i refer to Straits Times online article: Jan 23, WP'S REACTION TO MINISTERS' COMMENTS Workers' Party will stick by its platform
By T. Rajan
"The PAP ministers' position is that the WP proposal to scrap grassroots organisations threatens social cohesion; its call to do away with ethnic integration policies will derail multiracial harmony; while the call to raise subsidies is fiscally unsound. The WP's proposal to scrap the Elected Presidency will also remove a check on the Government, argued the ministers."
all these expressed are my personal views so feel free to disagree or tag anything.
it was said that the WP's manifesto had 4 time bombs.. as stated above.. but to think of it, maybe its not that unsound, or it could be slightly radical but because of elections drawing near, some feel its better to make a mountain out of a molehill or to play down certain party's merits.
1st, the idea to scrap grassroots. i did a google search and found the grassroots website and found this definition : "The People's Association (PA) being the leading government agency that promotes social cohesion, racial harmony and Government-to-People connectivity, has a network of about 1,800 grassroots organisations. The grassroots organisations are managed by volunteers who work with the PA to organise a wide range of programmes and activities to cater to the needs and interests of Singaporeans from all walks of life" It is said that grassroots actively promote social integrity and promote racial harmony. but dont you think that an organisation so dedicated to social building should be so politically involved? it even goes by the name People's Association.
2ndly, its call to do away with public housing quotas. the defense WP raise is that SG is already so multi-culturally mixed that we can do away without it. and it was challenged that without quotas, neighbourhoods might segregate along racial lines. But do we have quotas for Private Housing? housing like condos, terraces and bungalows. estates of terraces and bungalows are often large and might be a "mini-neighbourhood". do we see racial segregation happening in those estates? the answer is no. market forces also play an important role. just as flats are fixed price, so all will have an equal chance at bidding, or first-come-first-serve. of course, if blocks are seen to be "culturally" segregated then the govt might step in, but that doesnt mean the quota must stay indefinitely and for all public housing.
3rdly, raising subsidies seen as fiscally unsound. on the face of it, it might seem unsound. but lets not forget the very deep pockets and foreign reserves that SG has kept hidden away in banks. During election time, we do see some Budget goodies, tax cuts, rebates etc. who is going to pay for them? seems like these budget incentives are passed easily near election time, but the oppositions call to raise subsidies are promptly quashed. moreover, in developed countries, such as UK and US, heavy subsidies are given to the young and the old as medical benefits, pensions and state paid education. of course this comes with high tax rates but who are we to complain if some day in yr 80's u fall ill with no money to see a doctor, and u are glad u have state sponsored medical coverage to fall back on. moreover, are we not also paying rather high tax rates on income tax and CPF? housing, cars and medical care is definitely not getting cheaper
4thly, the removal of an elected president might remove a valuable check on corruption of ministers. but lets us think of the last 2 presidential elections. there was not a single opposition to challenge the presidency, let alone elect one. appointment might save us the trouble of having an election with so few candidates, and perhaps a well-informed presidential committee make better choices than common people influenced by presidential propaganda. Whether or not corruption is checked falls within the job scope and quality of the person elected and i doubt it has nothing much to do with the way the president holds office.
lastly, the WP call to switch to proportional representation instead of GRC's. it was argued that GRC's was a better method. but do u think its fair that at the last election, with approx 39% support WP received in seats contested, that WP only gets one seat in parliament while PAP has 82? of which 55 were walkovers. if we were to go by proportional representation, WP would get the proportion of seats as supported by the whole electorate.. say approx 10%. and that would be approx 8 seats. this method is also used for parliaments in several countries to ensure non over-dominance by one single party. one might argue 'dont fix what aint broke' but for our opposition to be at least a credible voice, to provide significant views contrary to the mainstream views expressed, 1 seat is definitely not the way to go. perhaps WP should reanalyse their strategy, perhaps the playing field should be more level. perhaps voting wasnt so easy as ticking the box with the Blue circle and the Red lightning bolt.
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
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Well ZG it’s not as if the PAP's politcial stranglehold is something new to us here. Anybody with even a basic knowledge of political science can easily see that the political enviroment here is hardly what you would call charged with competitive energy. And no prizes for guessing the main reason.
However, while it is undeniable that the perhaps the PAP has gone a bit too far in their efforts to stifle the competition, much of their success has been due to a very pragmatic, very rational and systematic way of doing things. True, policies like the ridding of an elected president might sound like a pretty good idea but we have to take these things in the context of the majority of the people in Singapore. We're lucky enough to live in a community where most people are at least somewhat aware of the political situation and can smell subterfuge if it's at least right under their noses. Though I'm no sociologist, I believe I cannot safely say the same for the majority of Singaporeans.
Lets take the call to do away with public housing quotas for example. From our point of view, it looks like a perfectly feasible plan. Singaporeans are more than reasonable enough not to start segregating in one community or the other aren't they? Aren’t private estates free of this racial quota policy? Well if you look at it in another way it might actually make a lot of sense. I believe when the PAP came up with this policy, they had a few things in mind.
1. The avoidance of racially segregated townships or communities.
2. The avoidance of racial minorities feeling alienated or out of place within a particular estate.
Now in a community where people feel there is absolutely no distinction between race, and perhaps even overlook that factor, then the two concerns raised above would probably not even be applicable. Unfortunately however, that is certainly not the case here. Racial distinction, if not discrimination, has been an ongoing issue since the man first set foot upon the earth. Even God chose to distinguish one race above all the rest, calling the Jews His ‘chosen people’. In fact, the signs of racial segregation despite these policies in Singapore are painfully obvious. You don’t see many Chinese gangs with significant proportions of Malays or Indians do you? Who do you usually associate with hogging the neighbourhood street soccer court? How many Chinese do you see amongst them? While I don’t deny that there probably quite a few exceptions to the rule, they are just that: exceptions. Racial and even religious partitioning is a very real avenue we must be careful not to walk down and I for one am pretty glad that the government has taken steps to curb it. In fact, the older generations of Singaporeans would probably have had first hand experience of the situation. The Racial Riots and Maria Hertogh Riots are no stranger to us and it has been nary 50 years since they have occurred.
But what about private housing and estates then? Aren’t they at risk of one race become dominant within the community? The answer is yes. But the fact is that if such a policy were to be imposed on private property, land developers and property owners would probably run out of capital long before they even reach minimum occupancy. This in turn would spell disaster for the property market in Singapore and perhaps even serve to discourage investors from extending their roots here. So in light of this, I feel the PAP has taken a calculated risk by freeing the private property market of the racial quota policy. A calculated risk because the PAP is banking on the knowledge that a high proportion of the people who reside in these estates are those who have some semblance of higher education and perhaps understand the racial volatility that is ever present in a multi racial population such as ours. I am not saying that these people do not exist in public housing estates but it is undeniable that their proportion in respect to their neighbours is significantly lower than in private estates. So it is that relaxing the policy for private housing might be a risk more worth taking than the risk of drastically devaluing the property market in Singapore, which might actually lead to unrest of another sort.
So in this case I feel that the WP’s desire to do away with racial quotas for housing estates is perhaps a valiant, but ultimately not very feasible idea. The stakes that they propose to gamble against are far too high to put the future of Singapore’s internal stability on.
Ok I think I can go on and on about this. Don’t get me wrong, I ain’t no red lightning bolt fondler. I actually agree with some of your views, but I do see the sense in some of their policies. Gotta head to school. Take care man.
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