In today's Straits Times,(22.12.2006) there appears an article
in Insight page entitled "People & Politics - 7 highly visible
types in Singapore politics"
In this article, the Straits Times claimed that it has published
readers' letters to the forum page from writers who have "the knack
of raising ssues in a timely and coherent manner."
It cited the writings of people like Mr. Michael Loh, Mr. Leong Sze
Hian and Dr. Lim Boon Hee and gives an impression that Straits
Times has been objective in publishing letters from its readers
with mention that some of its regular forum writers like Mr.
Michael Loh has scored some kinds of record in the Guiness Book of
record being the most prolific newspaper's forum writers.
May I ask the Straits Times to show that in the same breath,
whether it has published well-articulated letters from writers who
write on serious social or political issues or problems in the past
and how many of such letters have been published as against those
which were rejected in order to back up its point that Straits
Times has been objective and welcoming enough to publish
well-written or coherent letters from its readers.
Let me ask the Straits Times why my various letters to the Straits
Times on "High costs of living" or "Proposed Revision of the
Constitution" or "Time to review the Conservation Law", were less
coherent or worthy of publication or not as coherent as those of
Mr. Michael Loh?
I would just reproduce one such rejected "serious letter" written
to the Straits Times on 18.12.2006 concerning the problems caused
by the unchanging past summary practices of URA in implementing
conservation of properties which is now reproduced below:-
{QUOTE}Date:- Dec 18, 2006
From: Mr. Robert Teh Kok Hua
To: The Editor,
The Straits Times,
Dear Editor,
Your article Historic buildings no bar to progress (by Kannan
Chandran, Straits Times 13.12.2006) raises many issues and
challenges confronting the ongoing conservation efforts of the
government.
Enough has been said about the need for conservation of buildings
of historic and heritage architectural legacy. For example, beside
many past articles by various correspondents on this topic, Mr.
Kannan has again lent vocal support to conservation by rightly
emphasizing that Heritage buildings should be viewed as assets,
not stumbling blocks to progress. He cited the fact that
refurbished colonial villas previously owned by the family of
Straits Chinese tycoon Tan Kim Seng and now incorporated in a new
condominium development, known as Grand Duchess or Ducess @ St
Patricks were instrumental in the sale of 121 units within 36 hours
of its soft launch.
Mr. Ler Seng Ann Director (Conservation & Development Services
) of URA in his recent reply (Many criteria in conservation ST
24.9.2006) to a forum letter has attributed our conservation
success to the public support and he added that We need to balance
that with economics, changing lifestyles and expectations, needs of
building owners and other factors.
However, in my view, the success of our Conservation Exercises was
due to the following factors:-
a) Many of the prewar shophouses in China Town, Little India and
Kampong Glam were already compulsorily acquired by the government
under the Land Acquisition Act with compensations based on market
values of the properties as at 30 November 1973;
b) The Rent Control Act, and
c) The private landowners were also given financial incentives to
conserve their pre-war rent-controlled properties under the
Decontrolled Premises Act.
The Rent Control Act was abolished in 2003 and provision for
compensation for compulsorily acquired properties had been amended
several times already.
Numerous articles have been published in the Straits Times like
Conservation targets newer buildings (By Kalpana Rasshiwala, ST
14.7.2006) etc, wherein architects have described the practical
difficulty in extending the traditional conservation of monumental
sites and buildings to prime commercial properties outside these
areas and newer private strata developments like Beverly Mai (The
first condo built in 1974) and Futura, (2nd condo built in 1976)
etc. as Uphill Battle.
With 6,500 buildings in monumental sites like China Town and Little
India, Cuppage Road and Kg Glam largely protected, under our
conservation programs to date, it may be asked:- (1) Is such a
level of conservation for a small country like Singapore enough ?
(2) Land being rare and expensive, how do we balance conservation
with the loss of redevelopment potential and creation of jobs ? (3)
Is there a need to over-conserve by conserving more old buildings
of the same type? (4) Is there a case for compensation to property
owners who have lost hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars
in property values when prevented from redeveloping their
properties?.
In conservation areas, there are many old, dilapidated or unsafe
buildings. Since there are no incentives for new owners to
redevelop the properties to their maximum potential and inject a
new lease of life to the locality, there are left in their
neglected state.
With the bulk of our national monumental buildings in core
conservation areas like China Town, Little India and Cuppage and Kg
Glam largely conserved, is there an overriding need to continue to
conserve more and more of the same or every old building of certain
age or architecture. Prewar buildings are already amply
represented. It is post-war iconic buildings which the public want
the URA to begin conserving.
Of late, on 8.12.2006, URA has published yet another notice of
amendments to the Master Plan. URA is proposing to conserve the
peripheral precincts in Syed Alwi Road, Rowell Road, Desker Road,
Lembu Road, Jalan Besar as conservation areas.
Millions of dollars of property values will be wiped out upon
conservation. Some of the property owners affected have been
granted planning approvals previously for more intensive
redevelopments. Such a conservation proposal cannot be
justified.
From the foregoing, it is timely for URA to revisit our
conservation objectives and review all the criteria e.g. economics,
social lifestyle and offer a fair and equitable conservation
approach or methodology going forward. Unless such issues and
problems which may cause great concerns to all are adequately
addressed in ongoing conservation processes, it will be
unreasonable to expect the public or any owner affected to support,
even if a building is highly deserving of protection and well
justified by the experts on specifics. {UNQUOTE}
