DEFINITION OF TRUE DEMOCRACY

last SG · 2004-09-06T21:30:40+00:00

Hello BadzMaro, Thanks for the suggestion. I am only giving my views as a citizen as encouraged by PM Lee so that if there are mistakes in the past they wil...

OH-FF SG

In fact, the above "Success stories" of the Government has inspired the private sector from evolving from its own autocracy and meritocracy system. No longer are jobs given to the inspired "Less-Certified" employees. Those without certification are left without other alternatives than MLM ?

People are not discouraged to form Opposition Parties, the cost is higher for these "Certified-personnel" to form Opposition party because the general public will shun them in the workforce. The democratic people wants to stand at the "Winning" side when the show is over. They didnt know what is "Winning"? of course it is not the people that wins, they feel the thrill of being on the side of the winning team. (qn: why have there been more Man.U soccer fans than 15 years ago?)

The current issues is that people are more trained to hold on to their Jobs than create jobs.

robertteh SG

How do we judge talents? By academic qualifications or performance? The PSC does not seem to understand performance and results and its responsibility to always recruit people who can deliver results not on assumptions about potential or presumed abilities.

Because PSC has failed to come up with such result-oriented criteria it has to keep talking about hiring the academically highest qualified people. No wonder the whole government is full of people who have failed in their jobs.

They put all kinds of scholars in SIA, PSA, LTA and EDB lacking in successful practical knowhow to create business or technology start-ups. No wonder Singapore is technologically falling behind many Asian countries like Korea and Taiwan because scholars simply do not know enough about successful technology start-ups but were placed in charge of the economy.

No wonder EDB has for years to tackle superficial problem of bond-breakers who even if they don't break bonds are just not good enough to create jobs or start new technology applications.

Without a competitive PSC, the whole civil service will continue to be run by ideas but not implementation abilities. That is why today our economy is still very conceptually managed and vulnerable and dependent on foreigners and lacking our own resilience.

It is not just the economy that is badly managed by ideas and concepts which failed to work. Work site accidents like the Hotel New World should have put taught the BCA and MND the whole lessen how to monitor and proactively run the safety programs. Despite all the parliamentary committees and white and blue papers and judges' decisions and the presumed overhauling of the planning and approval processes, today there are still the same kinds of shoddy work site accidents happening every now and again. LTA running of the MRT is full of pitfalls and hazards wasting taxpayers' monies in all kinds of extravagant expenditures. The whole transport and telecommunication as well as MND will need to be overhauled as there are not good and efficient people running the government.

Inefficient officers of LTA or JTC who failed to get investors to fill up the empty factories and spaces were simply transferred to other more appropriate department.

How much should such iron rice bowl civil servants be worth- US$2,000 pm or S$20,000 pm?

LTA and JTC can easily solve all the above-stated problems by manageable processes. See one model of accountable and transparent corporate governance as posted:

http://www.ospforohsopolite.blogspot.com

pikamaster SG

Twilight,

thx for your prompt reply.

1) Does Heaven change from era to era? Practical goals change, not the ideals which accompany the goals.

2) true. And the source code for laws is the Constitution.

3) That doesn't mean we don't need to change our political system. your statements here are even mroe irrelevant than the exampe eof NKF.

4) *Sigh*. We have progressed economically perhaps, but not in any other way, certainly from the way I see it. Give me your evidence of the "progress in leaps and bounds" which is NOT in the economic aspect.

5) When the opposition is disqualified from contesting or is sued for political defamation (a rather spurious form of litigation), do they choose to do so? Live in the real world, please.

6) It is undemocratic for the ruling party to hoard so much power for itself, especially since it has gone beyond the powers granted to it via the election process. For eg, it was granted the power to protect the people's security, not to spend time arresting people for cleverly-spun indeas of Marxist conspiracy like it did in the 1980s. For eg, It is granted the power to protect children from harmful web influences, not the power to attack websites for political defamation, or sue reputable magazines like the Economist for slander. We are asking the ruling party to give up the EXCESS powers it accumulated for itself over the years which exceeds the mandate given to it by the people, not ALL of its power, which I give to you would be unrealistic and undemocratic.

7) What is your definition of "loyal"? I suppose you consider me and Robert disloyal?

Regards,

the pikamaster

OH-FF SG

There's simply not Certificible to deny capable people the better jobs than giving them to Paper tigers who sit and collect salary and spout theories and theories.

Although paper tigers are very well verse in internal office politics, they are simply more costly to have than those which they leverage their work on. Oh and they say they can Outsource departments to lower their costs???

