“THE People’s Action Party (PAP) chairman Lim Boon Heng said on
Monday that a key issue that the party will fight the coming
election on is the kind of future Singaporeans want for themselves
and their children” - PAP will fight for Singaporens’
Future,Straits Times.
I was looking through the PAP candidates and the list goes
something like this – former Chief of Army, high flying civil
servants, NTUC leader, a few successful bankers…and a 27-year old
[Link](wife of a civil servant who is the Principal Private
Secretary for the PM). These are precisely the type of candidates
you would choose to preserve the status quo – people who will not
rock the boat. There was once a PAP candidate whom everyone thought
will bring great change to govt, Dr Vivian Balakrishnan. Remember
the Remaking Singapore Committee? The outcome of that tells us
there are just too many constraints to change the PAP from within.
Singaporeans are pragmatic people – if the PAP can deliver the
change they want, why go for the opposition? The PAP has had its
chance already and after all the remaking, people can see the
limitation to the rate of change and type of change the PAP is
willing to make.
Lim Boon Heng now says the PAP will fight for the future of
Singaporeans. Really? Lim Boon Heng was the labor chief when the
floodgates were opened to foreign labor.
Without major changes to our system, our future will simply look
like our past. The next 10 years will look like the past 10 years –
rising cost of living, widening income gap, stagnant wages and
continued deterioration of the quality of life in Singapore. In the
past 10 years the real median income grew by 1.6% per year
[Link]and a meager 0.3% in 2010 [Link]when the GDP growth was
14.5%. Income inequality measured by GINI grew to 0.452, the
highest among developed countries. Cost of housing and medical care
rose much faster than wages. There are many things not measured by
numbers – stress levels, pace of life, overcrowded (public
transport), job insecurity etc – that have deteriorated over
time.
The PAP had the last 4 years and the last 4 decades to set things
right. They had every opportunity to demonstrate to Singaporeans
that Singaporeans come first and their future is the highest
priority for the PAP govt. Opportunities they had and opportunities
they squandered away.
“If native Singaporeans are falling behind because the spurs are
not stuck into the hide, that is their problem ” – MM Lee
[Link]
Singapore workers clock the longest hours according to ILO’s
report[Link] and experience the 2nd highest stress levels in the
world[Link].
The one time I see the PAP leaders fighting very hard was when they
wanted to hike their world’s highest pay to even higher. The PAP
leaders fought against minimum wages, they fought against lowering
GST, they fought against putting Singapore first in employment,
they fought against suggestions to make pre-school education
compulsory which will benefit children from the low income group,
they fought against safety nets for the unemployed, old, sick and
poor, …over time they fought to restrict our democratic freedom
-our right to assemble, right to speak in public – they bankrupted
and jailed people without trial for wanting to bring about
democracy, justice and equality to our society.
Now they say they will fight for Singaporeans’ future which is very
quickly diminished by their policy to open the floodgates to
foreigners and convert them to citizens. This influx will result in
a tougher future for ordinary Singaporeans – more competition for
jobs, housing and cars, tougher for our children to get into good
schools and places in the universities. It will mean Singaporeans
struggling in the future unless something is done to bring about
change in Singapore.
.
Lucky Tan
.
* Lucky Tan is a popular Singaporean blogger who likes to “study
the thoughts of Singapore leaders and the laws of Singapore”. His
blog is located at http://singaporemind.blogspot.com.
