Elaine Toh

The muffled rumblings of a gathering, the scene of students holding banners and standing in the narrow street just outside my school became a temporary distraction from the drone of my afternoon lesson. My tutor was quickly ignored (to his dismay!) as curious yet easily distracted students in my class left our seats to witness the hullabaloo outside. Apparently, a large number of students were protesting . 

As a Singaporean, what was interesting to me were the messages on some of the placards consisting of angry vulgarity, ironically painted in childish red scrawls. Is this freedom of speech at its best? I also wondered about the sudden hive of activity at that street while walking to school that day. There were more students than usual. Many were manning booths lined along half of that street with plentiful handouts for the interested passers-by. For the brave souls who had stopped to take a brochure, they were treated to a polite but animated verbal defense of the issue that these passionate students were concerned about. 

Civil Demonstrations

Despite the large crowds that had gathered by noon, I was particularly struck by the peaceful manner the demonstration was conducted in (being a typical “sua-ku” Singaporean). I then understood the rationale for that lone police van parked by the nearby road that I had encountered on my walk to school earlier. Several  British policemen dressed in their distinctive luminous yellow jackets stood by and watched the proceedings.

Based on my previous encounters with public demonstrations and protests in the British capital, most were conducted in a civil and peaceful manner. Policemen were present as a security measure rather than a law-enforcing deterrent but they seldom had to intervene. When overzealous protesters brandished threatening objects like metal pipes or wooden poles, they would be quickly surrendered to the police when they were asked to. If such events took place on a large scale, roads may be cordoned off, traffic diverted and public announcements on both the TV and the radio made a few days in advance. But after the protest and the chanting of slogans or intended messages have ended, life in the city reverts to its normal humdrum once again. 

Free Education for All

What were these students campaigning for? Their posters read, “Free Education for All”. Aren’t these students being too idealistic, I wondered? The student organizers of the protest believe that education is a right not a privilege . Instead of paying fees, students should be given a living grant, they say. Cost of funding education would then come from the rich instead.

For the pragmatic me, my consideration would be if education is free, then governments would have to dish out large sums of money to build schools, employ teachers and administrators and buy all the equipment necessary for schools to function. Where would all these money come from? Taxpayers? Government Investments? Our national reserves? 

Should living grants be paid to the students for being alive? Or are they asking for the government to pay them to attend school? Well, if the UK were a developing country, it would be a good idea since it would improve literacy rates of the general population. But the UK is one of the most developed countries in the European Union. Perhaps the living grant would alleviate problems of a different nature such as truancy?

But as an educator at heart, I do agree with their rationale of our universal rights to education but to tax the richer upper class to fund education for the masses? Hmm…now that is an interesting line of argument and belief system applied to the education context, even though it is not a new social idea. But isn’t it like punishing the rich for being wealthy and for amassing their fortune?

Summer is Protest Season

According to my tutor, summer seems to be a popular time of the year for protests and demonstrations. It seems true to some extent, see (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article4198462.ece), (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article3811692.ece) and (http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/transport/article3987723.ece) for some examples of strikes which took place in the summer of 2008. 

With the current credit crunch and economic downturn, the frequency of such events may increase dramatically. So, visit London in summer 2009 … anybody? 

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Picture from The Guardian.

Some reports on the protest:

http://www.workersliberty.org/story/2009/01/16/national-student-demonstration-25-february

http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=17242

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2009/02/422826.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/feb/25/tuition-fees-students-protest

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Related posts:

1. NTU students protest at Speakers’ Corner
2. Iranian students protest at Speaker’s Corner
3. TOCI Special Report: Singapore Day 2009 in London

Low Hansiong

In November 2008, the Economic Development Board (EDB) announced in the Straits Times its intention to market Singapore as regional hub for Non-Governmental Organisations (NGO) and Non-Profit Organisations (NPO). This brings me to an opaque question: what is considered public service among Singaporeans? This is of particular interest to me because I am currently doing my studies in public administration at New York University.

Antiquated Thinking in Singapore

Most people tend to envision public service as working altruistically, for little or no money, for the greater good. Is it really important that one must work for no money to be considered doing a public service? This is a particularly sensitive issue, given that fat ministerial salaries are already a sore point among Singaporeans. However, my idea of public service is not towards the civil service but rather the men and women who brave their lives and bare their souls to work in appalling conditions in the most dangerous and poorest nations among us, helping people in whatever manner they can.

The nature of public service is changing: thirty years ago, most Singaporeans would say defining ‘cheng-hu-lang’ (Hokkien for civil servant) as public service would probably be apt. However, in New York and the world, public service is taking a drastic turn today: no longer do most people think that the civil service is the sole agent of public service, rather it is now perceived that NGOs and NPOs play this role with far greater efficacy.

Yet Singaporeans remain cocooned. Singaporeans expect the government to provide for everything that is lacking in the free market. This is antiquated thinking. NGOs and NPOs have proved themselves to the world that they are the answer to the future. Organisations such as Mercy Corps, International Rescue Committee, International Red Cross and even the United Nations are now stellar examples of how non-sovereign and multilateral intervention can become agents of change and relief in the third world, war zones and major disaster sites.

It is essential to realise that public service is not necessarily a selfless endeavour. It is a business and profits or not, any organisation will aspire to expand its operations and be in healthy financial shape. As such, the staff behind a public service organisation should be well incentivised to do an excellent job. This would benefit recipients among the public and maximise the impact on society in the long run. Such incentives should include a competitive salary package, adequate medical benefits and a professional training scheme. After all, which labour market does the invisible hand not govern?

The State of Public Service in Singapore

Currently, Singapore has a handful of NGOs and NPOs, such as Mercy Relief, National Kidney Foundation (NKF), TWC2 and AWARE. With exceptions to NKF and Non-Profit Hospitals having a significant professional staff, many organisations are made up mostly of volunteers complemented by a small number of full-time professional staff. Such a set up hardly inspires Singaporeans to take up public service as a career because one ultimately needs to balance one’s lofty ambition with bread and butter needs.

To get things started, NGOs in Singapore could approach the myriad of foundations such as Hong Leong Foundation, Lee Foundation and Shaw Foundation to form a truly trans-Asian NGO. This can be a starting point: forming an organisation that will tackle head-on the most vexing and basic of issues such as poverty, illiteracy and sanitation, and do something about it. The Youth Expedition Project has been funding teams of 15-20 persons to go abroad to alleviate such situations in the third world; yet such activities require continuity, so it would be better to have a trans-Asian NGO to manage and implement these activities on a day-to-day basis.

Think tanks form a special group of NPOs. They serve an important role in research, advisory, advocacy and promoting understanding and policy debate within public circles. Think tanks in Singapore include the  Institute of Policy Studies (IPS), Think Centre (TC), Singapore Institute of International Affairs (SIIA), Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS) and NUS School of Public Policy (SPP). These think tanks serve a secondary role known as Track II Diplomacy. For example, SIIA negotiated the Singapore-Taiwan Free Trade Agreement with Taiwanese think tanks in October 2008 because the Singapore Government only recognises the People’s Republic of China as the sole representation of Greater China.

However, think tanks are not limited to Track II Diplomacy. Their research and advisory roles also enable them to act as advocator for a variety of non-state actors such as the private sector, political groups and special interest groups. For example, the Consumer Energy Council of America monitors development in the liberalised US electricity and gas trading markets and push for pro-consumer policies in Congress, the State Assembly and even the energy exchange itself. They make up for the lack of lobbyist capacity that is absent in a traditional consumer organisation such as CASE, since CASE is constrained by the diversity of consumers it represents. They also provide timely updates on policy development to the public that would not only increase the public’s awareness and understanding on policy and how it would impact them. With the exception of Think Centre, the other local think tanks in Singapore are directly or indirectly affiliated to the Government.

The Future of Public Service

Public service is also a global industry. Apart from public transport and healthcare, a notable example is international development consulting. Big players in this market include government and multilateral agencies (e.g. USAID, DFID, Asian Development Bank), international NGOs (e.g. Oxfam) and private firms (e.g. McKinsey, PA Consulting, Emerging Markets Group). Private firms in particular provide the much needed private sector expertise such as IT, logistics, project management, legal counselling and policy advisory.

Singapore is ideally positioned to be the regional hub for NGOs and NPOs. It has a highly educated populace, common culture, geographic advantage and most importantly, a ‘can-do’ spirit. Singapore is also home to some private sector expertise needed in international development projects. However, the Singapore Government needs to start taking the lead in the non-profit sector by abolishing archaic laws that prevent funds raised locally from being used in other countries and foster a new generation of Singaporeans who can and will take the lead in achieving the Millennium Development Goals, especially in South Asia.

Public service, in its simplest connotation, evokes grand imagery of sacrifice and noble aspirations, and it is still true. Call me a romantic but if the business of saving is left to the markets and dependency on inept corrupt administrations, there would be little left to hope for the people whom we call our friends.

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About the author:

Hansiong is currently doing his Master of Public Administration at New York University’s Wagner Graduate School of Public Service. His interest is primarily in economic development and poverty reduction. He believes that the Millenium Development Goals are attainable, but only if we cut the bull****. 

If you would like to join the TOC International team, please do drop us an email at: theonlinecitizen@gmail.com 

TOC International features every Tuesday on The Online Citizen.

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Related posts:

1. Blog Feature: National Service
2. Service of celebration and thanksgiving
3. PTW Week: World class service?

Gilbert Goh

I had returned to Singapore from Sydney some weeks back. I was away for only a few months and was shocked at the drastic transformation in Singapore. The first thing that struck me when I reached home was the sheer number of people that I saw on the streets, malls, MRT, buses and even the parks.

Meeting people on Sydney’s streets, unlike Singapore, is a premium, especially after dark. In Sydney, I lived a half-hour train ride away from the city. Shops close at 6pm daily except Thursdays, when they close at 9pm. There was one weekend I could not even buy a bottle of soya sauce because the shops had already closed. Parks are also sparsely filled with people.

Back in Singapore, I found it difficult to cope with so many people when I am outdoors. I felt giddy at times from the constant stream of people filing in for a bite when I visited Macdonald’s, for example. The cinemas are also full usually and it is tough trying to get a cinema ticket during peak periods and weekends. In Sydney, this is not a problem. Perhaps the AU$15.00 price for a ticket does not make it an attractive item to have for many. They would prefer to rent DVDs at the affordable price of AU$3.00 for one. I did that mostly in Sydney.
 