Then what shall these certified managers do ? Read reports after reports and look at the fabricated results ? As if they have not been fabricating those results in the past , now they will say their decision was based on the reports of the contractors. Completely shifting the responsibilty perception to the kind of intelligence they have.

They didnt realise that is is more costly to the people to have them there than to themselves.

TwilightZone SG

Dear Mr Pikamaster,

Heaven is an idealism created by man. Democracy is also an idealism created by man. Both are subjected to evolution over time.

The source code, i.e. the Constitution can also be dismantled by man.

I am saying you dont change for the sake of change if the ultimate result is the same or worse. Britain, as you said, has a more advanced democratic system than us, but this does not translate into the ideals which you envisioned, vis-à-vis us.

I believe you have visited countries or cities which started on the same platform as us and compare the socio and economic advancements over the years. I dare say that we are miles ahead of them. This is what I mean by leaps and bounds.

Individuals from the opposition parties were sued for defamations, not the parties. People who break the law must be prepared to face the consequences of the law. It is one of the democratic ideals. No one prevented the parties from contesting in the elections. As I said, they choose not to and they have the right to do so. This is very democratic.

The powers accorded the ruling party under the Constitution will be no different from those accorded to the oppositions if they win the elections. It is a level playing field and is also one of the ideals of democracy. It is undemocratic to ask the ruling party to give up powers either in part or in full.

I have absolutely no doubt that you are both loyal citizens. If parents stop nagging their children, or if spouses are nonchalant about each other, it simply means that they are no longer interested, concerned or care about them and have written them off their minds.

However during the nagging or chiding process they must not say things which are untrue or half-truths, or hurl personal attacks at them. This will result in a free-for-all and loss of rationality. They should focus on the issues, identify the problems and find solutions to them - together. Finally they should allow the right of reply and respect alternative views. Otherwise the end result will not be fruitful and will be undemocratic.

pikamaster SG

mr Twilight,

1) i see that you are a real secularist. Unlike you, I do not believe that heaven is an idealism created by man. In fact, I do not believe that man actually creates anything at all. Knowledge already exists; man only discovers knowledge, not makes knowledge. Thus, the amount of knowledge is finite, although it is such a large amount that we consider it infinite. It is there for us to seek, not for us to fabricate. Ideals are merely a subset of knowledge. Creativity is nothing except the discovery of linking knowledge between other pieces of knowledge previously discovered. As such, ideals do not evolve.

2) True, but that doesn't mean that there shouldn't be a Constitution or it shouldn't be amended in the first place. Anyway, I have the [academic] Permanent Law Act which will protect its existence and existence of crucial laws to the point that it shall be illegal and unconstitutional to render the paper or e-storage medium of the act non-existent.

3) I ask for change so that we can more closely reach the ideal, even more closely than Britain perhaps. And FYI, Britain has realized some of the ideal, albeit to a limited extent, but at least less limited than Singapore.

4) As I said, I agree that Singapore has progressed economically by leaps and bounds, but I question the assumption that we have made the same level of social progress. in fact, even MM admitted that much in a speech he made abt a quarter of a yr ago; he questioned how much racial and religious harmony had actually grown per se. Don't believe, check the Straits Times. Anyway, you haven't exactly given me examples of what social progress Singapore has made.

FYI, every major nation in the world was at some point, on the same platform as us, whether you are talking of Venice or Switzerland or Italy (Rome started out as a mere village, and it became the world's most glorious Empire), so that point is not really valid.

5) You obviously haven't gotten my point. Those oppo members who were disqualified from elections, did they choose to be disqualified? "People who break laws must face the consequences of breaking the laws" is a legalistic ideal, not a democratic ideal. In fact, teh democratic ideal allows for breaking of undemocratic laws. And anyway, the wording of the Defamation Act is decidedly vague. Why don't you read the text of the Act yourself?

6) At least you have gotten the definition of loyalty right.

7) The issue is that the ruling party has claimed more powers than was offered to them in the Constitution, or have circumvented the articles of the Constitution. Thus, Robert, me, and others like us, wish it to give up its excess powers, for eg the power to change constituency boundaries arbritarily ie. gerrymandering, which is decidedly undemocratic.

8 ) Attacks are in the eyes of the beholder. Wink That's merely an excuse for those who do not wish to accept personal criticism. And seriously, do you think our politicians do not equally deal in half-truths and untruths? Sometimes, feedback providers wonder if its really the govt who refuses to accept alternative views on its policy, claiming tt it knows best.

thx for your prompt reply.

cheers,
the (democratic) pikamaster

robertteh SG

7) The issue is that the ruling party has claimed more powers than was offered to them in the Constitution, or have circumvented the articles of the Constitution. Thus, Robert, me, and others like us, wish it to give up its excess powers, for eg the power to change constituency boundaries arbritarily ie. gerrymandering, which is decidedly undemocratic.

