"When we face problems, we acknowledge them publicly, and deal with them. We don't pretend there's no problem, no comments, studying the matter, thinking about it, will clarify one day. We settle now! You lie low hoping the public will forget the issue, and the issue will go away, the public will forget you, and might as well go away."
Lee, who is also the Secretary General of the People's Action Party, was addressing about 2,000 cadres at the party's 60th anniversary rally held at the Singapore Expo on Sunday, 7 December 2014.
Taking potshots at that paragraph alone is like the dilemma of a mosquito at a nudist beach - you just don't know where to start.
By his standards, the obfuscation of the Action Information Management (AIM) debacle was no problem. Wasting huge sums of taxpayers money on a $2 company with no technical staff or competence was no problem. That Chandra Das, a former member of parliament and longstanding steward of the party, was the principal middleman in the transaction was no problem. None of the salient points was acknowledged as thorny issue by the mainstream media. No wonder Yang Yin was emboldened to embark on his grand scheme of deceit. He punched all the right buttons, right connections and the right politicised machinery to sweep shortcomings under the carpet.
One positive way to look at the mee-siam-mai-hum talk of disconnect is that he was talking to boys and girls sitting at his feet, reminding them to be good or Santa won't be distributing presents. And what presents - $16,000 MP allowances, $1,000,000 ministerial pay, and lots of directorships for consolation prizes. Never mind if the people don't want them - as the "Son of Punggol" doctor's wife told him before the disastrous by-election - the gerrymandering and GRC system are time proven guarantees.
Party chairman Khaw Boon Wan said of their new vision,"As our society becomes more diverse, our economy more mature and our political landscape more contested, it is timely to fundamentally review our overall approach." If only leopards can change their spots.