The Aussies are pretty homely people and most prefer to stay indoors during the weekend. During the summer, many drive to the beach for a swim or to tan. Their incredible love for the outdoors has allowed them to save some precious money for rainy days. I find that Singaporeans tend to indulge in spending too much. We go for movies, dine in restaurants and indulge in post- Christmas sales events. Most of the stuff that we do often have a dollar tag to it.
 
No quiet moment

Thinking that I could have some space of my own for a while, I headed to my neighbourhood park one evening as I needed to think through some stuff alone. To my shock, I found that pockets of people had occupied the park. Some were there to smoke and chat whereas others simply sat around. I headed back home, disappointed that I couldn’t have a quiet moment on my own.

Overcrowding not only restricts one’s movement but also adds to one’s stress as there is a lack of personal space. One often feels frustrated if he has to fight with others for the toilet, movies, dining and, more importantly, jobs. It is not surprising that those friends that I met recently all asked me about the migration experience. Perhaps, they all shared how I feel about the experience back home. They felt like a foreigner in their own homeland.
 
Foreigners, foreigners, everywhere!

The next thing that hit me hard is the influx of foreigners into our country. Having taken the train several times, I had almost suffocated to death by the oncoming passenger load at every stop. I could smell the stench of human perspiration and also Armani perfume right next to me. Half of the train’s load was also strangely filled with foreigners (e.g. Filipinos, Indians, Chinese, Thais, etc) that I felt like a foreigner in my own country. I felt sad and detached. Am I home or what?
 
In Sydney, the Asians also seemed to dominate. My apartment has 12 units and at least ten units are filled up by Asians – mostly mainland Chinese or Vietnamese. Most Aussies have moved to Brisbane where the houses are cheaper and perhaps they find solace in their own kind. Will Singapore end up like this where the locals move away from the foreigners, creating a deep division? Is this one big reason why Singaporeans emigrate in large droves recently?
 
I ventured to my favourite coffee shop one morning and was shocked to see that the coffee shop was ran mostly by mainland Chinese workers. The worker ratio is three foreigners to one local worker there. They are all young and energetic and could even speak some simple English: “Kopi, want milk or not?” Our elderly workers have never seen so much competition for their often-shunned coffee shop job that pays S$5.00 an hour or less. Once again, I wondered how on earth can MOM allow so many young foreigners to do low-end manual work at the expense of our own workers. Depression soon took over me after that visit to the coffee shop.
 
Social cost of being so crowded

Our government ought to evaluate the social costs of having too many foreigners in our midst. Though the economic benefits may be there, the social cost can be too high for Singapore. Even in Australia, the Australian government is trying to reduce the emigration quota this year with rising unemployment. Although their protectionist labour policies may seem unfair, there is nothing wrong with the Australian government trying to protect the jobs of their own people. Yet in Singapore, the reverse could be said of ours: the jobs of the foreigners seem more protected than the locals’. This is a shocking revelation.
  
Maybe Australia’s strong social welfare policies have lessened the impact of a financial crisis for individuals and families at large. If one is unemployed, he can claim unemployment benefit. If one is a single parent, she can claim benefit for the children. They need not worry too much about money, unlike us. We only have ourselves to depend on, so much so that it has become an obsession. With that, our lifestyle also largely reflects our status – the car we drive, the house we live in and even the school we send our kids to.
  
Our government has perhaps been too effective in moulding us to be money-making machines. We all know how to make money the moment we graduate or enter the workforce. One takes the highest paying job offer even though our interest is sacrificed here. Bills need to be paid and we rather have cash on hand to buy a new car than doing something that brings us happiness.
 
I may stay in Singapore for a few more months to finish up some tasks. It is never easy for one to adjust to life back home, having enjoyed the nice weather, quiet environment and uncrowded train rides in Sydney. Nevertheless, home is still home especially when I can see old friends and familiar surroundings. I longed to visit friends and catch up over kopi while watching the EPL live games with my kakis. In Sydney, weekends were mostly spent at home with my family watching DVDs and soapy TV programmes. I guess one will not have a perfect place in this world to live his life. More importantly, as we age, we will feel more at home with our loved ones by our side wherever we are.

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Picture from: http://moeside.net

Read also: Is our politics any different from China’s?

TOC International (TOCI) features every Tuesday. If you’re a Singaporean overseas, and you’re interested in joining the TOCI team, do drop us an email at: theonlinecitizen@gmail.com. 

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Related posts:

1. Amnesty International Report 2008 – Singapore
2. TOC International : Is our politics any different from China’s?
3. Why no international recognition for S’pore’s fighters?

Jason Lim / TOCI Writer

As a Singaporean working in China, I meet a lot of Chinese locals who are interested to know more about Singapore. Many were curious about how and why a small country such as Singapore, which is without any natural resources, can be so successful. To this, I answer Singapore has a good, clean and efficient government. The PAP government, which has led Singapore since independence, has done an excellent job in transforming Singapore into a modern city state. Do we not all mutter the same reason word-for-word to explain Singapore’s success?

Opposition in Singapore and China

Some Chinese commented that both Singapore and China adopt the one-party system, but this is not true. Singapore is a dominant-party state, where weak and ineffective opposition exists. While Singaporeans have the right to vote for the right and best government, choices are limited because the rise of any opposition is often marked by a quick dismissal, usually caused by bankruptcy, defamation suit, etc.

There are also systematic constraints in Singapore that curtail Singaporeans’ choices on political parties and access to opinions on politics and public policy. These constraints include the climate of fear, the ruling party’s monopoly on ascertaining public interest, limited freedoms of association and speech, incomplete data and statistics published by the government, and no free press. Dr Bryan Caplan (Associate Professor in Economics at George Mason University) made a very startling discovery, when he visited Singapore’s Civil Service College as a Consultant in November 2008, that the public’s opinion hardly matters in policy making.

On the other hand, China is one-party state whereby the Communist Party of China (CPC) is and will always be the only political party in power. Contrary to popular opinion, 8 opposition political parties actually exist in China, but they cannot participate in parliamentary elections. The close ties between the CPC and these opposition political parties date back to prior to the Chinese Civil War whereby these political parties pledged political and financial support to the CPC against the Kuomintang (KMT) which had outlawed them.

The opposition political parties form the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), along with other special interest groups such as trade unions, business associations and ethnic organisations, which make recommendations to the National People’s Congress (the Chinese Parliament) and the State Council (the Chinese Cabinet). The Chinese Opposition today are in fact lobbyists and key members of the opposition political parties are usually installed in important positions under the Chinese Administrative Service and the Chinese Judiciary.

Voting in Singapore and China

The Singapore electorate currently consists of 14 Group Representative Constitutencies (GRC) and  9 Single Member Constituencies (SMC). Each GRC or SMC is contested in a plurality voting basis, otherwise known as winner-takes-all. Though the government has assured the public that their vote is not traced and voting is supposed to be secret, the serialising of our votes remain a concern for most Singaporeans. This is especially so for people who work in the government sector. The question remains at the back of many Singaporeans’ minds: “Will I be penalised on my work if I vote for the opposition?”

Drawing the boundary lines for GRC and SMC just months before the election is certainly in the favour of the ruling government. GRC and SMC are constantly regrouped, and the MPs of the ruling party will know exactly where they should build the rapport but not the opposition. This is largely caused by the Election Department, which  falls under the purview of the Prime Minister’s Office, setting rules in favour of the ruling party. In other estasblished democratic countries, the Election Department is an independent non-partisan body which does not side any political parties and their role is primarily to ensure a smooth and fair election.

In China, there have been direct elections since 1978. Instead of multi-party contest in a multi party democracy, a one-party system has multiple factions contesting. All candidates are CPC members but they represent different factions which are associated with different key CPC members in the CPC politburo. Election in China is multi-layered. The ordinary man can only elect their representatives at the county (a village or a few small villages) or municipal (town or small city) level. 

A large city may consist of a handful of counties instead. The elected representatives are collectively known as the local People’s Congress. Each provincial People’s Congress in turn will elect a team which will represent the province at the National People’s Congress, which is the highest legislative body in China. The President and vice president are elected by the National People’s Congress for five-year terms.

Most political scholars criticise this – that intra-party politics dominates the layers between the County-Municipal levels and Provincial-National levels. Therefore, the Chinese feel helpless when it comes to having a say in running their own country. They are also not less apathetic than Singaporeans when it comes to national politics. In Singapore, while we are able to elect our representatives to parliament to a limited extent, intra-party politics dominates too in deciding who the Cabinet will be. 

Taking Matters into Perspective

Singapore is a democratic country. We have the right to vote for our leaders. But, do we really have this privilege? The media, which is controlled by the government (same as China) often publish news pertaining to opposition in a negative light. Access to political opinion is restricted while public debates of government policies are  not taken up by the various mainstream media in Singapore. Therefore, in most cases, many Singaporeans either make uninformed choices during the General Elections or to resign to walkovers in their constituencies..

Th PAP continues to be our government and make themselves the highest paid civil servants in the world (even with the recent pay cut, they are still the highest paid in the world). Even though they may have made some blunders along the way, examples – Mas Selemat’s escape or Government linked – Temasek and Shin Corporation investment fiasco or the losses at Singapore-Suzhou industrial park or even the recent mini bonds or town council sinking funds, they are all small blunders and they continue to be our government.

Unless we have a free press and open debates on politics and government policies, majority of Singaporeans will remain detached from the political environment and not take charge of their ownership of Singapore. Political apathy may be good for maintaining stability of a country, but too much of it can be bad for the country, especially when there is nobody to sound out the alarm or contribute a solution when Singapore is heading towards disaster. 

Singapore politics is not really different from China’s in many aspects although they differ in details. In effect, both Singapore and China has an electorate which feels helpless with regards to the political situation and they are too resigned to deal with authorities or political figures. The helplessness is further compounded by the question of whether political opposition in Singapore or China  truly represent alternative voices of the people and whether they are effective in influencing any government policy.

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About the author:

Jason graduated with BSc (Hons) Business with the University of London, and have been working in various parts of China including Shanghai and Guangzhou for the last 3 years. Being a Singaporean, he is particularly interested in Singapore politics. Disappointed with the apathetic attitude towards politics of many Singaporeaans, he feels that  “we a need a political revival in our country. We need to have a stronger say and stand in running of our country, this is what a true democratic country should be.”

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If you are Singaporean and overseas, and would like to contribute to The Online Citizen, we would like to invite you to join the new TOC International group of writers. Send us an email at theonlinecitizen@gmail.com .