Precisely, a good government has the moral as well as legal duty to observe rule of law by desisting from using its interpretational or discretionary powers to bend rules to suit its own purpose. That kind of government is not only unconstitutional but destablises society and sets bad precedents for future political parties to do as they like !!!

TwilightZone SG

Dear Mr Pikamaster,

With due respects to your views, I am afraid that Heaven is a virtual image created in mans mind to appease his fear of mortality. Similarly democracy is a philosophy evolved by man to appease his desire for freedom, rights and equality. They are not linked to any real knowledge. They are both ideals and have been, and will be, subjected to evolution and interpretation over time and across all nations in a given period.

When a New Order comes into power, no one can guarantee that laws will not be changed by the people in charge to suit the day, for better or for worse. As I said if there is a will there is a way.

Singapore is not in such a dire state that we need to change for the sake of change. We are riding high in terms of wealth, standard of living, safety, freedom and equality, and respect for human rights, in the international arena. I do not deny that we have room for improvement. I believe that Singapore has adopted a continuous approach in all the things it does and has been urging its citizens to strive for excellence on the world stage. I also believe that Britain and many other countries have as much to learn from us as we from them.

The fact that all the things enshrined in our National Pledge are realized over the past 40 years of nationhood is evidence that we have made tremendous progress for such a young nation. Many countries in the world including the most advance democratic countries in the world are still struggling to achieve some of them.

The point of time is 1965. I do not wish to name the cities or countries for comparison as it will be impolite to do so. But I think you know which countries I am referring to.

The opposition can always nominate other members of their parties to run for elections. They are not stopped from doing so. They choose not to. And as I said, they have the rights, and this is democratic.

As to whether politicians deal in truths and half-truths, they have been settled by the courts in full view of the world. Ambiguities in the laws have always been resolved in the courts throughout the democratic world and we are no different. This is again democracy at work.

I dont think the Constitution say that constituency boundaries cannot be changed. So there is nothing to circumvent. Whatever boundaries drawn, it is still a level playing field. All political parties have the rights to contest. If they are credible and worthy of leadership roles they will be elected notwithstanding the boundaries.

Members of the government have always back up what they say with facts and figures, and refrained from defamatory remarks. The Opposition members have much to learn from them. They should try and move away from rhetoric and gain respect and trust from the populace with more rationality and dignity to improve their chances to get into parliament. As in boxing, the boxer who swings his arms and fists wildly against the opponent in the ring will invariably be flattened out by a TKO.

Finally, if the government thinks that it knows best, it will not establish the Feedback Unit and organize Parliamentarians to obtain feedback for their policies. I believe that it is sincere in seeking alternative views provided that they are properly cooked and presented, and not contaminated with grime and dirt, and served in a rubbish bin.

Thank you.

dryver SG

exactly. but we are hiding here in this dumb forum whispering amongst ourselves. Laughing

robertteh SG

LETTER TO : Editor Today Newspaper, (via email)

Dear Editor,

WHAT CHANCE DO WE HAVE TO GROW A CIVIL SOCIETY?

Your correspondent Mr. Siew Kum Hong in his report: Turning Point for Singapore civil society or a one-off? as published in Today on 3.8.2005 has raised a pertinent and timely question: whether the recent spontaneous reactions of the public as demonstrated in the NKFs episode reflected a sign of our growing maturity of civil society. The corollary is: have Singaporeans attained a level of maturity to act responsibly and peacefully to demand changes collectively to any erroneous government policies or actions to survive as a people.

It would appear that the NKF episode was a chance occurrence of people expressing their spontaneous pent-up feelings against a public organization reflecting governments own past policy errors. Despite PM Lees liberalizing of the government feedbacks processes, Singapore remains tightly controlled by all forms of discretionary arbitrary administrative and legal powers acquired over the years to counter perceived threats to society past uncertain political conditions ranging from denial of accuseds rights of access to counsel during custody to states power of detention of persons without trial for presumptuous security threats under ISA to the issue of impartiality of a state-appointed and controlled judiciary.

