December 29, 2009
It has been 5 days since we broke the news about Lee Kuan
Yew’s disparaging remarks about Singaporeans made in a recent
interview with the National Geographic magazine and none of the SPH
papers in any language have reported on it.
Speaking to journalist Mark Jacobson, Lee spoke about the ruling
party’s liberal immigration and pro-foreigner policies as if he was
their principal architect.
Though he said he was aware of the fact that “many Singaporeans
are unhappy with the influx of immigrants”, Lee continued to
insist that it is for the “good” of the nation:
“Over time, Singaporeans have become less hard-driving and
hard-striving. This is why it is a good thing that the nation has
welcomed so many Chinese immigrants.” Lee was quoted
saying.
Lee described the country’s new subjects as “hungry,” with
parents who “pushed the children very hard.”
“If native Singaporeans are falling behind because the spurs
are not stuck into the hide, that is their problem,” he
quipped.
There are 82 PAP MPs in Parliament and none of them have come
out in the open to dispute the remarks made by Lee. Can we
therefore conclude that all of them agree with Lee ?
This is as good as saying to Singaporeans in Hokkien – “you die
your business!” which should not be a surprise to Singaporeans
anyway.
Despite being the richest country in Asia after Japan,
Singaporeans enjoy few social welfare benefits which explain why
the country continues to suffer a brain drain of its brightest
citizens yearly to other countries like Australia, Canada and
United States.
The government can afford to lose billions of dollars in failed
overseas investments without blinking an eyelid, but unable
or unwilling to provide a basic social safety net for
Singaporeans, especially those from the low income group.
The PAP has long eschewed any form of “welfare” for
Singaporeans on the grounds that it will retard our competitiveness
by creating a “crutch” mentality in the populace.
As such, Singaporeans are exhorted to work for as long as they
can till the day they drop dead. One minister even urged local
workers to be “cheaper, faster and better” when he should walk his
talk first by reducing his own bloated salary.
Our per capita income is the fourth highest in the world, but
our income gap as measured by the Gini Coefficient is the second
highest in Asia after Hong Kong whose figures are skewed by a
disproportionately higher number of billionaires. On the other
hand, Japan has one of the lowest income disparity between the rich
and poor.
This discrepancy is hardly surprising as the PAP has opened the
floodgate to immigrants who flock to Singapore in search of a
better life.
One does not need to be an economist to figure out that the
influx of cheap foreign labor will increase the profit margin of
big businesses and companies thereby raising the income of their
owners and directors while helping to depress the wages of ordinary
Singaporeans.
At the same time, business costs are lowered contributing to GDP
growth without necessarily increasing productivity which explains
why GDP is a very poor reflection of the distribution of wealth and
the overall well-being of the citizens in a country.
Furthermore, a certain percentage of PAP ministers’
multi-million annual salary is pegged to GDP figures which may
explain the PAP’s perpetual obsession with the GDP.
To the average Singapore worker eking out a living in the
streets, GDP means nothing to him or her at all. All he/she cares
for is whether his/her pay is sufficient to support oneself and
family, to start a family, raise the children up and to
retire comfortably when he/she is old.
20 years ago, it will not be too difficult to achieve the
Singapore dream. Young couples are able afford a HDB flat
relatively easily, they face little competition from foreign
workers for jobs, the cost of living is low compared to today’s
standard and before 2003, they are able to withdraw their CPF in
one lump sum to enjoy life in their golden years.
Today, Singaporeans are facing an increasingly bleak, uncertain
and insecure future. The monthly median wage of a Singapore worker
is only $2,600, about the same 10 years ago while inflation has
more than tripled, especially that of public housing.
A graduate fresh out of school will earn no more than $2,800 a
month. After paying the tuition loan, one will have little savings
left to buy even a car, let alone get married and start a
family.
A new four-room HDB flat in Seng Kang cost less than $200,000 in
1999. A similar-sized flat in nearby Punggol now fetches close to
$300,000. In the recently launched Dawson BTO project at
Queenstown, a five room flat cost on average $666,000.
