Extract from Kent Ridge Common
SINGAPORE - One MP got punched and was subsequently set on fire in an unfortunate incident. Another received threats of a physical assault by phone. Recently, a 17-year-old was arrested for hurling a chair at the glass door of an MP office.
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It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that people who need help from their MP are already at their last vestige of desperation. Obviously, a person who has been doing grassroots work and administering to such people for a long time would be able to cope with such desperate souls. An attitude of wanting to help the downtrodden ones is a definite must-have.
What does the political culture of the ruling PAP have to do with this? Senior Minister Mr Goh Chok Tong admitted that the purpose of the Group Representation Constituency (GRC) is to serve as a platform to bring top talents who are potential ministerial material into the government.
They also contribute to Singapore’s political stability, by ‘helping us to recruit younger and capable candidates with the potential to become ministers. - The Straits Times, in an interview with Mr Goh
And Mr Goh further added that such candidates wanted the guarantee of winning their first election if they were to make their first foray into politics.
“Without some assurance of a good chance of winning at least their first election, many able and successful young Singaporeans may not risk their careers to join politics.”
- Mr Goh, in the aforementioned interview
Read the full article here.
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Aiya, what hazard? These incidents are isolated. You face more hazards when you cross the road everyday!
And also just once a week for a few hours only what. Whether these MPs can help the people or not is also not an issue because they won’t lose their job. They are assured of a 200K plus allowance for at least a few years!
Why? Because Gahmen won’t hold by election one, even if an MP dies, unlike in Malaysia.
The MP will only lose the job if he is convicted of a crime exceeding 2K fine or jail. Or if he got terminal illness or being killed.
So you tell me, be PAP MP good or not? I don’t mind doing it for a quarter of what they are getting. But too bad lah, I don’t qualify because I am not elite as my current pay is low.
Q: what went wrong?
A: that politics is about winning.
the means of getting “top” talent does not justify the ends of selecting the right candidates. the plot is lost.
I have been to one of these Meet The Peoples Sessions a couple of months back to speak to my MP about some beauracratic loopholes and challenges that I was facing with regards to my flat. I didnt have to do this, technically, as I had already emailed this MP about my concerns, but after a month or so of waiting for a reply and or at least an acknowledgement, which didnt come, I had no choice but to make my way to the MPS to follow up on my email.
Some observations:-
- upon arriving at the MPS venue, i was greeted quite abruptly and uncouthly by several men whose first response was “IC Please”. I gave my IC to one of the men, presumably a grassroots volunteer, who copied down my particulars, and then asked me to sit together with the dozen or so other people who were waiting to see the MP. This was at 7.30pm, the designated time that was stated. Most of the people who were waiting were elderly folk.
- the grassroots volunteers that were at the “reception” all had bad breath from cigarettes.
- the grassroots volunteers would then proceed to call you by name to go into a waiting area inside (airconditioned), where they proceeded to ask you questions like: where you live, what you do, the number of rooms in your flat, your monthly income, and subsequently, what you were there for.
- i dutifully gave them my particulars and the reason for my attending the MPS. the volunteer then wrote everything down in the form (even though I had volunteered to write it for him). thereafter, he told me to wait.
- about an hour later, i was called into another room, where a more eloquent man (presumably another volunteer) asked me again for the purpose of wanting to meet the MP. After telling him my reasons, he proceeded to write into another form (a report style format), the reasons, this time, almost verbatim, and at times, asking me questions as to, why i didnt approach the relevant authorities directly (already done that, didnt work) and why even though I had written to the MP, i still wanted to see the MP (cos I didnt get a response, that’s why!). I had already showed him the email I sent to the MP in question, which provided all the background to what he was asking me, which would have probably saved him that half hour of questioning me, and writing all those details down.
- AFter doing all that, he said ok. Please show this letter and his duly filled report to the MP when it’s time for me to meet him.
- Waiting for another 45 minutes, I saw many many elderly folks being interrogated condescendingly, harshly and impatiently by these volunteers. They seemed to be going thru their motions, as obviously, many of these folks are familiar to them and have come to see their MP not for the first time. An old man had come with his Singapore Power bill to enquire on why that month’s bill was so high (this was during the period when electricity tarriffs had shot up by 35%). The volunteer who was attending to him was shouting at him to say that it’s probably cos he left some of his appliances on, blah blah blah. No attempt was made to even try to explain in any civil manner or to answer him in a constructive manner.
- Anyways, when it finally came to my turn to see the MP, I passed him the report from that eloquent volunteer, plus my email that I had sent to the MP. MP reads my email and says to me. “Oh I remember this email. I have already forwarded it to the relevant agency with my recommendation!”, he proudly declared.
Oh my goodness. I could have saved 2 hours of my life if I had only received some sort of acknowledgement from this MP! Anyways, I asked him thereafter what would the next step be. MP says, “you wait for the agency (i wont say which) to revert to you. If they reject the request even after my recommendation, then you write to me again. You dont have to come and see me personally.”
Ok. End of story. That “consultation ” with this MP took about 5 minutes. The wait and the process from registering to giving answers to those two volunteers took 2 hours.
I think something seriously needs to be done about the way these MPS are being conducted.
Yes, I have the same treatment as what “beware” mentioned.
It’s humiliating, and testing of your patience if you want to see your MP.
No wonder some many cases about the MPs.
I think the RC members attitude MUST change.
#3
“I think something seriously needs to be done about the way these MPS are being conducted”
Alamak, they purposely design the process this way mah, don’t you get it?
This is so that people will be discouraged from seeing their MPs after all these become known.
These MPs and their volunteers go through the motion one. After all at elections, they have a 50% chance of getting a walkover, 66% chance of winning and 98% chance of being majority in Parliament.
So why need to make things easy for you to see them for help?
Quiz: When is throwing a chair a seizable offense, but punching or hurting someone is not????
Answer: When you throw the chair at a PAP MP.
MSM always write articles about events that show why or how singaporeans behave…examples recently they sent reporters on mrt to purposely cough and sneeze to see how other passenger react to the recent H1N1 episode…
they did it also during christmas period to see how people in the Hotel service line react to “unreasonable” reporters who masquerade as customers..
Wondered why they don’t do it here to see how Meet-the-people session is really like…
is there an occupation without a hazard? what more of those who work in high risk industries that face the possibility of loosing life on a daily basis with a modest salary?
A similar point is echoed at Today Online.