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Hi everyone,

It is with great delight that this campaign is embarking on its recruitment drive as it continues to evolve as a student grouping representing the voices of young Singaporeans. We are looking to strengthen our team with an additional 5 to 7 committed and dedicated individuals. We are not restricting it to only 7. This is just a number we are giving for ourselves. We certainly welcome more individuals; students, parents and working adults alike who are interested to step forward to serve the student community in Singapore.

If you are funky, hardworking and most importantly, have a heart for issues that affect the student community in Singapore; especially with regard to public transportation, YOU are the one we are looking for!

There is no application form to fill in and no dateline to meet. There are no positions to fill, everyone in the main grouping are of the same status/ position; that of student representative/ organiser. Simply put, a member.  If you are interested and would like to know more, do drop us an email at petition4fairtransport@gmail.com

As this campaign embarks on consolidating its success, we are also looking for dynamic individuals to bring this campaign forward responsibly and constructively. Join us today!

We look forward to hearing from you.

Thank you.

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SOME THINGS just do not change. This fact was well-illustrated In the recently-announced Budget for 2009.

As usual, the bulk of the Budget goes towards defence, a low priority at a time where our neighbouring countries are suffering from economic crisis, coupled with fractious politics. We are more capable of invading them than they are of invading us.

Then there is the normal government reticence towards welfare, even on a short-term basis. There is little point in the Long-Run if “in the long-term, we will be dead”.

And then there is the Jobs Credit Scheme (JCS). It is marketed as a means of helping Singaporeans to hang on to their jobs, but in practice follows the trickle-down concept of long-term growth, which has always been a key philosophy of this Government. The principle behind the JCS is to subsidise the wage costs of companies so that they hopefully will not retrench and hopefully will start hiring new workers.

The problem? “hopefully” is not indicative of confidence, the thing we need the most. Banks need confidence to lend. Companies need confidence to endure the necessary short-term losses from hanging on to spare capacity – which essentially is the effect of the JCS on them. The rest of us need confidence in our financial system, and in our ability to survive on what we have. But JCS does not guarantee jobs; worse still it does nothing to help those already without jobs.

So, the question is: is there a better solution than the JCS? The Government thinks not. I beg to differ. I wish now to propose an alternative solution, which I shall call the Rainbow Credit Scheme (RCS).

The gist of the RCS is simple. It stimulates domestic demand, which increases business confidence, which increases confidence of banks to lend. It then uses business confidence to boost foreign demand, which boosts foreign business confidence, which increases confidence of foreign banks to lend. More lending means more opportunity for growth, then less retrenchment and more employment.

The basic provisions are simple too. It is composed of 2 parts. The first is a re-directed $20.5 billion dollars from the JCS. The second is a smaller $600 million granted directly to people living and working in Singapore.

Now for the details.

But first a word of warning: I will not claim to have a Masters Degree or PhD in Economics, so I do not claim to have absolute insight on any other side-effects this policy might have. What I do hope is to ignite the brains of our scholars or other people on the Web to think of an alternative to JCS.

Step 1: Creating the $20.5 billion (+) ‘Rainbow’ Credits

An appreciating Sing Dollar reduces the cost of buying foreign currencies.

Bearing this in mind, the RCS begins with the MAS converting the $20.5 billion (or more) into a basket of currencies, specifically: US Dollar, Euro, Yen, Yuan and Pound; according to the relative sizes of our trade volumes with their home countries.

Step 2: Issuing RC Coupons

The $600 million (+) is used to provide a set of coupons for people by household. Each person in the household receives $100 (+) worth of RC coupons. The net cost of each RC is $1.00 (+) for the Government.

Step 3: Supplementary Price System

The Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) then fixes a price of 1 RC for anything sold in Singapore. So Singaporeans can now buy anything at either 1 RC or the listed price (in Sing Dollar). The only item that will not come under this is COE, because of the necessity of preventing traffic congestion. For goods that are normally taxed, like alcohol and cigarettes, they will be given a fixed duty (in Sing Dollar) instead.

This will stimulate consumer confidence; hey, you get your first 100 (+) goods literally free-of-charge! Unlike the JCS and Workfare, RC is distributed equally to all people in Singapore, including the currently unemployed.

Businesses benefit from 600 million (+) goods and services waiting to be sold locally alone. That may not be as large as the usual, but is still a considerable amount.

Step 4: Releasing the Rainbow Credits

At this stage, the MAS sets up a system to allow Individuals and Companies to redeem their RC coupons for portions of the converted $20.5 billion (+), subject to conditions.

Here is where the Government re-directs investment to long-term growth sectors. The Government can choose to provide larger portions for Companies in those sectors, for instance Biotechnology or Digital Media.

Once businesses are afloat, banks will feel more confident about lending. And increased business confidence will avert retrenchments and spur job creation once the worst is over. So, our workers gain again.

The effect of this is to direct resource spending on imports. Most of the $20.5 billion (+) will be used to finance imports from the 5 countries that just happen to be the world’s 5 largest economies: USA, Japan, Europe (Germany), China and Britain. A boosting in our imports will boost their exports.

Step 5: Foreign Diplomacy

And we are still in luck: this year happens to be the year when we are hosting the APEC summit. It also happens to be the year when the USA and China are on the same page with regards to the Global Economy.

the RCS will have some impact on the Global Economy, even if Singapore is the only country following it. But it will have much more impact if more countries join it. It is not a currency union; there is no fear of loss of sovereignty. It is not protectionist either.

For both politicians who want to be elected (as in the West) and politicians who require political capital to justify suppression of dissent (as in China), the RCS provides a win-win situation. It provides both a short-term cushion and a long term effect.

So, the final step of the RCS is for our diplomats to sell it – especially to the USA and China – at November’s APEC Summit.

A Last Comment

If you like this suggestion, please spread it to your friends and better still one of those Scholars working for the Government.

This crisis is disastrous; radical solutions are required to solve its radical problems. The question is: do we have the political will to do so?

Related posts:

1. The Alternative Green Economic Policy
2. An alternative to penalising labour
3. Will the Jobs Credit Scheme save jobs?

The petition will propose a more permanent concession fare sturcture for polytechnic and tertiary students.

Alternatively, you can sign the petition online at http://www.petition4fairtransport.org/the-petition/.

PRESS RELEASE:

We refer to the articles “Bus, train fares to go down” (The Straits Times, January 24) and “First of the cuts” (Today, January 24).

It is heartening to note that public transport operators (PTOs) are passing on the savings from Budget 2009 to all commuters, including the student and working population. In addition, we read with great interest the efforts made by the operators during the similar economic downturn in 1997 to alleviate the burden on Singaporeans.

These are exceptional times for all Singaporeans and this gesture by the PTOs is the right thing to do to reward fellow Singaporeans who have a played key role in the success of SMRT and SBS.However, we wish to question the sustainability of this price reduction. Is there expected to be a significant increase in transport fares once the economy recovers in the next one to three years? We cannot help but look back at the following statement in a Straits Times article dated 25 February 2005 – “New formula flexible on transport fare changes”. In this article, it was reported that “a proposed formula for calculating bus and train fares can bring reductions during an economic slowdown, but it can also give rise to bigger increments in bountiful years.”

More specifically, would tertiary students be paying more than S$97 for a combined train and bus concession when the economy recovers?

We would like to take this opportunity to make an open appeal to the Public Transport Council (PTC), SBS, SMRT and Transitlink to commence feedback gathering sessions with this student group and fellow student bodies in Singapore during this fare adjustment period.

This student group is also in contact with the various parties and is looking at arranging a meeting to present its own fare proposal to the Public Transport Council, SBS Transit, SMRT Corp and Transitlink for consideration. This student group would like to see that perspectives of tertiary students are seriously considered in any future fare increases/ reductions. We would also like to achieve a new and fair formula for determining students’ concession and obtaining mutual understanding and benefits for both parties.

Thank you.

Bernard Chen

Organiser(s) of National Petition for Fairer Transportation Fares for Polytechnic/ Tertiary Students

petition4fairtransport@gmail.com

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One of the employment worries of job applicants is that they might have to settle for a position they did not plan for originally. And that includes having to settle for less.

Lee Jianxing, a computing graduate from the class of 2008, had hoped to acquire a job in the banking sector.

After several unsuccessful attempts, he finally settled for a job in the IT industry. However, he had to revise his salary expectations to $2,500, far below the industry standard of $3,000 and above.

This is not an uncommon story going by the interviews conducted by The Observer with nine recent NUS graduates.

Three of the interviewees said they took longer than two months to land a job. Another five accepted salaries lower than their expected minimum salary.

Visit The Campus Observer to read the full article.

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27 JANUARY — NO PRIZE for guessing where this is — nope, this is not your typical hawker centre or HDB block, but THE Istana.

Imagine: people littering indiscriminately at the White House. I wonder what would the White House staffers say to that?

It seems like the presidential palace has attracted more than just people during its open house on the second day of Chinese New Year.

For the foreigners out there, the Istana is where the President lives and works in Singapore. And no, the president here mainly serves a ceremonial role with very limited executive powers, quite unlike the American president.

Anyway, I didn’t manage to take a picture of the whole stretch as the queue entering the Istana was moving quite quickly. Trust me, the scene was much worse than it looks.

The rubbish somehow managed to form another line, of all race and religion — you have Starbucks, Coca-cola, green tea, Crysantimum tea — the works. Somebody decided to initiate the whole thing by placing one empty soft drink can, and others followed suit.

And I thought Singapore is the clean and green city. But give credit to us Singaporeans though, for once you enter the wide open grass fields and the walk the long, winding road leading up to the main building, the whole premise is litter-free, guaranteed. The policemen on duty will see to that.

I was rather disappointed when the saw the rubbish lined up outside. What civility displayed by us gracious Singaporeans! I mean, if it’s throwing a sweet wrapper in a discreet stairwell of your HDB block — okay lah, can close one eye. But outside the Istana? That takes the cake.

Well, maybe I shouldn’t be too surprised, after all it was reported in The Straits Times (ST) recently that about 1,000 litter bugs were subjected to Corrective Work Order (CWO) this year, which is almost a ten-fold increase from 2006 (the figure stood at 120)!

A sign that such punitive measures do not work? Perhaps. Lee Bee Wah was quoted saying that education might be a better method of curbing littering tendencies. Of course, this is now being tried on foreign workers, and it remains to be seen whether it will work.

