March 4, 2010
In yet another sign that the ruling party is fast losing touch
with the ground, another PAP MP Seah Kian Peng has spoken out
forcefully in support of immigrants.
Not satisfied with a mega $10 million dollar Community
Integration Fund unveiled by Minister Dr Vivian Balakrishnan last
year to tackle a snowballing problem that is largely its own doing
– the inability of the immigrants to assimilate into Singapore
society as too many of them have come within too short a period of
time, Mr Seah now calls on more spending to make the newcomers feel
“part of us.”
“First, we need to make sure that they are called new
Singaporeans rather than new migrants. They are not even new
migrants – they are an old hand at migrating, and want a new life.
They want to settle down and to make Singapore a new home,” he
said during the parliamentary session yesterday.
Due to the PAP’s liberal immigration policies, foreigners now
make up 36 percent of Singapore’s population, up from 14 percent in
1990. Of the remaining 64 percent who are citizens, an increasing
number are born overseas.
According to figures from the Home Affairs Ministry, there were
over 70,000 PRs and 20,000 new citizens in 2008. Two out of every
three PR applicants are successful and there is no minimum
residency period unlike in other countries.
“We have not done any large scale survey, we do not know
their problems but we have already gone ahead and decided that the
funds will go towards organizing activities…..What we ought to do
is first – find out what new Singaporeans need, and then target
funding at helping them meet these needs,” he added.
Instead of spending precious public resources to find out what
the new immigrants need, why not ask what Singaporeans really
need?
Why should taxpayers’ monies be used to pay for a glaring
mistake made by the PAP? If it had not opened the floodgates to
accept so many foreigners at the same time, will we be experiencing
problems in integrating them now?
There are few incentives for the newcomers to fraternize and
reach out to the native Singaporeans as so many of their
compatriots are already in Singapore that they don’t feel out of
place.
As a result, they tend to congregate among themselves within a
closely-knitted community leading to the emergence of ethnic
enclaves in the HDB heartlands.
Had the PAP slowed down the intake of foreigners and exercised
more discretion in the selection of those to become new citizens,
we will not need to spend a single cent more on such ineffective
integration policies.
With elections around the corner, this may be another gimmick to
woo the new citizens to the PAP’s side and shore up its flagging
support base.
Singaporeans should send a strong message to the PAP in the next
general election that they will not allow anymore public monies to
be spent on the immigrants.
Perhaps Mr Seah should set up a fund contributed by all PAP MPs
to sponsor his own “integration” programs since he is so infatuated
with the new citizens and whatever.
