Mr Kenneth Jeyaretnam, the elder son of the late opposition leader Mr J.B. Jeyaretnam, joined the opposition Reform Party three weeks ago and has been co-opted into the party’s Central Executive Committee, according to the Straits Times.
The Reform Party (RP) was set up by the late Mr JB Jeyaretnam a few months before he died last September.
“The 50-year-old hedge fund manager was co-opted into the party’s 13-man central executive committee (CEC) a week later,” the Straits Times says.
Mr Jeyaretnam, who graduated from Cambridge with a double-first class honours degree in economics, had been working in London for several years. He returned to Singapore last year when his father took ill.
When contacted by The Online Citizen, the Reform Party’s chairman, Mr Ng Teck Siong, said Mr Jeyaretnam’s membership “will raise some interest among [the] public… that one of the sons of JBJ is joining us.” Mr Ng also hopes that with Mr Jeyaretnam’s presence in the RP, the legacy of Mr JBJ will carry on. “It will be alive,” Mr Ng said and added that the party’s aim is to carry on the legacy of Mr JBJ to “improve life in Singapore – politically and socially.”
“We have other people joining us,” Mr Ng says. “We hope more and more will join RP.” Asked about the next general election, he says the party will put up candidates to participate and that the party will work hard to get a good result.
Mr Jeyaretnam is married and has a 12-year old son.
TOC will bring you more at a later time.
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A final advice to Andrew Chuah,
we are all entiled to own opinion.
Yoiu can have your hero or idol so do others have theirs.
There is one thing we can gain from this discussion, is to speak objectively and be relevant. Labelling others is simply impolite.
and telling us that your bro is influential and victimizing you and that your parents were retired lecturer and businesswoman, are totally ir-relevant here !
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I think the policies of Singapore are generally more effective than many other Asean countries’.
But the parental governing style may not be the best way to bring us forward.
Think about the ban of selling PlayBoys and Penthouse magazines, does it stop us from reading in London or Paris airports ? :)
We’ve gotten a strategic advantage for the next 5-10 years, in the context of regional stability. if I may venture a guess
All the best to you Kenneth. Race has never been an issue in old singapore. People supported the first Chief Minister and President, and they were not chinese.
Until now, no opp party has campaigned on the platform of abolishing NS for a full professional army. There are many economic rationales for that. If the RP will take it up you have 1/2 of Singapore’s votes.
Kenneth – one of us wrote you a letter.
http://civicadvocator.net/kenneth-rally-your-supporters/
14/4/09
Good Morning-Andrew Veggie: I noted your latest posting (*101) and my objective writing my story is to tell you as a Singaporean, we continue to move forward despite the setbacks and injustices we have suffered in our lives (our forefathers survived with no help-handouts from first the British and now from the Government. I have also suffered injustice in Singapore courts ie I fought my Singapore bankers who lied in their swored affidavits, up to our Singapore Supreme Court and I lost, and also in 1995 during my NS, I was court martialed for AWOL and cut botak and sentence for 3weeks (I was a very senior banker with the Swiss Banking Corporation) and I did not appeal and went in and this was a very good experience. I have moved on and still struggling and this is life and Singapore (I don’t expect handouts from our Government and very against welfare and handouts-please read my postings on similar subjects onTOC).
Regards
Andrew Chuah
HI Angry_One-I noted your posting and I am very against the abolition of National Service and it must always be there since its implementation and will support your call for a full time Army (similar to the State of Israel who has both National Service and full time Armed Forces to be more correct). Let us look back, NS is a good thing and I had my fair share of good expericne especially in 1995 I was found guilty for AWOL and sentenced to 3months which I served (after being found guilty, I was hand cuffed and cut botak) and I have no regrets.
As Singaporeans especially local born, we must look beyond the box and put our Modern Singapore and its national interests above all things and always remind ourselves that we are similar to the State of Israel.
Regards
Andrew Chuah
the term “modern Singapore” is totally irrelant to teh subject here.
and Chuah must be a extremely lonely person, he likes to share his life time stoties here and again….
We are only interested about KJ and Singapore’s better future.