Acccording to a financial consultant, a couple should earn a
minimum of $7,500 monthly before they should even think of buying
such a flat and even then, they have to cough out a few hundred
dollars every month in cash in addition to their CPF to
finance the property which leaves very little for their retirement
needs.
Life is never smooth-sailing. What if we are retrenched and
replaced by a foreign talent in our mid 40s, met with an accident
which renders us permanently unfit to work, afflicted with an
incapacitating disease like kidney failure or get embroiled in
some lawsuits? How are we going to continue support ourselves and
families?
A netizen, Tracy Tan shared this heart-wrenching story
on the
Vote PAP out facebook:
“I know of a lady who has kidney problems, heart
ailment and is half blind. She can’t work because of her health
problems. She is 40yrs+, a single parent with a Sec 3 daughter. She
is poor, sick and helpless. She approached Family Service Centre
for help. FSC saw her need and helped her to pay her HDB rental,
utility bill and conservancy charges. In
addition, she received $300 per month and $250 school pocket fund
for her daughter for meals at school. After helping her for two
years, FSC recently told her that it can’t help her with the $300
per month and her daughter’s school pocket fund although her
situation remains the same. She was referred to Jayakumar’s MPS.
They wrote her a letter to SE CDC to support her case. The reply
from the CDC was that “she had been helped for two years already
and they can’t help her anymore”. She went back to her MP and he
said that he can’t help her anymore as he had already written to
CDC for her.”
The above story is not an isolated case, but one
which we can easily identify with in our everyday life and it can
well happen to you or me one day.
The PAP does provide temporary forms of financial
assistance to the needy in the form of NTUC vouchers, utility bill
rebates and waival of conservancy charges, but these are stop-gap
measures which address only the symptoms of the disease and not its
underlying cause.
If this lady is unable to find or hold a long-term
job, then it is the duty of the government to step in to help
family for as long it is necessary till her daughter complete her
studies and start working.
There are many needy Singaporeans who are in dire
straits and yet not able to qualify for state support due to its
stringent criteria: one must be certified either permanently unfit
to work forever by a medical specialist or completely destitute
meaning that one has no living relatives left before one can apply
for Public Assistance (PA) and even then, it is granted only on a
case by case basis.
Another real life story: a 73 year old lady has to
pick used cardboards for a living in Toa Payoh Lorong 7. She has a
fifty year old son who is mentally challenged and therefore unable
to hold on a permanent job. She could not qualify for PA because
she still has a son, never mind the fact that nobody wants to
employ him!
The PA scheme which is run by the Ministry of
Community, Youth and Sports, offers only $330 monthly to its
recipients which is surely insufficient to maintain a decent
standard of living fit for a human being in
Singapore.
A few years ago, the amount is only $290 and when
PAP MP Dr Lily Neo asked MCYS Minister Dr Vivian Balakrishnan to
increase the sum so that PA recipients can have three meals a day
as an entitlement, he shot back:
“How much do you want? Do you want three meals in
a hawker centre, food court or
restaurant?”
It is not as if MCYS is so cash-strapped that
it is unable to provide more to the PA recipients. Dr Vivian just
unveiled a $10-million dollar Community Integration Fund to make
new citizens and PRs feel “welcomed” in Singapore. Why not spend it
to help Singaporeans who have contributed to the nation in one way
or another?
The primary role of the elected government of
the day is to take care of its citizens who voted for it, not to
compete with other nations in terms of some obscure economic
indicator, flaunt one’s wealth to the world by saving distressed
foreign banks or jet around the globe at the expense of taxpayers
to lecture other leaders on how to run their
countries.
Lee’s latest remarks will demolish any future
attempts by the PAP to portray itself as a party which cares for
Singaporeans. He has already stated very clearly in no uncertain
terms: if Singaporeans are unable to keep up with the immigrants,
don’t ever expect the PAP to help us – it is our business, not
theirs.
For a young graduate struggling to start a
family due to sky-rocketing costs of public housing, it is not the
business of the PAP to bring the prices
down.
For a middle-aged man who is retrenched
because his company manages to find a younger and cheaper
replacement from China or India, it is not the business of the PAP
to help him find another job.