The pertinent issue to be answered is: do we still need the same paternalistic past controls of our society given todays more educated citizenry better able to take care of their own conduct and behavior. Do we need to continue to vest such huge and overbearing powers over to the state to survive and create a more entrepreneurial and vibrant society? Can we grow our own active citizenry to play an integral role in nation building? Do we need to re-examine the whole social, cultural and political spheres including revamping our current constitutions to give clearly established rights and more equitable rights to individuals to motivate them to contribute to our future success. My conclusion is that unless the state is benign to give up some of its powers presently constraining the growth of active citizenry, nothing will ever change and we will be forever be a grumbling people beholden to state for subsistence for many more years to come.

pikamaster SG

Robert,

What does maturity of the population have to do with govt restrictions?

the confused pikamaster

P.S.: Ref. ur letter to TODAY today

robertteh SG

quote]Originally posted by pikamaster:

We need a large pool of people actively engaged in deliberating over or debating and evaluating government policies and actions affecting our lives and works or making suggestions or feedbacks on alternatives to check on the government actions.

Such active citizens will be our standard bearer or goal keepers serving as a ultimate check on excessive policies like over-paying of our leaders or over-zealous building of surpluses or reserves to stalemate the economy.

At the least they can serve as a check on abuses, uphold justice and equity or accountability or transparency as demonstrated in the NKF episode.

From necdotal evidences I don't see we have a large number of active citizens regularly speaking up and giving views and opinions on matters of economic, social or political concerns or taking part in political process or renewal.

I only see that people generally being more concerned with their own immediate livelihood or material possessions or economic matters. We are simply a fragile society.

Rummel's Law, states that a government is more likely to murder its people offering the least resistance to its policies or doings.

Furthermore, over the last 40 years, we have a government which has instituted many laws and regulations which in name were intended to deal with perceived threats to society but over time have turned against the people in terms of restricting curbing their freedoms of speech, choices and business entrepreneurship and stifled the growth of our active citizens, vibrancy and maturity?

I do not see any immediate freeing up of the state-controlled press or abadonment of truculence in demolishing political participants through defamation suits. Yet many people have taken their losses of freedoms for granted preferring to see no evil hear no evil. This state of our populace sad to say will lead ultimately to greater abuse and our eventual decline.

Do we need overwhelming primitive controls and restrictions over the entire populations just to prevent insignificant assumed past threats of communism or control certain miscreants. The fundamentals of all these excessive controls and powers of government is anti-progress and anti-entrepreneurship.

The government has to reexamine all the major legislations and even our constitution if we are to remake the nation to a more competitive inclusive cosmopolitan society. It does not amke sense to deny change of policies on the flimsy ground that some of them are good policies without elaboration. A stand has to be taken to define what has worked well and what not to keep. The more educated people today surely have the right to know which are good and which are not good to keep. Only our first-generation cannot see the fine differentiation.

That is the primary cause of our state of restrictions and controls imposed on the people as stated in the Ruumel's law.

Beyond a certain point many seemingly good policy like meritocracy only produces only diminishing returns and not only created a divided but neglected giving rightful opportunity to augment the growth of a entrepreneurial society based on broad-based education and mass participation needed to produce technological knowledge applications. There are many evidences of lack of maturity of our civil society..

The look-good leadership and meritocracy policies in the final analysis had ended up in self-serving quanxi and egotism. The safer bet is to grow and cultivate large number of active citizens who will form the backbone to assure good corporate governance the key to success of our future government.

Active citizens will not only safeguard our democratic framework and prccesses they will provide collective leadership to guide all to work together each in his or her own way according to his or her abilities. For now we are handicapped by a lack of civil society. There is a great urgency to nurture greater social cultural and political maturity among the general population starting from young to mould such an active citizenry.

http://www.managefranchise.blogspot.com

TwilightZone SG

[qDespite PM Lees liberalizing of the government feedbacks processes, Singapore remains tightly controlled by all forms of discretionary arbitrary administrative and legal powers acquired over the years to counter perceived threats to society past uncertain political conditions ranging from denial of accuseds rights of access to counsel during custody to states power of detention of persons without trial for presumptuous security threats under ISA to the issue of impartiality of a state-appointed and controlled judiciary.
uote][b]

Are racial riots experienced in the past, and extreme terrorisms experienced over the last few years and up till today, percieved threats?

Didnt the US and UK detain suspects without trial, too? An innocent suspected unarmed bomber was even summarily executed in public in the UK just a few weeks ago.

Ultimately we have to consider the rights of the majority of the people of the nation to live in peace without being terrorise by a few who abuse their human rights under the guise of their political beliefs.

[/b][/quote]

robertteh SG

There is no disagreement that any country would need certain effective laws to deal with its particular problems.

In our case, we have passed too many harsh laws in the past eras of communism, communalism etc presumably to deal with certain threats. We keep up dead sentences to deter serious crimes and hard-core criminals to ensure peace and harmony.

