still being sold in Singapore shops.

Earlier the good judge said Tey's corrupt intent hinged on, amongst other things, a balance of power, highlighting that he was 38 when he took advantage of a student at nearly half his age, "just shy of her 21st birthday". To emphasis the point, the judge said she was about 6 years older than Tey's 14-year-old daughter. Okay, the math works here. Power corrupts, we have seen enough daily reminders of that, and we are told he had great influence over her, the future was in his hands. By same extrapolation, didn't Michael Palmer overwhelm the PAssionate grassroots leader with his "past achievements" too? We can only speculate whether Mike sought out to impress Laura, resulting in the homage of mangoes. Only a corruption case in open court can enlighten us further here.

It is doubtful whether anyone in the legal fraternity, or anywhere else on planet earth, will shed a tear for the philanderer. He was dumb to be his own lawyer, but it was downright cruel to cause her to undergo an abortion at such a tender age. Maybe the earth didn't move for either party at the interlude on his office couch, but he should at least have given her an A for the effort. Only then, can we truly file this away as a sex-for-grade case.

Associated Press (AP) was taken to task for its article ("Singapore police protocols flouted in US death") by ambassador Ashok, who called it "inaccurate, misleading and mischievous". Read AP's statement in response (italics mine):

"The Associated Press erroneously reported that police admitted violating or flouting official protocol in their investigation by not seeking fingerprints or DNA samples, and by examining the contents of a laptop in the dead man's apartment.
"Rather than admitting to any incorrect behavior in testimony, a police investigator simply recounted his actions, which he described as permissible under the guidelines."

Of course the Singapore Police Force will never admit their mistake, doing so will confirm its procedures fall short of FBI standards. Thanks to the "correction", the whole wide world now knows how the cops bungled the handling of evidence at site. In first world countries, tainted evidence will have a case thrown out of court easily on technical grounds.

The National Environment Agency's (NEA) political foray into a town council's custodial duties was more easily debunked. NEA said the town council sought to charge hawkers for scaffolding needed for cleaning purposes. The smoking gun email from NEA has this bit:

"... the hawkers association will make the necessary arrangements with their contractors on the scaffolding erection/dismantling during the spring cleaning period."

The hawkers did approach a contractor for the scaffolding quote. Doing so, it was de facto confirmation of the competence of the partisan elements at NEA. "Inaccurate, misleading and mischievous" would an apt descriptive.

But all is not lost. NEA can hire the writer at AP to craft a response statement with real bite. Let the war of words begin.

Watching Acting Minister of Manpower Tan Chuan Jin on the Talking Point programme special reminds one of a book which has the full title, "Denialism, How Irrational Thinking Hinders Scientific Progress, Harms The Planet, And Threatens Our Lives." The despicable licensing of news sites is no rocket science, but Tan was definitely in full denial mode.

He repeated ad nausem there was nothing new to regulations already in place. Well, before 1 June 2013, there was no $50,000 dangling like the sword of damocles over sites that have a reach of 50,000 and offer at least one article per week on Singapore’s news and current affairs. And then there's the potential fine of up to $200,000 and/or 3 years in jail if the Media Development Authority (MDA) feels you are tardy in taking down the offending post within 24 hours. The lawyers' letters of demand, which has seen quite a bit of action, at least provides a longer time-frame to respond.

One caller phoning in asked point blank whether Tan is prepared to state on air that no blog site will ever need to be licensed. The cowardly general took evasive action behind the "until such point that we notify other sites" caveat emptor, choosing instead to keep all options open. His empty promises smack of the hypocrisy of 377A, which also promised a light touch. Like the duplicitous legislation of 377A, Tan is as good as criminalizing bloggers with a free spirit.

“First they came…” is the famous statement and provocative poem attributed to pastor Martin Niemöller (1892–1984), an indictment of the sloth of German intellectuals after the Nazis' rise to power and the subsequent purging of their chosen targets, group after group:

When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.

When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.

When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.

When they came for the Jews,
I remained silent;
I wasn't a Jew.

When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.

And you actually thought you were safe. Think again.

In "Denialism", New Yorker staff writer Michael Specter reveals that Americans have come to mistrust institutions. One guest on the Talking Point panel touched on a similar mistrust generated by MDA's obscene haste in railroading the licensing regime. The final tally at the end of the program: more than 70 percent felt the new licensing rule will limit online news content.

After the Todds left the official hearing about their son Shane's death in a huff, they told Reuters: "What has made us say that we can no longer stay here is the testimony from the beginning saying they are always only looking at suicide, never murder. The outcome was pre-determined."

Father of the deceased, Rick Todd promised, "Our next step from today is using the court of public opinion," and he is delivering the goods. The material sent to Associated Press includes some pictures not made available in the extensive coverage given by the 149th ranked local rag. Quite plausibly, they fear falling short of the regulatory framework misinformation minister Yaacob Ibrahim had in mind when he told the BBC that the Media Development Authority (MDA) regulations are crafted in "the interest of ordinary Singaporeans" to enable them to "read the right thing".

Rightly or wrongly, it looks suspiciously like the ultimate cover up. Use your own eyes, before you have to be licensed to be permitted to make your own observations.

In the light of so many discrepancies, why couldn't the jaundiced judicials have prepared to come away with an open verdict? That way, no one wins, but no one loses either. In death there's no need for a victor.

The Singapore view

The American view

Strategic hands in play?

The Rape Of Democracy

Lack Of Trust All Around

Price Of A Patriot

The Fix Goes On

Story Of A Brave Ah Lian

It's All Done With Math

Truth Is The Real Casualty

Competence Challenged Again

Who Is Janadas Devan?

Good News About Singapore

Growing Old In Singapore

Go On, Make My Day

No News Is Good News

The Evil That Men Do

More Cracks In The System

Case Closed

A Tale Of Two Corrections

How Mistrust is Generated

Redacted, 6 June 2013

Ghostly Hands At Work