For an elderly man who has to work as a
cleaner to support himself because he has no savings left in his
CPF, it is not the business of the PAP to ensure he has three basic
meals a day.
This is the kind of society Singapore has
become under 44 years of uninterrupted PAP rule – cold, unfeeling
and materialistic. Can such a country ever hope to attract the best
talent in the world to settle here? Is it little wonder that
Singapore is getting the “discards” from China and India and not
their crème de la crème who prefer to migrate to U.S,
Canada, Europe and Australia?
The PAP’s economic policies have already taken
a toll on the low income group and are now affecting the middle
class. The rich businessmen, doctors, lawyers, accountants and
engineers may think they have “prospered” under PAP rule, but wait
a minute – stop and ponder over the future of your
children.
Do you want them to grow up competing with
foreigners over a coveted place in a Singapore university? Do you
want them to fight tooth and nail with the more “hard-driving and
hard-striving” immigrants for a job which pays no more than $2,000
a month? Do you wish to see them perpetually stressed, frustrated
and unhappy because they are unable to make enough money to finance
their lifestyle? And lastly, do you really bear to see your
children working for as long as they are able to because they are
unable to retire?
Even for PAP members with
connections inside the system – your futures are not as secure
as it seems. Unless you belong to
the elite, you may soon find yourselves replaced by their new
“pets” from China, India, Malaysia, Philipines, Bangladesh,
Timbuktu and god knows where.
The PAP is not even a political party now after the
departure of the Old Guards in the 1980s. It is nothing more than
an empty shell filled by department store dummies whose only
purpose is to masquerade Singapore as a “parliamentary
democracy” to the rest of the world.
As Lee puts it succinctly himself:
“To be the prime minister, you don’t have to
know every instrument, but you got to recognise, ah, he’s a good
violinist, he’ll be the first violinist, he’ll be the double bass.
