As a Singaporean who had dedicated 2.5 years of his life to
serving the nation, it really pains me to read about what is
becoming of this nation in the article “The
woes of a Singaporean IT consultant” – we now have
under-qualified “foreign talents” who had merely fabricated their
resumes are now being given priority to local jobs over qualified
Singaporean PMET’s (who, like me, had dedicated 2.5 years to
serving the country). These foreign talents do not have to
sacrifice a single second of their lives to protecting Singapore,
yet are able to share in the same benefits as the Singaporeans
whose jobs they have displaced.
If this is not bad enough, let me add that Singapore is now
being sold piecemeal to rich foreigners (some of which hail from
dubious backgrounds, just like our “foreign talents”), by
foreigners who have now decided to call themselves “Singaporeans”
but actually have no intention to contribute back to Singapore (in
any way), what benefits they have taken as “Singaporeans”. How do
they do this? Via the Global Investor Program
(a.k.a GIP scheme) [Link]
sanctioned by Contact Singapore. Let me explain how this works…
The GIP scheme was actually endorsed by the government to
attract skilled and rich individuals to invest in Singapore. One
way is for the foreign individual to invest at least S$ 2.5 million
in one of GIP-approved private equity funds [Link];
of course, the migrant in question must satisfy certain criteria to
ensure that Singapore is actually accepting talent and not junk. If
the criteria is satisfied and the migrant passes the interviews by
the relevant governing body, he / she is then allowed to “invest”
this money in one of the GIP-approved funds and then obtains a
Singapore-PR with no questions asked.
From the GIP fund’s point of view, they manage the funds and are
required by governing mandate to invest at least 50% of the funds
into Singapore enterprises to encourage the growth of local
enterprises. At the same time, the fund-manager collects 2.5%p.a.
of the funds under management as management fees to cover operating
costs. The fundamental intentions behind this idea are good.
However, it has come to my attention that there are funds, which
have been started by former PRCs who have either become Singapore
citizens or are currently awaiting to become Singapore citizens.
Ironically, they too became Singapore PRs (and then subsequently
citizens) through this GIP scheme.
Unfortunately (according to an insider), none of them have
professional fund-management experience and are focused on raising
as much money as possible (i.e. getting as many migrant-investors /
clients to invest in their fund as possible) rather than channeling
the money to helping businesses grow, so that they may benefit from
the 2.5% management fee. It appears that they have a terrible
market reputation and actually advice some of their clients who do
not meet the criteria to qualify for Singaporean PR under this
scheme to get their documents forged.
To make things worse, they have not invested a single cent of
the funds raised in any Singaporean enterprise (instead investing
in Chinese enterprises recommended by their own friends or clients)
and are not intending to invest a single cent in any Singaporean
enterprise.
To top it all off, I was told that this firm (based in
Singapore) employs a lot more PRCs rather than Singaporeans. From
what I understand, the founder of the firm has sent his wife and
son to the UK for the son’s education, and is intending to send his
son to the States thereafter for his university education, with no
intention to let his son serve his rightful share of national
service.
To summarise it in a nutshell, Singapore offered such ingrates a
good life in Singapore by offering them Singaporean passports, and
ultimately Singaporean citizenship, and how do they repay us?
.
.
.
Really, seeing such things happen in Singapore does make me
wonder what this country is coming to – to have a country being
sold out to foreigners by its own government is a terrible thing.
To have a country’s government let foreigners sell its own country
out piecemeal? That’s unheard of and absolutely ludicrous.
.
Billy
* This comment was posted on the thread ‘Painful experience
of a local PMET working in financial sector’ (http://www.temasekreview.com/2011/05/20/painful-experience-of-a-local-pmet-working-in-financial-sector/)
Taken from:
http://www.temasekreview.com/2011/06/17/prc-fts-abusing-our-global-investor-program/