However, after the collapse of communism 20 years ago our government still keep retaining the same harsh laws by giving justification after justification to persist in detaining potential criminal or persona non-grata in the same presumptuous manner without regard justice and equity or relevance of changing time and circumstance.

The relevance of older laws giving discretionary power to government officers to detain persons without proper trial such as the ISA regulations should be properly and objectively evaluated based on facts and figures.

So far, no facts or figures have been given to show why 20 yeara after collapse of communism we still need to give such overwhelming powers to the state. In addition, the state has overwhelming power over indiviudal including using of the "guilty till proven innocent" criminal procedures to deal with crimes.

Yet containment of crimes should have been more objective and holistically based on multi-pronged approaches and not just by sheer discretionary powers liable to be abused beyond the control of the leaders.

We may have many cases sad to say of likelihood of depriving individuals of just and fair trials based on objective professional and detached accountable and transparent processes.

Recent international terrorism to a great extent cannot be solved purely by harsh laws alone. Even if we should have all the ISA to allow the state to use the guilty-till-proven-innocent criminal trial procedures are we getting wiser in handling the guilty or protecting the innocent citizens from potential misuse or mis-application of such laws for private veageance or personal vendetta.

We will still be unable to build a better society despite all the ISA as crimes are not that straightforward easily controlled or prevented by harsh arrests or detentions alone.

Given such facts regarding the nature of threats and how government can be more objective in tackling them in more just and equitable manner, Singapore should not be forever held hostage by government's use of scare tactics such as international terrorims as another lame excuse to perpetuate rough-shod controls over the individuals.

If ISA has been necessary in the past it has been necessary in the past and let bygone be bygone. There is no need to keep to the egoistic mentality and refuse to change. A good corporate governance code should be implmented to avoid abuses. Statistics would amply show that it is wrong to continue to use a sledge hammer to swat a fly.

Terrorism cannot be effectively controlled even if we have double the ISA regulations. In a new age, government should be more open and objective to look at crimes and threats and not resort to usurping powers of any kinds and use those powers to contain all the problems which could easily be solved in simpler and more effective ways.

Many solutions to crimes could have been more effective if we maintain multi-pronged approaches aimed at tackling the problems at the root not be catching criminals alone and punish them excessively or unfairly and making innocent suffer just to frighten the monkeys.

We need holistic and practical racial harmony actions among the citizens. More harsh laws do not necessarily create efficiency in preventing crimes or mischiefs. In fact over-harsh laws might lead to the reverse with people feeling unjustly treated by uncaring civil servants who only wanted to take credits and show results to their political masters. There can be insidious abuses of many kinds behind each form of discretionary power without the government control or knowledge. Usually when such cases of abuses happened, it will lead to scandals and government refusing to be exposed for scandals.

There is now a crucial need to evaluate continuing existence of harsh laws like ISA or guilty-till-proven-innocent criminal procedures. Such potential abuses will ultimately pose greater concern and become larger threat to society than the few criminals or terrorists uncaught.

The guilty-till-proven-innocent criminal procedures" and together with all the presumptuous regulations need to be reexamined. The frequent resort to defamation lawsuit to prosecute political participants should pose a greater problem to the citizens than a few incidents of street unrests. In fact some street demonstrations might be good for society as otherwise problems of abuse might persist like the NKF case till they become a time-bomb leading to widespread unrest and even bloody revolution. Citizens should no longer be indoctrinated by all kinds of justifications to give more powers to the government if we want to progress to be a more inclusive and cosmopolitan society as pledged by PM Lee in his inauguration speech.

There has been use of overwhelming state powers over the individuals in the past for maintaining laws and orders. Can the government say with conscience that such poweres have not been abused or extended for political control purposes and perpetuation of autocratic one-party rule.

If Singapore's harsh ISA regulations should be maintained as of old because of terrorism it does not sound very convincing now because of the lack of objective evaluations to provide rationale for continuing use of such laws after collapse of communism 20 years ago.

On the other hand, if PM Lee genuinely wanted to build an inclusive society, he needs to understand that laws and orders and ease of governance or prosecution effectiveness is only one aspect of government. Clearly he does not want his men of government to abuse powers or stifle the growth of civil society, entrepreneurship to build a more competitive and vibrant society participated by the masses.

Our harsh ISA regulations might have been copied by a number of countries to tackle particular needs but that does not mean that anyone should tongue-in-cheek conclude that those governments will use ISA ad nausem on ordinary citizens at the slightest suspicion.