He will play the viola, he will have the trumpet, he will do the
drums. Then you coordinate them and then you have great music. And
if you already have a great orchestra, you can put a dummy there
and you still got great music.”
Now we know why none of the 82 PAP MPs dare to
contradict the old man – because they are all dummies who do not
deserve a seat in parliament in the first place.
So Singaporeans, the next time some PAP MP come up
to you and promise to voice your concerns in parliament, just
remind them of the PAP’s mantra to Singaporeans:
“YOU DIE, YOUR
BUSINESS!”
December 29, 2009
5天过去了，对于李光耀在国家地理杂志所发表的狂言，新加坡报业控股各语文出版的报章都只字不提。
面对该杂志记者马克·雅各布森 (Mark Jacobson)
时，李资政以主要建构者的身份大谈执政党有关亲移民和宽松接纳的政策。
虽然他说他知道“有些新加坡人对于移民的大量涌入感到不高兴”，但是他还是认为这是对国家“有利”的。
“这些年来，新加坡人已经越来越不进取和努力，所以我们的国家欢迎很多大陆来的新移民是件好事。”李资政说。
李资政形容这些大陆新移民为十分“饥渴”，并且父母们都把“孩子看得很紧”。
“如果土生土长的新加坡人被抛在后头，那是他们对自己的鞭策不够，苦果必须自己尝。”他打趣地说。
国会里有82个行动党议员，竟然没有一个敢公开出来驳斥李资政的评论。我们可以这样就认定他们都同意吗？
这就好比对新加坡的福建人说：你死你へ代志！——听惯这种语气的新加坡人，对此一点也不感到惊奇。
虽然新加坡排在日本之后作为亚洲第二富裕国家，但是新加坡人却享受很少的社会福利，所以造成每年都有不少一流人才移居到澳洲、加拿大和美国等地。
政府可以在海外投资一输上百亿而不眨眼，却不要为新加坡人，特别是那些来自低收入的社群架设一个社会安全网。
人民行动党长久以来要新加坡社会避开任何形式的 ” 福利 ” ，并将之称为“拐杖思维”，认为将削弱我们的竞争能力。
如此，新加坡人就得工作到死。还有一个部长呼吁本地人要“更便宜、更快、更好”，要实现这个目标，我想他最好以身作则，先减自己的百万年薪。
我国的人均收入是高居世界第四，不过测量收入差距的基尼系数，我们则在香港之后，在亚洲高居第二。那是因为国内有太多不成比例的亿万富豪。另一方面，日本却能够在缩小贫富差距方面保持领先。
而这样的差距唯有继续扩大下去，因为政府已经大开方便之门让追梦的外来移民大量涌入。
这不需要是经济学家也能看得出：大批廉价劳工的流入，当然会给大企业带来丰腴的利润，增加业主和管理层的收入，打压一般新加坡人的薪水。
与此同时，生意成本降低就无需通过提高生产力来达到国民生产总值的提升，这个说明国民生产总值其实并不能真正反映一个国家人民的财富和全体的生活素质。
此外，人民行动党部长们的百万年薪是和国民生产总值的数据挂钩，这也解释为何他们如此沉溺于国民生产总值的计算。
对于一般在职场讨生活的新加坡人，国民生产总值对他们来说并无特殊意义。他们担忧的是收入是否足够维持个人和家庭生活？如何开始一个家庭、抚养孩子以及老有所依？
20年前，也许要追逐新加坡梦还不太难；那时年轻夫妇还买得起政府组屋、没有外来者的竞争、和今日相比，生活费相对地低。在2003年之前，他们还可以一次过领出所有的公积金来安享晚年。
今天的新加坡人面对的是一个萧条、不确定和不安定的未来，新加坡人月入的中位数是2千600元，几乎和十年前一样，并且还要面对百物腾升，特别是政府组屋的价格。
一个大学毕业生起薪不会超过2千800元，除了偿还大学贷款，根本都没钱买辆汽车，更遑论结婚生子。
盛港的四房式组屋在1999年不超过20万，不过隔邻榜鹅区的同样屋子最近已经索价30万。还有在女皇镇的杜生预购组屋，五房式的平均售价是66万6000元。
根据金融顾问，一对夫妇至少要有7千500元的月入才买得起这样的组屋。或许还得每月拿出几百元现金来填补公积金户口的不足，这样下去他们在退休时的公积金户口已经所剩无几了。
生活并非一帆风顺，如果我们在人到中年的时候被外来人才抢去饭碗，或者意外致残、染上慢性疾病如肾衰竭，又或者官司缠身，那我们要如何养得起自己和家人呢？
在“把PAP踢出去”的facebook上，特雷斯·陈网友和大家分享一则揪心的故事：