I recall one ST Forum writer who wrote:

I applaud the authorities for displaying signs in foreign languages to warn and remind foreign workers not to litter in the Jurong East MRT Station area.

However, on the other side of the MRT station, where a covered walkway leads to Jurong Entertainment Centre, there is litter near an advertisement board.

There are people distributing various fliers to passers-by at the covered walkway daily, and some of the fliers are thrown away there, landing on the floor.

So far, no one has come to clear the litter.

I wonder what kind of message the authorities are sending to our foreign workers. They are told not to litter at one part of the MRT station, yet the other part is strewn with litter.

Give me a break, Mr Letter Writer. Blame the foreign workers for taking away our jobs if you want, but this is going a mile too far. Maybe it’s not the foreign workers that is the problem, but us Singaporeans. What an absurd letter this is, and even more absurd is the editor who allowed this to get published.

A survey by the National Environmental Agency in 2007 found that a “shocking one in five Singaporeans do not take pride in keeping the nation litter-free,” said a TODAY news report. What abject horror! Perhaps this will serve as a wake-up call to Mr Letter Writer and those in the same vein.

So who is in need of re-education now?

The reason why Singapore is so clean is not because Singaporeans are civil-minded, but because thousands of cleaners sweep our streets every morning, before we wake up. According to a ST report, NEA hires 1,200 road sweepers, while the PAP town councils hire 6,000 men and women to clean up our mess.

For NEA alone, the expenditure for 2007 came up to $34 million. A staggering sum indeed, considering what else they could have done with the money! Sure, we may kid ourselves by saying that littering provides employment. But guess what, the people who clean up after us are old folks and foreign workers. So who are we to preach to them about “appropriate” behaviour?

Hypocritical, if you ask me.

I can attest to the litter problem plaguing Singapore at the moment. Ever walked through HDB estates at 3am in the morning? I have — and it is not a pretty sight. I had to do a double take and pinch myself — I wasn’t sure if I was still in Singapore.

Sure, tourists with cash to spend will certainly sing praises about how clean and green we are as a country — but they will never get to see the other side of Singapore, not unless they drop their luggages and start carrying a broom.

But of course, they’d rather catch the Singapore Airlines flight back home.

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Has anyone seen the recent Workforce Development Authority (WDA) advertisement? It is the one which showed a middle-aged man in his forties with his wife, as well as a group of friends of various races, sitting together in the coffeeshop.

One by one, his friends disappear as they talked about how they got new jobs after taking courses by WDA to upgrade their skills or learn new ones. Eventually, even the wife disappears, leaving the man behind. The point made in the advertisement is rather clear: Go for skill-upgrading courses with WDA and get a job. If not, you might remain unemployed.

All of these might seem appropriate in the context of the recession that is happening. Retrenched low-level workers are advised to take up skills-upgrading courses in order to improve their chances of employment. However, these skill-upgrading courses still cause the Singaporean worker to remain in the manufacturing industry – the area most vulnerable to retrenchments in times of recession.

Data from the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) shows that during the peak of the recession, 57,5 people per 1000 were retrenched in 1998, compared to the services industry, which saw 18.5 per 1000 people retrenched.

Singaporeans deserve better offers than these – in particular, not the low quality jobs that would be especially vulnerable to shifts in the economy, because in a depression, all jobs get affected. In a recession, the best way to spark future growth is by creating high-quality jobs that give Singaporeans security in a recession.

The basic idea for skills upgrading is that the productivity and value of the worker would increase. This might lead to better profit margins for the employer and even pay increment for the worker. The concept sounds reasonable in theory. However, while skills upgrading might seem to be the good thing to do, I have concerns about this approach towards improving the well-being of the Singaporean worker.

We remain an export-driven economy, where we rely heavily on our manufacturing prowess and efficiency, as well as our connectivity to the rest of the world through shipping links. Such thinking is antithetical to the concept of the ‘knowledge-based economy’, a phrase that has been overused so much to the point of being cliché. There is a genuine need to continue developing a knowledge-based economy.

Such an economy would still be innovating even in a recession, because ideas do not follow the trends of market, but the flow of information within a society, something that is not dependent on whether the market is going up or down. A genuine knowledge-based economy would require a knowledge-based society.

The point is not that the WDA is doing a bad job of giving people the opportunities and resources to upgrade their skills improve their employability. Rather, it is that there is a failure of imagination in the provision of these skills. Giving Singaporeans low-quality skills does not help them during a recession. These low-quality jobs tend to be the ones that get retrenched first. The point is not to make Singaporeans into low-quality Swiss knives, but to make every Singaporean a sharp sword, of high quality and value.

What the WDA could look at is to see how they can provide people with the education at the tertiary level so that they will be able to work at higher levels of management with greater productivity – jobs that are still required in a recession. Perhaps WDA can work in tandem with the private universities in Singapore to see how people might get better access to the finances needed obtain the qualifications required in the workforce today.

Skills retraining and upgrading is just another form of education. Could further and higher education be seen also as another form of skills upgrading? Perhaps WDA could collaborate with the private universities to provide Singaporeans access to quality tertiary education to keep them truly employable in the longer-term, recession or not.

—–

*** See related posts

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IT USED TO be that whenever I meet new friends, I would ask them about their education, about what they were interested in, and what their future job might be.

I used this topic as a convenient conversation starter, and if a person had no idea what to do, I would pose as some sort of an amateur career consultant, and try to find out what a person could do.

But my own experience in life has taught me something else, and since then, I have avoided asking that “what are you going to do in the future” question. A large part of my reason for not doing that anymore comes from my experience in education even as I am continually entrenched in the ideology of Singapore’s socio-cultural expectations.

The expectation is this: We have always thought that what we study ought to be related to our occupation after we graduate. For some careers, you do need a very clear idea of what you are doing and why. This is especially so for doctors, lawyers and architects especially, where there exists a set of professional standards.

For these people, the intrinsic motivation might be clearer – the kid might have decided from very young that he wanted to heal diseases, the lawyer might have a strong sense of justice, and for the architect, the desire to see beauty manifested in buildings.

Those are, as you might observe, very naïve, philosophical ideals about what people ought to be. In our modern reality, people are also driven as much by the material benefit that they might obtain, even though I suspect that the enjoyment derived from doing these jobs ought to far outweigh the monetary benefit they might receive.

Or that is what I like to believe.

What you study may not be what you will do

However I’ve come to this realisation that what I study now, content-wise, has actually got very little to do with what I might do in the future. In other words, even though I am working towards a chemistry major right now, my future career might not necessarily be in the chemical industry, even though people tend to have this idea that what you study ought to be what you work – which I think is a wrong conception that ought to be throw away, instead of hanging on to that notion and suffer for their entire lives.

The truth is that, most of us wouldn’t be applying what we learn in our careers. We would be handling things like administrative and executive duties, positions where knowledge of our specialty is hardly required at all. If we were only allowed jobs where the full range of our academic knowledge was required, there would be very few jobs out there at all.

After all, which career, other than a scientist or teacher, would require the knowledge of molecular orbital theory (for chemists)? It seems that the more important thing would be that we learn how to learn. Our time in university should have taught us to learn how to understand things, apply concepts, solve problems, and having a good imagination.

More generally, studies would usually require that we learn how to manage our lives – how to manage the information that we take in and organise it, and how to contextualise and interpret information in ways understandable to ourselves and to others.

We also would learn how to speak clearly, and present information in coherent and concise ways for others to understand. Along the way, we might also learn other psychological skills, such as managing expectations and anxieties. These are things that are part of any professional career. Once these skills are acquired, they will stay with us for the most part of our lives.

Studying for passion

We should change the way we think about education and how it should contribute towards our future. Maybe it is just the way the education system in our country has turned out, but we are starting to realise that the core assumption – that what we study will be our career – does not hold true at all. Just as we can’t predict what might happen to us the next day, we cannot expect to know what we might be doing in the future. Instead, what we do now in the present will prepare us for the unexpected.

We should not study in anticipation for our working future. We should study instead, for intrinsic interest – for the passion that we might have for a particular subject. But let me clarify, by doing what we love, we should end up becoming good at what we do.

It is the passion for excellence then prepares us for the future. Faced with this, we realise that the subject that we study does not matter, as long as we learn to pick up the skills that will enable us to adapt to challenges in the workplace.

The jobs of the future are going to change anyway. They are going to be more challenging, requiring us to think beyond our fields of specialty and, to think beyond our comfort zones. Faced with such a situation, our expert knowledge will not help us very much in that kind of working environment. On the contrary, focusing on our own area of specialty will restrict us in the way we think about problem-solving.

The important thing is to master the skills that are being acquired, and to be good with them, which require much practice. A person would definitely do all that if the material that he is studying is of genuine interest to him in the first place.

This brings me to the conclusion: do what you love!

***

See related posts

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The recent furore over whether a multi-party system or a single-party system would be better for Singapore has led to a renewed interest due to recent rumours about upcoming snap elections.

I assume, for the sake of this commentary, that Singaporeans want change, and are beginning to look for it. President-elect Obama’s election victory just one month ago has awakened the entire world to the possibility of change. A functioning government requires checks and balances, and not a monopoly of power as seen in Singapore today.

The Opposition: United or divided?

Singapore’s opposition has undoubtedly seen better days. There were the highs in 1981 when the late Mr J B Jeyaretnam managed to clinch more than 50% of the votes for the first time since independence and in 1988 when the Workers’ Party came close to beating the PAP despite facing internal problems within the party. In 1991, the Worker’s Party, together with Singapore Democratic Party, managed to achieve a record high of four seats, and there was optimism that a stranglehold of power by PAP would be broken soon.

The state of the opposition today seems rather tame by comparison. The current batch of non-PAP politicians does not seem ready to step up the mantle. No successor is in sight for the ageing opposition veteran Mr Chiam See Tong. Mr Low Thia Khiang has yet to show that he has made significant differences to the implementation of PAP’s policies, given the heavy odds stacked against them in Parliament. Dr Chee Soon Juan is embroiled in many trials and his party also face possible closure due to bankruptcy.

The passing away of Mr J B Jeyaratnam has also dealt a severe blow to the opposition, especially when the newly-established Reform Party raised hopes amongst many that things might perhaps change. The question for the opposition as a whole is: What is next on the cards?

Opposition parties in Singapore have been divided internally and externally over many issues. The mainstream media has also been quick to play up these divisions by giving more publicity to such incidents instead of focusing on other more meaningful issues and events, and projecting the image of a disunited and fractious opposition that seems more interested in squabbling than fighting for Singaporeans.