In our case, for a long time since the collapse of communism 20 years ago our government knowing the likelihood of abuse of discretionary powers had continued unreasonably to persist in using ISA even to control presumed marxist preachers.

Let there be honesty and integrity in all aspects of government and in determining whether we are still under the same kinds of threats that justify such harsh laws to build our so-called cosmopolitan society. As citizens all would want to live their lives without all the kinds of suspicions hanging over them because of potential abuses by men.

http://www.easymanager.blogspot.com

robertteh SG

The Channel New Asia's headline today reads: "SPH makes fresh request for access to detained journalist"

It is ironic that SPH is now raising issues with justice or of accountability and transparency over detention of without trial.

I just wonder whether SPH will ever take an objective stand over the NKF case had the wrongs had been exposed by some citizen whistle blowers unconnected with its defamation lawsuits against its own journalists.

Now I wish SPH will become more objective in reporting on justice, accountability and transparency and not just where its own interest is at stake. Perhaps, a time has come to for our leading newspaper to act and report in the national interest covering news objectively without serving the establishment's preferred objectives. Finally a newspaper should grow up and be unafraid in news reporting particularly on accountable and transparency of government.

OH-FF SG

I find that having moved into the Knowledge age,

Our basic Singapore leaders management and education system are still stuck in the industrial age of management. The micro-management type.

Very soon the rest of the countrys which have less rigid policies and more free opportunities of development will over-run us in "Talents"

Don't blame the people of Singapore, they havent the means to outgrow the "cans" of Education and the employment system.

pikamaster SG

TwilightZone,

1) As I told you in my last post, it is nonsensical to believe that knowledge is created. It exists, and is found or discovered. In such a sense, even imagination is based on knowledge. The knowledge of the existence of freedom, rights , equality and mortality is knowledge in itself, so you essentially contradict yourself when you say that democracy and Heaven are not based on any real knowledge. Try and drop your secularist inclination; It may let you be more objective.

2) true.

3) Wealth, Standard of Living, Safety, yes. Freedom, Equality, respect for human rights, no. Even the UN criticized us as late as 1992 on those issues. the US State Dept, Amnesty International, and a whole host of other orgs act in the same way. Even the OECD and the World-Bank rated us low in these areas. Continuous? I might say it's more chaotic, and in certain senses, such as in Freedom of Association, stagnant.

4) i urge you to seriously reconsider.

5) Again you skirt the question, *sigh*.

6) the USSR and Nazi Germany used courts too, u know? Even the Qing Dynasty did! Were these three states Democratic?

7) Hmm... I think i probably misused the word "circumvent" here, but I can't think of the more proper alternative. But go and check the definition of "gerrymandering" in the dictionary, and see if that results in the creation of a level playing field.

Cool Figures, yes. Facts? Depending on your criteria. To tell the truth, ministers' speeches are filled with as much rhetoric as they are filled with facts, and a significant amount of this rhetoric could be considered rather defamatory too, depending on which perspective you are looking at. For example, the Minister of Education calling students "soft" is defamatory from the student's perspective, as are the various insults the government routinely hurls at Amnesty International or Freedom House. To me, even the Steve Chia saga is a defamatory attempt, since personal affairs should never be brought into the public realm.

9) *Sigh*. I guess one chooses what one wishes to believe. The Feedback Unit can be compared to kangaroo courts, just nearly like the recent IR debate. Send in feedback, you get an extremely furtive answer, one that goes round in circles. Last year, that was precisely what a host of pple wrote to the Straits Times complaining about. The worst kind of reply is the kind that simply paraphrases your qn. another kind is where the authorities assume that the people giving the feedback are absolute idiots and merely regurgitate what has already been said in newspapers or on tv, or on their website. The msot irritating reply is "we will look into it", after which silence becomes the answer. The Feedback Unit, like the ballot box, is merely a front of democracy and inclusiveness which the government puts up. And ya, I speak this with requisite experience.

And anyway, I am skeptical of the phrase "properly cooked and presented". What does it mean? Does it mean "make sure that it at least prasises us [the govt] a little bit"?

10) ur welcome.

Regards,
the pikamaster

P.S.: Sorry for the late reply. had to write out this reply properly first.

TwilightZone SG

Dear Pikamaster,

I did not say that knowledge is created. I said that Heaven and Democracy are not based on knowledge. Anyway, as I said, I respect your views on this issue.

Considering the human rights records of the so-called advanced democracies of the world like the US and UK, I am of the opinion that we are way ahead of them. Their organizations have a standard operating practice of diverting the worlds attention away from their own human rights abuses against the peoples of other countries and even their own citizens, especially the colored ones. Our human rights records in this respect have been second to none in the world. Our government has never discriminated against any race, language or religion with equal rights extended to one and all.