“
我认识一名肾脏和心脏都出毛病的半瞎女子，由于健康问题而不能工作。她现在四十多岁，是个单亲妈妈，有个就读初中三的女儿。以前她向家庭服务中心救助，家
庭服务中心明了她的困境，就帮她付建屋局房租、水电费和杂费。此外她每月还获得300元补贴，和让她女儿在学校用餐的250元零用钱。经过两年多的援助，
家庭服务中心最近通知她，该中心不能再继续提供她每月三百元和女儿学校零用钱的补助，虽然她的情况没有丝毫改变。他们指示她在接见选民的时间去找贾古玛，
那里的人就帮她写封信到东南社理会寻求援助，结果社理会的回答是：‘已经帮了她两年，不能再帮她了。’她回去找国会议员，他说已经帮她写信，就只能帮这么
多。”
上面的故事绝不是单一个案，而是时时在我们周围发生，说不定有一天也会发生在你我身上。
行动党可以暂时提供求助者职总超市礼券、水电回扣和免除杂费，然而这一切都是治标不治本的措施。
如果上述的女子不能找到或者保住一个长期饭碗，那么政府就有责任支撑这个家庭，直到她的女儿毕业出来找工作为止。
此外，在新加坡还有很多穷困者够不上国家援助的严格规定：必须由医学专家裁定永久性伤残，或者证明是无亲无故才能获得公众援助金，而且批准与否每回还得依情况而定。
另外一个真实故事：有个73岁老妪在大巴窑七巷靠拾纸皮为生，她有个五十岁的儿子，由于天生弱智不能找到一份稳定的职业。她够不上资格就因为她还有个儿子，然而没有人要聘请她儿子这个事实则搁置一旁。
由社青体部所发出的公众援助金是目前每月330元，显然不足以在新加坡维持一个像样的生活。
几年前，当行动党议员梁莉莉医生要求社青体部部长维文医生把290元援助金提高，那么这些受惠者才能有一天三餐的正常饮食时，维文当场问道：“你要多少？你说的三餐是在小贩中心、食阁还是餐馆吃的？”
这当然不是社青体部经济拮据，才无法帮助更多的人、因为维文医生最近才披露一个1000万元的“社区融入基金”来帮助新公民和永久居民觉得在新加坡“受欢迎”。为什么不拿这笔钱去帮助那些曾在建国时出过一份力的人们呢？
民选政府的基本功能就是要照顾选民，而不是通过一些暧昧的数据和外国竞争、夜郎自大或者使用本地纳税人的钱乘飞机到处去教训别人怎么治理国家。
李资政的讲话显然破坏人民行动党要把自己装扮成爱民政党的任何企图。他已经斩钉截铁地说：如果新加坡人赶不上新移民，不必期望行动党来打救——那是我们人民自己的代志，不是他们的。
也就是说，一个大学毕业生为了追赶升腾的屋价而无法成家立业，也不必期望行动党会把价格拉下来。
一名中年人被中国或印度找来的更年轻的廉价劳工所取代，也不必期望行动党会帮他找到一份工作。
对于年长者由于公积金户口没钱而必须当清洁工来养活自己，也不必期望行动党保证他一天有正常的三餐。
这是新加坡社会在44年行动党一党独大下养成的——冷酷、无情且物质至上。这样的社会真能吸引到最好的人才前来吗？在中国和印度移民心里，新加坡在他们的名单上已经是渐渐“排除”，他们之中的出类拔萃者都喜欢移民到美国、加拿大、欧洲和澳洲去，这一点都不奇怪。
行动党的经济政策已经让低收入群蒙受打击，现正转向中等收入阶层。而有钱商贾、医生、律师、会计师和工程师或者以为他们在行动党的庇荫下“发了”——最好再想一想你们的子孙将来会怎么样？
难
道你要他们和外国人在新加坡大学里争夺位子吗？你要他们和那些所谓“进取和努力”满足于2000元以下薪水的新移民为一份工作抢得头破血流吗？你要他们长
期紧张、失望和不快乐，就因为他们找不着一份如意的职业吗？最后，你真的愿意看到自己的孩子工作到最后一口气，就因为他们永远无法退休吗？
即使是身为行动党党员，和制度有很多联系的，你的未来也不见得如表面那么风平浪静。除非你能跻身精英阶层，否则你不知道何时会被他们从中国、印度、马来西亚、菲律宾、孟加拉、廷巴克图跟天知晓国度找来的“新宠”所代替。
行动党在八十年代一批老将退下以后，根本不能再称为一个政党了。它更多像一个摆满假人偶的百货市场来表演“议会民主”空壳给全世界看。
诚如李资政自己说的：
“
要当个总理，你不必每样乐器都会，但是你都要认得；哦！他是个好提琴手，所以他来当第一小提琴。他可以去当倍低音、他可以玩中提琴、他玩喇叭、他玩鼓。只
要把他们组织起来，你就能玩出美妙的音乐。当你建立起一支好乐队的时候，即使放个假人在那儿（指挥），也一样能玩出美妙的音乐。”
现在我们知道为什么82个行动党议员不敢顶撞老家伙的原因——因为他们都是假人，其实都没资格在那儿。
所以新加坡人，下次再有行动党议员来跟你说：他会为你在国会发声。别忘了提醒他们行动党给新加坡人的口号：
“你死你へ代志！”
http://www.temasekreview.com/2009/12/29/%e8%a1%8c%e5%8a%a8%e5%85%9a%e5%af%b9%e6%96%b0%e5%8a%a0%e5%9d%a1%e4%ba%ba%e8%af%b4%ef%bc%9a%e4%bd%a0%e6%ad%bb%e4%bd%a0%e3%81%b8%e4%bb%a3%e5%bf%97%ef%bc%81/