The lack of common consensus between opposition parties over issues further perpetuates the PAP’s constant subtle and not-so-subtle reminders to the masses that they are the only party capable of delivering the goods, as seen clearly by the recent PAP’s Party Conference in which Secretary-General PM Lee Hsien Loong clearly disregarded the opposition and spoke about political change only within the party.

Ugly differences between former colleagues and party leaders such as Dr Chee Soon Juan and Mr Chiam See Tong also became the attention of mainstream media in the past, which highlighted the conflict and contrasted it with the “united” PAP.

The lack of support from WP and SDA for SDP over the recent legal issues brought against them accentuates the idea of a disunited opposition that could not see past their own rivalry and demonstrate solidarity in the face of a greater enemy.

This has certainly led to alienation of the opposition from Singaporeans, especially those that only read mainstream media or have no access to alternative sources of news. Despite that, Singaporeans who voted in the last election has shown their willingness to give the opposition a chance, as demonstrated by the falling percentage of popular votes when compared to the 2001 General Elections (75.3%).

History’s lessons

History has shown clearly that disunity has marred the possibility of success for many political parties. Before the Japanese Occupation, there were many efforts all across South-east Asia (except Philippines) to resist the colonial masters who were deeply entrenched in their positions of power.

However, parties who were pushing for nationalism had different agendas. Some called for radical action to be taken to overthrow the colonial masters. Others were more moderate but had different thinking or ideologies so they also could not see eye to eye and cooperate for the greater cause. In the end, before the outbreak of the World War II, nationalist movements in nearly all the colonies had achieved little.

Everything changed when the Japanese came along and transformed this region forever. These parties capitalised on the Japanese Occupation to build up popular support for themselves and they saw opportunities once the Japanese left. Efforts were made towards unity, either through the merging of political parties as seen in the Alliance between UMNO, MCA and MIC in Malaya or through strong leaders such as Ho Chih Minh who - favouring pragmatism and playing down ideology – did not hesitate to cooperate with opposing factions to achieve their aims.

Fire and water can mix after all

If one should cast their eyes globally, one will come across even more examples when seemingly incompatible groups came together to achieve their common aim, one of the most infamous being the alliance of Hitler who hated communism and Stalin against Poland prior to World War II.

In Singapore, if one agrees to the current existence of a dysfunctional democracy and the need for better checks and balances, then the idea of a united opposition, regardless of how much bad blood was spilled between opposition parties over various issues in the past, would be of paramount importance if one is to break the stranglehold of the incumbent party in government today.

Given recent events such as the Town Council’s losses and the huge paper losses sustained by GIC and Temasek Holdings as seen by the plunging share values of recent buys into UBS and Citibank, the need for a meaningful opposition has never been more pronounced.

If the various opposition parties such as the Workers’ Party, Singapore Democratic Party and Singapore Democratic Alliance can come to the negotiating table and discuss the possibilities of greater cooperation and even integration, the potency of the opposition would be considerably stronger. Singaporeans will be more convinced that the opposition is credible.

Surely Singapore does not need another tumultuous event like the Japanese Occupation to convince the opposition parties to unite and fight for better representation in government? If Hitler and Stalin, arch enemies and dictators of powerful nations, could unite to achieve their ends, surely our very own parties can unite to meet the pressing needs confronting our nation now.

For the sake of Singapore’s future and its democracy, perhaps it is time they do.

————-

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Cultivating social graces at the lunch table must start from the base, not by covering up the cracks.

Measuring just four-by-two inches, the rather flat tissue packet rises larger than life. Loved by some who use it to claim tables at packed food centres, it is reviled by others who brand it symptomatic of Singaporeans’ anti-social nature.

In the cacophonic relentlessness of the Central Business District (CBD), the informal ‘chope’ system symbolises efficiency over social congeniality. It is borne of necessity. But a Singapore Management University (SMU) undergraduate group is discouraging it for more “gracious” behaviour – by beseeching patrons to personally reject hopeful bidders of the empty seats. Verdict: rather flat.

The Singapore Kindness Movement (SKM), in endorsing the Tissue Parody, forms a true two-ply mockery of addressing the long-time problem of lunch-time social ungraciousness. Couple 10,000 tissue packets exhorting “This seat is not taken, it’s yours!” with Singa the Courtesy Lion prancing to the tune, and the parody is complete.

Removing the ‘chope’ system adds a host of new problems that will overwhelm the perceived benefits of their version of social graciousness. Instead, systemically addressing the problem of crowded food centres deserves more attention.

No tissue packet chope: Just wiping the surface

The biggest loophole undermining the ‘people for packets’ policy is simply, a crunching lack of time. Lunch hour in the CBD is exactly that: 60 minutes; less, given walking times to and from the kopitiam. If Tissue Parody had its way, the combined man-minutes wasted by table-waiting workers would run into the hundreds-of-thousands. In a country predicated on economic efficiency, time is money – the dollar losses would be huge.

Even by ignoring its commercial non-viability and giving human contact precedence instead, the no-tissue movement will fall short of achieving its end. The SMU students fail to consider the irritation generated by having to verbally reject others asking, “Excuse me, can I sit here?” ten times over. And the inevitable reply, “Sorry, seat taken!” or a curt, “No” is hardly kindly either.

And that is assuming everybody lunches in groups. Solo-diners will struggle to secure a seat sans a reservation system. Nimble-brained as CBD workers may be, maze-like food courts threaten utter mess. Laksa-stained shirt anyone?

Necessity is the mother of invention. In the remarkably-dense CBD, the tissue-packet-chope system boasts utter efficiency: one packet in the centre of the table signifies that every seat is taken; if not, one packet per reserved seat. It exacts a clear solution to a peculiar environment. It has, and will, continue to work – eradicating the tissue issue will be quixotic and certainly chaotic.

Addressing it systemically

Instead of advocating dress changes, the SMU students and SKM should tackle the spectre of over-filled food centres. This would in turn help address the graciousness problem. Witness the groups chatting at the table long after gratifying their stomachs, or the hawks who stare down diners only halfway through their meals.

To purge this evident ugliness, streamlining the smooth flow of the hungry crowd, rather than discouraging an informal system of reserving tables, is key.

A ‘number vacant’ system, akin to what we see at carpark entrances, will nip the problem of roving crowds in the bud. Comfortably-populated food courts would counterpoint hassled office spaces. Paired with ceiling-mounted green/red indicators indicating the presence of free tables, people can make a safe beeline for them, even with tray in hand. This automation allows a more relaxed lunch environment, and can build a base from which better social graces can spring.

A simpler, cheaper idea is a manual reservation system, where diners can indicate ‘Occupied/Not Occupied’ on an in-built slider or flipper device. If the tissue system is frowned upon for its cursory nature, this formal arrangement adds a degree of accepted permanence.

The peak hour table overstayers, to me, impede graciousness the most. Restaurants offer longer post-meal chill out time, but it should not happen at packed hawker centres. A small roving team, assigned to discreetly request them to make space for new diners, would help. A campaign targeting this group would be truly effective, enhancing both social awareness and human traffic flow.

Even in the soaring glass and concrete hardware of our city centre, space abounds for heartware. But it will require our famed brand of rigorous research and practical solutions, not three-by-two inch campaigns, to create lunch environments that can foster both laughter and graciousness.

———-

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It has been two months since the Advisory Council for the Impact of New Media on Society (AIMS) released its report. Its report was standard government fare except for a major point that has got everyone talking: the need for the government to engage netizens on their own turf.

A number of netizens wonder what the aim of MICA in convening AIMS was. The more extreme of them – at Sammyboy and Sintercom – believe that this is a conspiracy by ISD and MICA to conquer the last free space in Singapore – the Internet. As for MICA, the banning of podcasts during the last General Elections stirred up considerable ire amongst netizens.

Even those who are not “into” podcasts find the mechanism of MICA somewhat outdated. Only the maverick component of “Arts” saves MICA from becoming a replica of Ministries of Information in countries like Israel, Saudi Arabia and China. Information Ministries cut off “undesirable” information. How is “undesirable” defined? Some aspects, such as pornography and hate speech, are clear, but others – like party political broadcasts– are a grey area.

Make MICA independent

The best way for the government to show its sincerity towards e-engagement – and no, P-65 bloggers just don’t cut it – is by granting independence to MICA.

The newly-independent MICA should also absorb a number of other government offices: The Elections Department (ELD), the Registry of Societies, the Registry of Births, the Registry of Deaths, the Registry of Marriages, SingStat and Reach.

On Censorship

Does this sound too extreme? Here is why it is not:

Daily inflow of new information is too high. The only way for traditional censorship to work is by instituting increasingly coarse-grained categories. However, these categories prevent dialogue on new concepts by reinforcing societal prejudices e.g. homophobia.

As categories become wider, the temptation to flout the rules is greater. I remember my friends screening the Passion of Christ (M18/R21) during recess in secondary school.

There is more likely to be unjust censorship when categories are wide. Remember the furore over the lesbian scenes initially cut out from The Hours on grounds of public morality?

What E-Engagement Really Is About

Information Management, in its traditional sense, is becoming less feasible to implement. In the Information Age, information management will be less about restricting the flow of information, and more about redirecting the flow of information through appropriate channels.

The role of an agency like MICA should be to aid in the networking and linking of information sources, rather than block out “undesirable” sources, especially political commentary. Blocking political commentary creates the dangerous situation where the elite gets increasingly distanced from the ground. What results is a façade of peace and happiness covering a simmering mass of resentment, waiting to blow up.

The government seems to classify political comments into three categories: the “official” comments in the print media like The Straits Times and Zao Bao, the grumblings at coffee-shops and of taxi-drivers, and online commentary. The first group the government endorses and at least gives an ear to. Whether it provides active response is another question. It ignores the second group. It has traditionally ignored the third group, but the AIMS study has elevated the position of the third group.

Playing the national interest card, and subject to government intervention, Singapore’s traditional media have tended to shy away from direct criticism of the government. The few journalists and contributors who attempted that were summarily removed from their posts. The most recent individuals were Michael Backman (TODAY) and blogger Mr Brown (contributed to TODAY). When one reads editorials in the local papers, one gets the sense that they criticise everybody but our government officials, who are usually quoted as if they give sage advice. The result is that the first group creates an unrealistic confidence in the government.