HELLO, please start a personal blogger to write your memoir.
Perhaps u can beat the viewership of Catherine Lim.
15/4/09
Hi Andrew Veggie-Good to hear from you. Singapore’s better future are in the hands of Singaporeans especially ordinary local born who are more than good enough to chart their own future and don’t need the Elites from the PAP and PAP Government of the day or Elites from the Singapore Opposition parties (the present 2.5MPs in our Parliament, are not Elites and are ordinary local born Singaporeans). Let us watch how Kenneth leads the Reform Party which has to be tested and I won’t be surprise majority will be Elites Singaporean Indians-I am not racists (expected)…..we cannot avoid Race in domestic Singapore
Regards
Andrew Chuah
{“fairplay” wrote on April 10th, 2009 1.32 pm #10: “Better still if his brother joins too. Then get Tan Kin Lian to join too. Then get Dr Wong Wee Nam to join too. Then we can expect more capable politically minded people will join RP. It will be interesting.”}
A SENSIBLE SUGGESTION
Hi “fairplay”, you talk sense. I like your idea—ya, get good, wise and capable people like Tan Kin Lian and Dr Wong Wee Nam to work and support Kenneth. Leave out his brother Philip for the time being. Let him be in the reserve force. For your information, Dr Wong Wee Nam is my good friend.
Over the years, I have been engaging and helping our ministers and even PM Lee as a good citizen. To their (and PM Lee’s) credit, they are good and sensible people too. The success of PM Lee, for example, was not just because he was personally capable. To PM Lee’s credit, he is open to good suggestions/inputs from others—-from people like me too. And he tries to be friendly and humble towards everyone. That’s why he has ended up being more popular than Goh Chok Tong. Even Dr Catherine Lim (Singapore’s most renown writer) wrote nice things about him vis-a-vis Goh Chok Tong (whom she is still fuming for threatening to destroy her some years ago for her courage to speak and write the truth about him).
On the other hand, Dr Chee Soon Juan was not so open to the good advice of others; he likes to do things trusting on his own cleverness, and ended up messing his political fortunes. So Kenneth Jeyaretnam has these two persons to learn from. I pray he will choose wisely if he wants to capitalise on the tremendous goodwill Singaporeans have for him, largely by virtue of their respect and fond memories of his dear father, the courageous and indomitable JBJ. Then Kenneth will be able to navigate the treacherous political waters in Singapore.
Lastly, his success will have to ultimately depend on God guiding him. So I sincerely hope Kenneth will not forget or reject my advice to him in my other post at: http://theonlinecitizen.com/2009/04/toc-interview-kenneth-jeyaretnam%e2%80%99s-debut/comment-page-1/#comment-62450 #48
Andrewe chuah
Pls drop the subject of elitism. This is Irrelevant to KJ’s joing Reform Party, let him proves or fail himself, but don’t demolish others if you don’t even know him well
You are actually racist, go see your earlier postings.
If you really have served NS, I think you could not adapt then, and even now with others races
You actually like to show off your past glories and self-boosted sufferings — it is pitiful to live in the past .
Your education did not help you to open up your mind before opening your mouth, hey, i am demolishing you now, feel pain ? this is similar to your attempt to label and tearing down others with unfounded names and description.
I will not write more, we have made enough distraction from the objective discussion. Only 3 last requests :
1) Stop sharing your memoir draft here, start a personal blog, seek a publisher to buy the draft
2) Use word adequately, the word “modern” ( i guess you mean versus ancient, ineffective ) Singapore means nothing to many of the subjects in TOC.
3) Form your own view, use your education, you are such a remarkable senior exec in the banking line with a social science degree, so use your creativity, rather than repeating what the government say, being a copycat do infringe on the IP law though :)
Racial card is only useful politicking for a coalition government as in KL, they divide and conquer the minority
Even PAP doesn’t play do that, if andrew claims that he is a true singaporean, pls drop that old thinking, this is no good for “modern” Singapore.
Kenneth, it is good to begin some lecturing or forum on your econ policies, but ready for heavy fire from the authority who is good to use statistics to their advantage