ON JULY 4, while travelling on bus service 16, my fellow
passengers and I were the victims of racial abuse.
The incident was sparked by a person who boarded the bus but had no
change for bus fare. At that moment, an elderly Caucasian woman
came up and offered to pay the fare for that person.
She did this while raising her voice and commenting that
Singaporeans will never help anyone but themselves and that all
Singaporeans were money-minded.
She even went so far as to add a four-letter vulgarity before the
word 'Singaporean' in every sentence she uttered.
At that moment, I could not remain silent any longer and I
interrupted her, merely uttering the words, 'excuse me'. It was
then that her racial slurs began, referring to Chinese people as
'chinks' and how she hated all of them.
I then accused her of being a racist which she freely admitted to
being, all the while adding again the four-letter vulgarity
directed at all 'chinks'.
She then remarked to the entire bus how Chinese people could not
speak proper English, adding that she did not know how they could
see owing to their small eyes.
To say the least, I was shocked and horrified by her bigotry. Being
lost for words and disgusted at her deplorable behaviour, I just
called her a disgrace.
After the dust had settled, I found myself utterly disappointed at
how such a small and hateful person was allowed on our shores, if
in fact she was in Singapore on a long-term basis.
However, I was even more disappointed in the extreme apathetic
nature of my fellow Singaporeans. This racial abuse lasted a good
five minutes on a bus packed full of Singaporeans who had just
finished work, and no one except me had shown disapproval of this
verbal abuse.
Everyone just sat there without saying a word. If we Singaporeans
do not stand up for ourselves in the face of such blatant tyranny,
who will? The ironic thing is that I am Eurasian and my girlfriend
is German and I was the only one who said something when she went
on her racial tirade.
This debacle has left me with the opinion that our Government's
drive towards attracting foreign talent needs to be approached with
great caution.
More stringent checks on potential immigrants are required, which
should not be solely based on paper credentials, but on their
sentiments towards Singapore and their people. One bigot allowed to
grace the country I love is one too many.
Shaun Jalleh
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