Members of the second group are individuals who view policies from the prism of their own lives. They are overlooked because they supposedly lack the big picture that the first group is argued to possess. However, it is precisely because they speak from real life experience that makes them worth listening to, and their sentiment would be an accurate gauge of sentiment on the ground.

AIMS recognized members of the third group as people with valid concerns. The traditional pre-AIMS view of the online population was a cacophony of voices in cyberspace, or mainly comprising grouchy middle-class youth. Perhaps that was an accurate description in 1998, but within the last decade the makeup of the cyberspace population has drastically altered. Senator McCain is not the only senior citizen in the world with a web presence.

E-engagement is not really about engaging a new group of people – this is one of AIMS’ mistakes – but about trying to engage a group of people who have always been existent, but been continually sidelined by the traditional approach to information management.

Restructuring Our Information Management Apparatus

This is where the rest of the assembly comes in.

Firstly, we have REACH, the re-named Feedback Unit. Aligning REACH under an independent MICA would enable it to better facilitate active dialogue between government and citizens. Netizens and other citizens would better respect the objectivity of an independent agency. The agency itself would also be able to police the quality and availability of feedback replies, so that events such as the recent Herb Garden incident would not occur.

Secondly, we have SingStat and the Registries. Given our government’s overwhelming dominance in most political sectors, giving SingStat official freedom will provide it with a higher degree of credibility.

The role of the Registries is record-keeping. By divorcing the Registry of Societies from the executive arm of government, it can untangle its bureaucratic function from the political arena: register all Societies first, and then leave it to the politicians to decide if they should be de-registered.

Thirdly, we have the Elections Department (ELD). The ELD would gain much more local and international credence if it were an independent agency, rather than a sub-department of the Prime Minister’s Office. It could maintain a level playing field without bothering about partisan obligations.

Out of Elections, the new ELD can also dedicate time to educating the public about representative democracy. (For instance, how about having the ELD run student council or prefectorial elections?)

Beyond the above, an independent variant of MICA would give individuals and NGOs access to the legislative branches (parliament) and the executive branches (cabinet and ministries) of the government, as well as to each other.

Conclusion

These are certainly radical ideas, but the end of product of their implementation will be enhanced national pride, an end to our classic political apathy, and the aligning of our societal institutions to the new forms of the Internet Age.

————-

About the author:

The writer is currently in National Service. He was formerly from Raffles Institution and Hwa Chong Insitution (College Section). He fancies himself a seasoned armchair critic. (He prefers the sofa though.)

——–

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On November 4, we all witnessed history being made. The US elected its first ever black president. A nation that once regarded its black citizens as slaves has elected an African American to the nation’s highest office. I salute Mr Obama for his inclusive and positive campaign that has invigorated the normally apathetic youth voters to come out in droves to exercise their democratic right to vote.

His victory speech in Grant Park, Chicago, struck a chord in me with its message of inclusiveness and bipartisanship. I find this severely lacking in Singapore. PAP leaders don’t really bother with campaigning really hard and fighting for votes. They appeal to Singaporeans to support them during campaigning and then spend the next five years talking down to us, making important decisions without meaningful consultation (remember the casino issue?) and chiding us for expecting the government to help when we are in a crisis (minibonds and high notes issue).

While Obama vows that “to those Americans whose support I have yet to earn – I may not have won your vote, but I hear your voices, I need your help, and I will be your President too”, former PM Goh Chok Tong openly threatened constituencies that voted for the opposition that their HDB estates would “become slums”. His exact words were, “Your [housing development] through your own choice will be left behind. They become slums. That’s my message”.

He said this on Nomination Day in 1996. He had the audacity to threaten Singaporeans because he was confident that Singaporeans would not complain too aggressively against such blatant discrimination and would vote for the PAP anyway.

Obama also graciously thanked his opponent John McCain for his congratulations and promised to work together with him in the future. I can only dream that PM Lee can thank his opponents for a worthy and challenging campaign. He is highly unlikely to stand in a rally and say, “I thank my worthy opponents from [insert political party] and promise to work closely with the opposition to ensure the progress and prosperity of this nation which we all call home”. PAP leaders are never really gracious anyway.

The PAP titled its 2006 election manifesto “Staying Together, Moving Ahead”. But it has failed to live up to this promise.

1. It has denied our gay community the right to equality.

2. It has failed to ensure that the rights of all Singaporeans to freedom of speech, assembly and association are protected.

3. It has failed to keep the population informed by not disclosing information such as GIC and Temasek Holdings’ full financial records, the breakdown of HDB flat costs and even the financial statements of town councils that invest our money.

4. It has denied the rights of Potong Pasir and Hougang residents to public housing upgrades available to PAP constituencies, violating their right to equality.

5. It has prevented non-PAP politicians from playing a decisive role in Singapore politics by trying to create and maintain political hegemony. This denies Singaporeans our right to take part in public affairs and isolates us from the political space and process.

PAP leaders, especially MM Lee, love to claim that the Western model of democracy is bad for Singapore as it is too individualistic and that Singapore’s model safeguards the welfare of society as a whole ahead of the individual. Barack Obama has shattered this lie. He has shown that when the situation demands it, Americans can and will elect a president who promotes the welfare of society as a whole while at the same time protects their fundamental liberties.

Obama is promising to do in America what the PAP has consistently failed or refused to do in Singapore. As a Singaporean youth who will be eligible to vote in 4 years time, a message of hope, inclusiveness and change appeals to me more than the message of political restrictions, blatant discrimination and threats.

I await Singapore’s Obama and our moment of change.

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About the author:

Dhevarajan Devadas is a Year 1 student studying mass communication in Ngee Ann Polytechnic. He is 17-years old.

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Read also: The contrast between Singapore and American politicians by blogger Singapore Citizen.

———–

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2. Malaysia’s defining moment and the new economic agenda
3. Does Singapore have a climate change policy?

Although the immediate outlook for the world economy looks grim, the historical experience of the emerging markets pulling the world economy along will point the way forward when recovery gets under way.
As the global financial crisis continues to unveil itself, leading OECD economies were already on a united dive into recession, driven by simultaneous collapse in consumer and business spending and the rising threat of job losses and bankruptcies. A vicious cycle emerges: deteriorating economies drag down prospects for companies and debt defaults, which further damages the financial markets and thus the economies concerned.

For the financial economy, the problem is greater than simply adding up the bad debts. The mark-down of all debts (good and bad) on the basis of the dramatic slide in asset prices has an insidious effect. Such a mark-down has the potential to destroy more financial institutions. Few have the cash and reserves to readily cover the gap, and raising new funds in current conditions is virtually impossible.

(Left: Figure 1: Financial Market Liquidity)

This is best demonstrated by the rapid disappearance of the bulge bracket US investment banks.

1. March 2008: Bear Stearns was taken over by JP Morgan.
2. September 2008: Bank of America purchased Merrill Lynch.
3. September 2008: Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy.
4. October 2008: Goldman Sachs & Morgan Stanley become commercial banks.

For household and companies alike, the risk is no longer limited to cutting down on budget. The immediate threat is the freezing up of credit and the struggle to access working capital that pays wages and input costs. The loss in spending already in the pipeline is enough to cause a nasty global recession: GDP will probably fall by at least 1-2% in the US and Europe in 2009. However, taking into account the current turmoil, the drop in US and Europe GDP could escalate to proportions more typically seen in Third World debt crises. Some pessimists have estimated a drop of as much as 10%.

To illustrate the stark impact of the credit crunch, the State of California is having problems with credit lines necessary to pay teachers’ wages. During the 1997-98 Asian Financial Crisis, Asian companies could not even get the finance to ship goods out of the factories and the ports. It is no wonder that the ASEAN labour ministers recently warned that job cuts would be expected in the region.

Will recession engulf the global economy?

In general, economic decoupling refers to the growth in one area of the world economy becoming less dependent on growth in another area. Up to mid-2008, the emerging market economies remained strong and the process of decoupling from US and European economies that had been in evidence for some years offered the hope that they could keep world growth going. However, the global financial crisis has deepened so dramatically that the validity of the decoupling theory is starting to show cracks.

Although the emerging market economies‘ growth rates are much higher than the OECD average rate, and this gap has widened, the cyclical pattern for most years is very similar. In other words, OECD and the developing world growth rates continue to be highly correlated. Decoupling is only a temporary phenomena. Sustained high growth in the emerging market economies has been supported by successful diversification in the engines of growth, with stronger dynamics in domestic consumption in the emerging market economies offsetting slower growth exports to OECD countries.

(Right: Figure 2: Contribution to Global GDP (Source: IMF)

In fact, the share of emerging market economies‘ exports to the US has dropped below 15% of the total from the peak of about 25% in 1997. Diversification reduces exposure to specific risks but it does not rule out systematic risks. It is widely thought that the global financial crisis is the result of over-flourishing of systematic risk in the global financial system. This view was in fact echoed in Couterparty Risk Management Policy Group‘s submission Containing Systematic Risk: The Road to Reform to the US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson in August 2008. A systematic overhaul of the global financial system is overdue, but there is no quick-fix solution that can halt a global recession.

Will China rescue the global economy?

It is widely regarded that the Chinese economy will play an important role in limiting the damage of a global recession. After all, China has been the mainstay of world growth over the last couple of years. The growth dynamics of the Chinese economy has shifted markedly in favour of domestic demand over the export-orientated model. While the IMF forecasted Chinese economic growth for 2009 to be 9.3%, Standard Chartered Bank forecasted 7.3% for the same period. It is expected that Chinese demand will continue to act as drivers for growth globally and regionally.

A consumer boom has finally materialised after many years of the Chinese government trying to boost spending and curb excess savings. Such policies include taxing savings accounts and granting more public holidays. Chinese retail sales in 2008 have grown by more than 20% while investment growth remained high at 25%. At the same time, soaring Chinese exports to the rest of Asia and other high-growth regions have taken over sales to the US as the main drivers of export growth.

The Chinese government, which has currency reserves of US$1.9 trillion, has announced a series of measures to address the bleak economic outlook. The Chinese government will increase infrastructure spending, raise export tax rebates, reduce property transaction fees, encourage banks to lend more money to small- and medium-sized companies, and introduce new programmes to support farmers. Furthermore, economists expect the central bank to cut interest rates for the third time this year.

Last but not least, inflation is not a threat. There are severe excess capacities in many Chinese business sectors, so businesses would have to lower prices in the domestic market at a time when China‘s exports to the US, which accounts for 21-23 per cent of China‘s goods and services, are slowing down. The RMB, which has been rising in tandem with the US$, is counter-intuitively boosted by the credit crisis. This is due to fears that the financial crisis in Europe is even worse than in the US. The strengthening of the RMB against most currencies is therefore deflationary for China.

