I’m not just talking about Wee Kiak’s poor pronunciation and Chinese accent, but how he carries himself. Sylvia is more composed and dignified, and even when Wee Kiak is hogging the airtime, she manages to communicate her disdain and incredulity through her eyes and facial expression.

In contrast, when Sylvia speaks, Wee Kiak looks more like a school student, his eyes darting about in their sockets as he tries to parse her words and compose a reply. He comes across as being overexcited and doesn’t seem to be conscious of how he looks on camera, in contrast to Sylvia who deliberately controls her expression and movement.

The opposition should not aim to become like the PAP but to present itself as an attractive alternative that could fulfil in meeting needs where the ruling party can’t.

Slyvia Lim is a talent in her own right who is different from most new generation PAP MPs. I believe she would go far if she treads carefully, draft a workable strategy and get more to join her slate in the coming elections.

is it a pap ploy or reverse psychology? make u think no difference, must as well choose the ‘authentic’ one. like dat forever no strong oppositions lah.

get them in, when there’s a critical mass, they will be strong

I understand & totally agree with u. This Lim chap, honest & decent as he is – is not cut for politics. Its one thing to claim yourself to be self-sacrificing etc and another for people to believe you to be self-sacrificing etc. And I reckon what all those claims of self-aggrandizement do are to legitimize PAP’s authority. Their statements r not really about ‘renewal’ or ‘attracting people to join politics’ as much as staying in power.

Sylvia Lim, if she is elected into parliament, will cause PAP to lose 5 seats (since she will most likely contest in a GRC). That will be a big blow to the credibility and capability of PAP, not other opposition. In fact, it will help opposition cause since once a precedent is set, the idea of voting in opposition in GRC will take shape.

Individual opposition parties must not think they can go at it alone. No one in their right mind would think they alone can take on PAP.

We will need all kinds of opposition MPs, the noisy ones as well as the quiet ones. Even the strongest opposition supporters know that not all laws or ideas from PAP are to be opposed. Only those that do not serve the nation and the citizens.

Personally, I’m comfortable with WP and SPP’s current performance as they focus more on grassroots activities, the critical factor in getting votes to be in parliament. They recognised their miniscule number of MPs will have negligible impact to the government and they do what they can.

What we need to do, if we really want to see issues being discussed in parliament robustly, then we have to vote in 10+ opposition MPs. Each MP will then able to tackle various issues relevant to different sectors of the populace.

But all these will have to start somewhere. Now that Sylvia is being showcase by the mass media, hopefully those with eyes can see the quality of opposition and be encouraged to vote for them in the coming election. If they can win, eventually others can win as well.

I’m not defending the guy, far from it, but as I understand, being an MP really takes the mickey out of your personal time.

I’ve had a conversation with an MP once and i asked him about how he handled the pressures of having corporate job as well as having to attend Meet the people sessions etc. and he replied that it was a very tough having to balance his family, his career and politics all at one go; i recall that he was quite happy to have served for one term only.

But he did acknowledge that was the price he had to pay for going down that path. He never made any grandiose, self-serving/self-praising statements.
Wonder what he would have said about this.

Re: “…a reflection of the dearth of talents … in the opposition as well as the PAP.”

When it comes to political talent, skill, knowledge, conduct, and acumen, we know very well that it is the PAP that has set the bar really, really low; it’s disgraceful and embarassing after the constant boasts of ‘world’s best education system’ which isn’t the case either.

But when opposition party members – and I speak primarily about the conservatives in the Workers Party and the one-man party Chiam See Tong – benchmark themselves against the PAP and its low standards when they are free to chart their direction, it’s definitely NOT of any service to the Singaporean electorate who want political diversity.

How can you bring the much needed diversity when you are trying your level best to becoming a PAP clone? That being the case, why vote them when the electorate can vote for the REAL PAP?

PS. I would normally not write posts like this, but because the readers in this forum clearly belong to the category of those who pay lip service to the “idea” of opposition unity, except when it comes to the SDP, I don’t mind returning like for like; the WP and the Chiam See Tong are NOT above criticism. The difference between them and I though, is that I have no prepackaged lines by Lee Kuan Yew to use to criticize what I consider to be the PAP’s mirror image in the opposition. My critcisms are entirely my own and based entirely on my own perspective.

Together with the print media’s blackout especially of SDP related news that can help mitigate the SDP’s image that has been deliberately dragged through the mud by the PAP, and the occasional mention of the WP only in print reports, it should be clear that the PAP has granted PAP-approved status to the WP and is engineering the outcome of the next elections (for a Sylvia Lim win) by featuring her as if she were the only person from the opposition parties who can speak to the issues.

Yes, renewal is very difficult as Dr Lim admitted. Good talents will think twice about joining PAP. The odds stacked up against the opposition will deter good men and women to serve too. Poor Singaporeans.

Of all the 3 talking, I like Sylvia’s accent best. Her ‘P’ as in ‘MP’, ‘PM, ‘PAP, does not sound like ‘pee’ from the nose.

By the way, did this Dr Lim serve as MP and man a MPS in Pasir Ris before? He looks so friendly here but the Dr Lim I saw previously during a MPS was aloof and arrogant. Throughout the MPS with me, he didn’t say more than 3 words! Are they the same person? If yes, what a hypocrite.

This is the reality of being opposition member. As such, they deserve that much support from us for walking through a political minefield that can blow up on their face anytime.