I must emphasize that Freedom or Civil liberty does not give one the right to deny or compromise the rights of the majority to live in peace and harmony by creating social unrest or terrorism.

I believe that the USSR, Nazi Germany, and Qing Dynasty have their own way of dealing with ambiguities of their laws too. Whilst we talk about democracy, we must also acknowledge that each and every nation on earth have democratic rights to choose their own political systems or variations of them too.

All aggrieved parties have the right to sue if they are wronged. Nobody prevented them from doing so. Again, it is also their right if they choose not to. This is what I mean by freedom and level playing field.

I agree with you that the authorities need refinement in processing feedback. But I also understand that they need to sieve out rhetoric and fiction, and to deliberate and analyze each suggestion before deciding on acceptance or rejection. As such, the people who presented their feedback also need to refine their presentations by doing their homework and putting forth their views in a rationale and objective manner. Working together is more productive than working against each other.

A spoilt child will usually throw tantrums, pull his hair, and kick his legs in the air to get what he wants. The child knows that his requests and views are too unreasonable and onerous to gain acceptance and the only way is to create a scene. Even if his requests and views are reasonable, this primitive form of communication will not find an open ear amongst the authorities or sympathy amongst the masses in Singapore anymore. Also repeating old issues over and over again will tire out the impatient ears of the public.

Please remember that our government is democratically elected. The people have the right and power to remove them if they did not perform. The results have been excellent so far and that is the only reason they are elected time and again with landslides wins. The ideals of democracy are right here in Singapore because it produces excellent results over the past 40 years, politically, economically and socially. Others who are jealous of our achievements tried to run us down and our own citizens must not be taken in by them, especially when they have not much to show in terms of democratic ideals themselves.

Thank you and have a nice day.

pikamaster SG

Twilight,

0) I am trying my best here to be cool, and this is because you are beginning to sound badly like the Feedback Unit. (read my last post if u don't understand the implications of this statement. The button at the bottom of the page says "new reply", not "new thread"; when you reply, you are supposed to be engaging a person on the points s/he has made before, not steer into another line of conversation altogether, or worse, continue on your previous track w/o any indication that you have even noted what the other person said. THAT shows absolutely no respect for the other person's views. I don't mind being disagreed with, but at least I want engagement on the points I brought up. That, you ahve woefully failed to do.

Nevertheless, I shall try to respond in the most accurate and most polite way I can:-

1) It's not about views, it's about facts. Unless of course you do not consider imagination knowledge, which would mean that you treat every great novel in history as trash.

2) You are being extremely naive here, if not arrogant. We are not "second to none" in the world for HR records. Laughably, we are actually ranked far below those "so-called advanced democracies" in this aspect. Wherefore do you get your statistics from? Our government may not have discriminated against any race, language or religion (or at least appeared not to), but it has discriminated according to ideology; Notice how many times in recent years local liberals and rights activists have been slammed in public by the government, and purely because of their political leanings, and not because of what they actually do, in case you have managed to imagine up a situation of clandestine riots. And anyway, for the record, Falun Gong and Jehovah's witnesses are banned, does this not count as discrimination against certain religions? And anyway, HR does not just include the issue of such discrimination. it includes stuff like the Death Penalty (which is registered in an attached Protocol) , right to freedom of assembly and association, including independent student and trade unions, which we ostensibly don't have, freedom of collective bargaining, freedom of the press, which we lack even more than the USA, freedom of speech and expression, which the MDA and laws such as the Films Act sorely restrict. HR also includes teh right to privacy, which our government has never recognized, giving police the power to storm houses. Oh ya, not mention the right to fair trial, which is bypassed in the case of detention w/o trial conferred upon security agencies such as the ISD and the Police. So, are we really second to none in the world for maintaining HR? [HR = Human Rights] I've given you the evidence, you decide.

3) Just what is social unrest? Riots are social unrest, yes, but not street protests, unlike what our myopic Minister for Foreign Affairs thinks. And like I said earlier, the minority must not impose views on the majority, but neither does the majority have the right to repress the minority. Besides, apart from race, language or religion, the population would be divided into several minorities since political attitudes lie on a spectrum.

4) Remember, Stalin and the Qing Dynasty, and to a large extent Hitler, forced their systems on the populations. Do not have the illusion that the peoples of Germany, China, and Russia respectively had the democratic right to choose the style of goverment they wanted.