However, there are warning signs in the Chinese economy that cannot be taken lightly. The Chinese government‘s main price index for 70 cities fell modestly last month. There is also more conclusive evidence of an impending slump in the market. Last year, the number of properties sold increased by 26%, but in the first half of this year, it fell by 11%. In August 2008, the amount of floor space under construction fell. This was backed by weak figures for steel and cement production. Car sales grew by 23% last year but it fell by 5% for the first half of this year. On the other hand, real urban income only grew by 5% for the first half of this year, whereas it grew by 12% last year.

The light at the end of the tunnel

Persistently high global growth has been due not just to the sustained buoyancy of emerging markets, but also to the greater impact this now has on global GDP because of the rising weight of the emerging markets in the global GDP. A non-OECD recession must involve additional risks such as a slump in the domestic investment and consumer confidence.

Although the immediate outlook for the world economy looks grim, the historical experience of the emerging markets pulling the world economy along will point the way forwad when recovery gets under way. Growing cooperation across central banks in the face of a serious and common challenge is also a positive development in mitigating the risk of a global recession. The degree to which all countries have seen similar impacts and responses to the crisis has heightened the sense of all being in this together.

Perhaps this bodes well for further global policy coordination in other arenas. After all, a global problem requires a global solution.

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Instead of helping the elderly, a group of undergraduates decided to engage in a different sort of community service – helping married couples bond.

Held last Saturday, “Project M” is an event organised by six first-year students as part of a compulsory course in Singapore Management University (SMU). The course requires each team of students to organise a community service programme and learn about leadership and team-building skills in the process.

A total of 19 couples participated in the whole-day event, which lasted from morning to evening.

Recognising that communication is the most important factor in keeping a relationship going, the team hoped that “Formula M” would help couples gain more awareness on how they can better communicate with their partners.

“Sometimes people are so caught up with work that they forget their commitment with their other halves. So we hope that through this event couples can make some adjustments by communicating more,” said 19-year-old Ms Elycia Koh, who was one of the student organisers.

To incorporate some fun elements into an otherwise ordinary workshop for couples, the team started off their event with two physical activities, “Blind Maze” and “Formula Race to test the communication and cooperation level between couples.

“Blind Maze” is a game that required one partner to be blind-folded and be guided by the other partner through obstacles while “Formula Race” required couples to find their way to several designated places based on given clues.

A workshop on communication between couples followed. Led by Fei Yue Community Services’ Family Life Educator Ms Evelyn Khong, the workshop turned out to be an interactive session that saw couples engaging in discussions and small tests to find out their respective love communication styles.

Mrs Crissy Lau, 50, who is married for 20 years, thinks that an event like this is a good way to spend time with her husband. “People should do this more instead of going shopping,” said Mrs Lau, who also revealed that she particularly enjoyed the physical activities held before the workshop.

But the physical activities failed to attract all the couples who signed up. In fact,13 out of 19 couples who attended the workshop opted out of the activities.

Mrs Lau also felt that one of the reasons why couples chose to opt out could be their busy schedule, but she felt such events is definitely worth taking the time off to attend.

“Busyness can often become overly used as an excuse to avoid spending time with one another,” she said.

Besides married couples, the event was also open to dating couples.

University undergraduate Geri Lin, 21, who attended the event with her boyfriend, felt it was not suprising that some couples would find it hard to commit to the event for the whole day, “especially if they have young kids in tow.”

Nevertheless, she finds it encouraging that young undergraudates are concerned enough about such issues to organise such an event.

“Very often, young dating couples don’t know who to go for advice and they usually go to our friends who are equally clueless,” said Ms Lin, who had asked a group of couple friends to come along.

19-year-old Amanda Lau – who is one of the organisers – added that the team was initially worried that older couples would not take the committee members seriously as they are only first-year undergraduate students. But they overcame the anxiety by inviting an experienced speaker like Ms Khong to add credibility to their event.

In fact, majority of the participating couples think that there should be more events like this in the future to remind couples of the importance of communication.

Participant Ho Wei Xiang, 21, said that while the benefits of the event are long-term, many people do not realise the importance of it. But such events are definitely helpful as they teach lessons that couples can apply to their daily lives

The student organisers, too, hope that they would inspire others to organise similar events at a larger scale.

“This is a pilot test for everyone to see if such things will work in Singapore. If it is, then they can adopt the idea and make it bigger,” said Ms Koh.

Pictures by Sijia.

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Related posts:

1. Strengthening the marriage bond
2. TOC Report: Singaporean, 57, employed, married but cannot buy HDB flat
3. Goh Chok Tong: The pioneer bond-breaker?

Turning 21 in Singapore means a lot of things – one of which is that I have the right to vote and the ability to choose the political leadership that I want for the community and the country. On another note, it also means that I am now an adult, and in the coming years, I will enter the “real world” as I leave the university, facing real responsibilities and real consequences.

For me, and for most other males in Singapore who are fresh out of National Service (NS), entering university and becoming an adult is the normal run of things. But I know this is not so for most other Singaporeans.

The Singapore (Parents’) Dream

The notion of the Singapore dream still exists among parents – I know my parents still believe in this, and they are driven to work hard to ensure that I can continue with my tertiary education here, and this is why I can study in NUS without worrying about finances. Work hard, reach university, land a good job, earn thousands per month, work harder, get promoted, stay filial, become a big shot, start a family, have kids, save and retire. I think this sums up the Singapore dream most parents have for their kids. My parents believed in it enough to invest in encyclopedias while I was still in primary school fantasising about dinosaurs.

However, I also know that more middle-aged Singaporeans, especially the retiring baby-boomers, are also losing faith in Singapore. They see Singapore as a hyper-competitive place where people either thrive or dive, where there is hardly any middle space left for people to live in. I know this because of my background. I can safely say that through these few short years I’ve lived I’ve pretty much been around the entire socio-economic spectrum.

Change – experiencing different worlds

I stay in Geylang, and I still do. I have lived long enough to see my own neighbourhood change ever so subtly through the passing years. For one, the neighbourhood playground has less kids nowadays, the faces at the neighbourhood park have grown more wrinkles, and I see more foreign workers hanging around in the parks.

Until my junior college days, my life pretty much revolved around the neighbourhood. The world beyond Geylang was strange to me, and other than some bookshops in Orchard, I was ignorant about the rest of the world. Until of course, I arrived at JC. There, I came across a different world: one of affluence, elitism and social class. In JC, I felt out of place, not because of my grades but because of my outlook. Living in the neighbourhood and being sheltered from the world did not prepare me for the world out there at all.

In the neighbourhood, being slightly better in academic grades seemed to make all the difference; in JC, being slightly better made no difference at all. And there was of course, the difference in affluence. LV, Prada, and all the Italian and French and other European labels were alien to me. I had simply no idea what affluence meant at all.

In time, I became used to friends staying in landed property in wealthy Sixth Avenue, or hearing about some other kid in JC (whose parents are high up in the civil service) doing something scandalous or something like that. Even today, I am still trying to get used to this other affluent social universe out there that I would otherwise never have dreamed of on my own.

National Service

In NS, another world opened up for exploration. I entered a unit where they still had direct ‘mono’ intake, taking in people who fell through the cracks of secondary school and ITE; older teenagers who simply became disinterested in studying and wandered aimlessly through life and pretty much having to do NS because they had nothing else to do. A lot of these people were simply that – something else in life other than school had distracted them so much that they left it; some were even doing illegal things – things that blew my mind. They told me of the close shaves they had hanging out with gangs in Geylang (Gangs of Geylang; has a better ring to it than Gangs of New York), and for them staying in camp was a kind of protection. A close friend of mine told me about his NS story of being in the Military Police, handling cases of drug addicts. I am not sure what the affluent kids who lived with gilded spoons would say to these people. Would they tell them to “get out of my uncaring face”?

I can’t.

What next?

I can’t, because I’ve stayed in Geylang too, and I have friends who got distracted in life and lost their way in school. I have practically lost touch with my primary school friends, many of whom came from less-privileged backgrounds where academic grades were never a priority, not because they are stupid, but because they didn’t have the motivation to work hard for themselves, and probably were never encouraged by their families. They are just people who have well, lost their way.

And now I’m in university, in some atas programme, taking pride that I can actually speak Hokkien quite decently even as I got an A1 for GP during A’ Levels. I don’t think a lot of people can say the same.

For me, turning 21 meant something else, other than the usual, ‘Oh I’m 21 and I can now…’ things. Having gone through these experiences, having lived through different social environments, and now, having arrived at such a privileged position in education, what then?

For the moment, I have taken to writing for The Online Citizen lorh.

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The minute something interesting and distinctive begins to develop in the heart of town, we pull out our guns and go “shoot the eyesore”.

A few weeks ago, I opened up the Lifestyle section of the Straits Times on Sunday to read some food reviews, when I chanced upon an article by Cara Van Miriah. Titled “Oh my, is this Orchard Road?” (ST 5^th October 2008), the article examines the “infestation” of our beloved shopping belt by buskers, foreign workers, touters, makeshift stalls and other such miscreants, all of whom the article suggests tarnish the image Orchard Road has (ostensibly) built up for itself as a swanky, world class shopping belt.

Some Singaporeans chimed in, asking ‘how can Orchard Road be a world-class shopping haven and rival other major cities such as Tokyo when it is a free-for-all zone for anyone to hawk their stuff?’, perhaps in reference to the “particularly irksome”, “cacophonous” strains of buskers trying to make a living amidst the noise of nearby roadshows.

Others who responsed to the article, such as one Suden Lim Li Huang (ST 11^th October 2008), reasons that “Parkway Parade, Toa Payoh and Bishan Junction 8 are better places to shop . . . [because she does] not have to fight with the maids for toilets and seats in the foodcourt”, or, it seems, jostle with the foreign workers having picnics along “narrow walkway[s]”.

Orchard Road a “pasar malam”

The same Suden Lim is principally concerned with how “Orchard Road is packed with domestic workers, buskers, tissue-paper sellers, ice-cream vendors and people distributing flyers. It has lost its glamour, prestige and class.” It has, to borrow Cara Van Miriah’s term, become a pasar malam.

