February 6, 2010 - Temasek Review
Reform Party urges PAP to embrace need for political
reform in Singapore
Written by Our Correspondent
In a press release posted on its website yesterday, the Reform
Party urges the ruling party PAP “not to be half-hearted or timid
about embracing the need for reform in Singapore.”
It claims that the PAP appear to have incorporated many of their
economic proposals in its new economic strategy unveiled by the
Economic Strategy Committee (ESC) lately and calls upon it to
follow by by adopting political reforms they have been
advocating.
These reforms were previously mooted by the late opposition
leader and founder of the Reform Party J.B. Jeyaretnam and includes
abolishing the GRC system, repealing the Newspaper and Printing
Presses Act and removing the draconian restrictions on freedom of
assembly and peaceful non-obstructive protest.
The ESC report bears uncanny similarities to some proposals put
forth by the Reform Party earlier such as reducing Singapore’s
over-reliance on foreign workers and boosting labor
productivity.
The Reform Party is currently led by Cambridge-educated
economist Kenneth Jeyaretnam.
The press release also highlight the progress made by the Reform
Party since its founding in 2008 by attracting credible candidates
into its fold:
“The Reform Party has effectively changed the mindset of
Singaporeans and demonstrated that the opposition can attract
high-calibre individuals, that the opposition can put forward
credible policies (so credible that the government has now adopted
many of them), and that the opposition can one day be entrusted
with the government of Singapore without adverse economic
repercussions.”
The Reform Party has been trying to reach out to Singaporeans
via a series of closed-door seminars with the latest one on
education being held two weeks ago.
It advocates a more pluralistic political landscape in the form
of a two-party ssystem for Singapore and is optimistic that it will
become a reality soon:
“……Singaporeans can perceive the current one-party dominance
giving way in the not too distant future to a genuine two-party
system with both parties alternating in power. This has happened in
much of the rest of Asia, in particular in Taiwan, South Korea,
Japan and Indonesia.”
Unfortunately, its call to the PAP to reform Singapore’s
political system is likely to fall on deaf ears.
Last year, Law Minister Shanmugam defended Singapore’s system as
one which “works” for the nation.
He also floated the idea of introducing “political education” in
Singapore schools to educate students on the different political
systems present in the world today so as to enable them to reach an
“informed” decision on the system which best “suits” Singapore.
Since coming to power in 1959, the PAP has brought all
institutions of the state under its control including the civil
service, media, police, grassroots organizations and trade
unions.
The incoming U.S. Ambassador to Singapore Mr Daniel Adelman told
the U.S. Senate earlier this week that he is aware of the fact that
Singapore is not a democracy and he will make use of “public
diplomacy to work towards greater press freedoms, greater freedom
of assembly and ultimately, more political space for opposition
parties in Singapore to strengthen Singapore into a multi-party
democracy.”
Read the Reform Party’s press release
here