5) I am utterly confounded. Why would there be fiction in feedback? rhetoric maybe, but not fiction surely. The authorities don't just need refinement in how to process feedback; they need to know what it actually means to process feedback. And here's an excellent example of your ignorance of what i posted earlier. I gave you very clearly a description of the nature of teh feedback system, and you ahve not even made a reference to that description, either concurring with it, or attempting to repudiate it. Instead, you ahve merely repeated your previous line of argument. What kind of a debate/discussion/conversation is this?

6) Laughably, it is the public who are resurrecting the same issues over and over again, so your point is? And besides, this paragraph is the most insulting of all! Are all feedback-givers, in your opinion, tantrum-throwing children? I used to read the feedback posted on the old site of the Feedback Unit, and I have to say that the feedback was much less tantrum-throwing than the government's replies. If you are authoritarian, admit it: Don't try poisoning the well and derogating liberal activists with meaningless and inaccurate labels. That won't work.

7) The last paragraph was the most insulting; this is the most irritating. You did not even bother to engage the points on electioneering advantages, gerrrymandering and walkovers. you simply resumed your previous line again.

What kind of political results are you referring to? frequent landslide victories for the Ruling Party? Sorry to burst your bubble, but that does not count as an "excellent result". You have woefully eliminated political results such as defamation suits and Operations Coldstore and Spectrum, as well as the banning of the UN Special Rapporteur from investigating Singapore in teh 1990s.

Excellent economic results, yes. But economy isn't everything.

Excellent Social results? the pursuit fo 5 Cs counts as excellent? And you once again failed to engage me on the point I raised about LKY admitting that racial and religious harmony as a goal was still not attained yet. And that is a fact by the way; it was the headline of the Straits Times and the New Paper earlier this year.

Groups like Freedom House, Amnesty International the UN, the Far East Economic Review, the Economist are not jealous of our achievements; they acknowledge them, but recognize that economic achievements are not everything. There is no reason for the US and UK to be jealous of us; they are economic powers on their own. And besides, AI, FH, RSF, FEER and Economist are not governments, so they are on a different path; there is no conflict of interest in these groups that could give rise to jealousy.

Perhaps it is time Singapore [Government] was a little less arrogant.

regards,
the (slightly annoyed) pikamaster

robertteh SG

TwilightZone,

You might have missed the points posted here in this thread. People have experienced many problems including the 20 problems with autocracy and are now making suggestions to the government to change their past policies to keep up with changing time and circumstances.

I notice from your replies to Pikamaster, a young school boy that you are here to defend the establishment's past policies some of which were clearly the root cause of the 20 problems as given in my previous replies to your status-quo views as posted in this thread.

May I recap the suggestions made at the beginning of this thread and various views by Pikamaster to make certain timely and pertinent changes to shortcomings for which the government has so far refused to acknowledge:-

Here are the 7 points of democracy framework suggested to assure citizens of accountable and transparent government:-

(1) One Man One Vote, or one Man two votes (one for constitutuency representation and one for election of 20 percents receiving the highest votes among unsuccessful candidates to act as shadow cabinet or checks and balances on actions of party in power)

(2) Non prosecution of any citizen for standing for election or any manner of political participation.

(3) Enshrine the Basic rights of citizens in the constitution.

(4) Uphold the fundamental principle of Rule of law, fairness and equity and right to stand for election and other constitutional rights of citizens.

(5) Establish a low-cost independent sub-court open to observers from UN agencies to oversee election process and political participation by citizens.

e.g. To look into amendment of election process and giving out of pre-election goodies etc.

(6) Establish powers and procedures for Investigation and adjudication by an idependent sub-court of reported conflict of interests

e.g. To look into validity of elected representatives' paying themselves the highest salaries equated to the best-paid employees or boss-categories of person in private sector and self-evaluation, self-recommendations and self-approval of their own salaries and benefits in parliament.

(7) Non prosecution of political opponents

(e.g. Speeches made during the 60-day pre-election campaigning should be protected agasint politically motivated prosecution or subject to interpretations and oversight except by independent sub-court established under the constitution)

I don't see why the government cannot accept or acknowledge the many shortcomings revealed in all the fiascos as reported from corruptions at high places to lack of accountability and transparency with regard to fee increases etc. I don't see why being paid the world's highest salaries they cannot acccept responsibility for failures and take people's suggestions or criticism objectively. It is counter-productive to persist in defending the status quo policies as elaborated in the 7 points. It is against the tide of people expectations to continue with such defensiveness as NKF has been doing but finally debunk by the people.

To view a model of accountable corporate governance: view:

http://www.ospforohsopolite.blogspot.com

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