I do not suppose the same people above would take too kindly to the hordes of, say, whiny, screechy teenagers crowding out Takashimaya and Paragon where there are, after all, way too many things that they cannot hope to afford, or the middle aged aunties and uncles frolicking about in underdressed splendour, flip flops slapping noisily against the Orchard Road walkway, wet and sticky with ice cream spilled by screaming children in off-colour Pokemon tee-shirts. Let us not even begin to talk about foreign workers- it seems the only kinds of foreign workers that are to be tolerated in Orchard Road are either carrying screaming babies and Jason’s Supermarket plastic bags for their yuppie-couple employers, or white.

That, of course, would have been impolite to articulate, because it would come across as being intolerant and elitist and snobbish. When Singaporeans complain about bunches and bunches of people besmirching our high class shopping paradise with their “vaguely artistic” harmonica-playing, wooden-ball swinging, tissue-paper selling antics, they are lauded as being concerned Singaporeans. It would be impolite for us to suggest that the sight of low class, poor people eking out a living in our premier atas hangout is what is really bugging us.

But that’s exactly what the article is about, isn’t it? Orchard Road is rich-man’s land, you shouldn’t be here. I remember, years ago, that there used to be a field where the Orchard Ion is now, and that every Sunday there would huge numbers of foreign workers having picnics on that field, right smack in the middle of town. Now that the field has been torn down to make way for even more swanky shopping, these same people have moved their picnics and gatherings elsewhere in Orchard Road, just in time for Singaporeans to complain that they are a public nuisance. It seems we’re more than happy to have foreign workers come here to do work we’re too loathe to do ourselves, but only if we don’t have to see them or, as recent developments show us, live near them.

Perhaps, in very much the same way, we accept the fact that there are people who have to do all sorts of peculiar things to earn money- sell tissue paper or ice cream or play the harmonica along Orchard Road, say- but having to see and move around with them in a place otherwise noted for being “high class” ruffles our middle class feathers.

Shoot the eyesore

The way I see it, we stand to gain more from this “infestation” of Orchard Road than we would from clearing it out. These buskers and makeshift stalls and tissue paper sellers and maids having picnics in the heart of town, rather than being mere nuisances, actually add to the quirkiness and eccentricity, hustle and bustle, charm and maybe even the cultural diversity that one might identify with a dynamic downtown location. Singaporeans complain that we do not have a distinct identity and culture to call our own, but the minute something interesting and distinctive begins to develop in the heart of town, we pull out our guns and go “shoot the eyesore”.

Such colour is anything but an eyesore. Walking along Orchard Road one evening, I saw, in succession, a bunch of Indian guys playing tablas sitting at the fountain outside Ngee Ann City, the pretty Pipa-playing lady, the harmonica-playing uncle belting out Hokkien tunes and that great bunch of feather-clad Native American musicians somewhere along the walkway between Ngee Ann City and Wisma Atria. I remember thinking to myself, “wow, that’s pretty cool”.

I personally think that this mish-mash, free-for-all daily bazaar in our downtown is precisely what we need for Orchard Road to become truly memorable and distinctive, not just another up-market tourist attraction to check off a list of “things to do in Singapore”. The only thing remotely high class about Orchard Road, after all, is the fact that it houses brand names that aren’t even Singaporean. All the Louis Vuittons, Pradas and Chanels of this “shopping paradise” are by-products of globalization, the “uniformication” of places all over the world- so how can we begin to think that selling goods that are available in virtually every other up-market shopping district worldwide is going to make Orchard Road some sort of shopping capital of Southeast Asia, let alone Asia?

Dogmatically intolerant

One Roberta Wong, responding to the above article (ST 11^th October 2008), writes that “shopping in Orchard Road [is not] an incredibly dynamic retail experience. It cannot hold a candle to places such as Nathan Road in Hong Kong or Shibuya in Tokyo” which combine swanky shopping with makeshift stalls, cultural diversity and local eccentricities. Being intolerant to the varieties of people who choose to pepper Orchard Road with their music, wares and activities is cutting off a perfectly natural avenue for making the place more fascinating and vibrant than our reputation for being straight-laced and sterile will lead others to believe.

Yet, if it is one thing we Singaporeans have precisely shown ourselves to be in these past months, it is intolerant. People like foreign workers, buskers and tissue-paper sellers who, while not exactly in the same personal situations, are alike in appearing so starkly different and “lower” in a society that has no sympathy whatsoever for their estrangement- from their homes, from wealth, from society. Now, we see that they are roundly criticized for encroaching on Singaporeans’ shopping space in an attempt to make some money for themselves or to break the monotony of working away at jobs Singaporeans themselves refuse to take up. To borrow the logic of Cara Van Miriah’s article, how are we ever going to become the next New York, or Paris or London if we are so dogmatically intolerant?

Alas, in pursuit of becoming “world class”, we’ve found that there really is nothing more to it than class, class, class.

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Related posts:

1. TOC YOUTH WEEK: Yes to elites but no to elitism
2. TOC YOUTH WEEK: Don’t blame the education system – speak up!
3. TOC YOUTH WEEK: Young S’poreans’ sense of entitlement

Thng Yi Ren / Student

The recent emergence of the Speaker’s Corner has surfaced issues that have haunted us for many years. Is there truly a perceived ‘silent but prevalent’ atmosphere of surveillance that haunts us? Are we really subjugated within a repressive Panopticon as envisioned by Foucault, where the means and ability to formulate thought are already hampered?

As a 17-year-old who has just finished his JC Promotional Examinations, a wild streak within me calls out to launch an application for a slot at the Speaker’s Corner to voice out certain problems ranging from the sub-prime crisis to the Serangoon Gardens foreign workers issue.

However, while the young radical within desires to launch into a fierce tirade about the attrition of morality in a face of an egocentric mindset as witnessed from the Serangoon Gardens incident, the rational me went back one step to evaluate.

“I’m only 17!”

“I’m already 17!”

Do my thoughts originate from the various self-help courses that I have been subjected to from my secondary school days?

“Believe in yourself! You can do it!”

Am I simply a radical at heart?

Allow me to make a generalisation I observed from my peers in school. As utilitarian as it may sound, I do think that schools are an excellent social laboratories (pardon the utilitarian undertones).

I think that it is not the student’s lack of desire to voice out their own opinions that is the issue. Rather, putting aside all aspects of self-consciousness, it is the recognition by oneself of his or her lack of understanding and insight into the real world that discourages the expression of one’s opinion.

Of course, to make such a generalisation may potentially draw flak from many, in that I as a student may also be a guilty of it. However, I qualify my generalisation simply from a perennial response that is often heard when someone is asked to speak up: “I don’t know.” While some may argue that it is simply shyness that discourages one from speaking up, I would humbly beg to differ.

A simple analogy to highlight my point is the assessment of students’ knowledge of current affairs (secondary school students would know it as the NE Quiz while Tertiary students would have their assessment based upon their respective institute’s own initiative). How many really know what is going on in the world today? How many actively seek out these facts (and not for the purpose of the GP examination)?

Are you interested?

Before we get too engaged in this entire argument about whether students are interested, let’s take a step back to reflect. Do you yourself have a desire to speak up? Would you be contented to hide behind your computer screen, in the comfort of your armchair and music in the background, simply viewing my ‘rambling’ as a sort of entertainment? It is an amusing spectacle to watch a 17-year old boy finding some sort of glories in his own ignorance, showing the world his own inadequacy. Or would you rather see my flaws and engage me in a discussion – be it on this platform or contact me directly to enlighten me?

This entire problem of not speaking up, not understanding the world can simply be obscured and we may choose the convenient route to dump the entire burden upon that Ministry operating in Buona Vista. However, I firmly believe that it is a flawed causality relationship to say that the Education policy is flawed and therefore students have no ability or no courage to speak up. In fact, the onus, in my humble opinion, is truly with the students.

Shaping the learning community

While many may be quick to dismiss me that this has been highlighted countless times, I really do wonder how many actually appreciate the substratum of wisdom beneath the concept of the learning community. If we accept the assumption that the Ancient Greeks were the pioneers of a civilized society, then many aspects of pedagogy and education can be gleamed from the model that was formulated.

The Greeks pioneered a triumvirate approach to learning in Rhetoric, Grammar and Logic. This inculcated the various dimensions of learning, developing both the regions of the cognitive and the presentation of one vis-a-vis speech. However, while the curriculum may pay much emphasis on the development of these skills, the actual bulk of learning was done in the student community itself. Learned men like Socrates and Plato led discussions, thereby encouraging more and more people to speak up and be exposed to a great variety of topics, ranging from the hair-splitting technical aspects of philosophy to the stars in astronomy to mathematics.

What am I driving at? This article is not a policy recommendation for a Heuristic or Maieutic approach. I laud the many generations of educators, some of which have played major roles in directing me through the various challenges of life. It is my humble attempt as a plea for highly-educated individuals in society to play a greater role in shaping the learning community of Singapore.

Please stand up and speak up

Without going into specific statistics, it is widely acknowledge that Singapore has one of the highest literacy rates in the world. What happened to the many brilliant students of each generation? Are they simply too busy caught up in their own world? As a student, I yearn for access to policy-makers not only at organized national forums, but simply to be able to converse with them about my own personal response.

Please stand up and speak up. I am shifting the burden of speaking up and understanding the world onto individuals in society who have the exposure and the educational backing to enlighten and to educate. While teachers in school may provide much insight, one’s resources are ultimately limited. I give credit where it is due: my tutors in school are definitely very capable, but someone working on the ground like the MAS would be able to highlight issues on the sub-prime crisis better.

It is heartening to note that the Straits Times offers a great variety of articles across a wide spectrum, and of course, to say that the proliferation of Internet literature from Wikipedia to academic papers has aided many is a great understatement. However, to progress, I believe greater correspondence is required.

As a reader, it may be a passive activity that necessitates little or no action on one’s part. However, as a correspondence, a direct response onto the views highlighted by a particular individual would require serious reflection about one’s views.

I do dream of a day where highly skilled professionals would take on a more active role to educate us the students. Students, much has been said about apathy and indifference. It is your life, choose it the way you want, but perhaps the rite of passage would require a certain appreciation of the world around us. The avenues are present, the infrastructure is ready.

Adults, stand up to teach and educate; and students, sapare aude: Dare to know.

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About the author:

Yiren is 17 years old and is a student in a junior college.

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Related posts:

1. TOC YOUTH WEEK: Yes to elites but no to elitism
2. TOC Youth Week: Get out of town
3. TOC YOUTH WEEK: Young S’poreans’ sense of entitlement