OPINION
During a visit to Sai Kung last Sunday
to promote his reform package to the people, Hong Kong Chief
Executive Donald Tsang was greeted by hundreds of disgruntled
citizens who heckled, abused and accused him of “selling out” the
people.
Not only must he put up with a torrent of verbal abuse including
vulgarities in Cantonese from the crowd, he also have to guard
himself against flying eggs and slippers thrown at him from
nowhere.
One protestor ran towards him swearing to “do him in” and was
stopped by the police before he could reach Tsang. Despite the
cacophony, no arrests were made. The police simply stood by and
watched.
Had the scenario occurred in Singapore, riot trucks will be
called in immediately and the protestors arrested and brought away
forcefully by our Singapore Police Force.
Last week, a 52 year old relief cabby Mr Teo Kian Seng was
charged in court for “threatening” his PAP MP Lee Yi Shyan. One
would have thought that he must have done or said some horrible
things to scare the wits out of the newbie MP, but all he did was
to remind Lee that he hoped he would not see a “repeat” of the
torching incident of Seng Han Thong last year.
How this can be construed or misconstrued as a “threat” by the
MP and the Singapore police is anybody’s guess. The poor man had
gone to see Lee at his Meet-the-People session in Bedok over a
summons received by his elderly mother for leaving her
“garang-guni” along the corridor.
The media did not report what transpire in the conversation
between the two men, but surely Mr Teo would not have uttered those
regrettable words for no good reason.
Either he was provoked into doing so or he must be so peeved by
Lee’s attitude that he had a slip of tongue. One thing for sure:
the exchange between Mr Teo and Lee is unlikely to be a pleasant
encounter.
In all likelihood, Mr Teo probably said the “threatening”
sentence out of anger or frustration and bears no malice or
ill-will for it was not mentioned if Mr Teo had raised his voice or
behaved in a hostile manner towards Lee.
An understanding and magnimanous gentleman would have forgotten
the incident and let it pass instead of lodging a police
report.
In most cases, the police will not even bother to investigate
and will simply refer the complainant to the Magistrate’s court,
but of course when it involves a PAP MP, they are especially
“efficient”.
The PAP MPs should realize that they are bound to encounter
rude, unpleasant and unruly residents during their grassroots work.
There will be people who are unhappy, peeved and angry at the
government and they will naturally become their immediate targets
to vent their frustrations on.
During his visit to Tainan county last year in the aftermath of
the Typhoon Morakot, Taiwanese President Ma Ying-Jeou was mobbed by
angry villagers who threatened to beat him into a pulp. The
unfortunate scene was telecast “live” on Taiwanese TV.
Elsewhere in Asia, it is relatively common to see lawmakers
being heckled, abused and even beaten physically by disgruntled
citizens when they are out in the public.
While violent behavior should not be condoned and deserved to be
prosecuted, more discretion should be exercised by the authorities
in the dealing of cases like Mr Teo’s which lie in the “gray”
zone.
The role of an MP is to serve as an intermediary between the
people and the government and to be an official channel for
feedback from the ground, whether positive or negative.
Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew wrote in his memoirs that he and
his entourage was jeered, heckled and jostled by opposition
supporters when he was campaigning for the PAP in strongholds held
by the Barisan Sosialis and he was even pushed into the drain on
one occasion.
The present generation of new PAP MPs are indeed “strawberry”
MPs who appear unable to differentiate between real threat and mere
paranoia.
Facing and dealing with unhappy Singaporeans are part and parcel
of their work as MPs. If the PAP MPs are so easily “threatened”,
then perhaps they should seriously reconsider their positions as
representatives of the people in Parliament.
It is so much easier being a MP in Singapore compared to Hong
Kong, Taiwan, South Korea and other Asian countries and it is a
shame that PAP MPs still get paranoid over such trivial
incidents.
That is the kind of MPs we get when they do not have to fight
tooth and nail for every single vote from the people and are
whisked into Parliament either through walkovers or GRCs.
Under the PAP’s uninterrupted rule for more than five decades,
the term “MP” has taken a new definition altogether. Instead of
serving the people as they should be, they are now behaving like
little emperors whom the people must kowtow to and beg on their
knees for help.
Hello, the key word used here is threaten, Singaporean threaten his
MPs, it is an offence.
In Hongkong, they dun threaten their temporary govt, they only
scold, throw rotten eggs and cry foul on their right being abused.
That's the differences ya.
The court of Singapore are not stupid, and certainly not the
prosecutor who is the govt lawyer, he choose his key word
"threaten" well, not only MPs are the one seeking protection and
unjust, even a man on the street, being threatened can sue the
other party.
So, i suggest, if next time you dun like your MP, throw rotten
eggs instead of use threatening words ya...
