7/19/2013

It is just a poll


This latest poll was prompted by a very assertive statement from Hsien Loong arising from the hawker centre cleaning issue debated in Parliament. His statement, ‘Singapore has succeeded because we have honest, upright people in politics: people who can be trusted to uphold the public interest, to speak the truth even when it is inconvenient...’ And the poll is conducted to see whether the people agree or disagree with his statement. What do you think?

93% of the respondents disagree with Hsien Loong’s comment that Singapore has upright people in politics, people that can be trusted, to speak the inconvenient truths when needed. How come like that? Is this frightening, that the people don’t think we have upright and trustworthy people in politics?

The poll is just a poll and it is not conclusive to say that the people are right and we don’t have upright people in politics. We may have a lot of them, we may not. What the poll is saying is that they don’t believe, rightly or wrongly, that there are upright and trustworthy people in politics. This is bad enough. It is like an innocent guy in court while the jury insists he is guilty.

For the people to say so, alright, just the people who responded to the poll, it says something. What has the Govt done to deserve such mistrust from this group of people? Go do some soul searching ok?

The other point is for the Govt to do the right thing so that they can regain the trust and faith of the people, that they are good and upright and can be trusted to speak the truth. I think this is a trying task looking at the emotions today. Can the Govt change this negative perception?

What is bad is that if the perception of the people is true. In that case no medicine can cure this sickness. Habis lah.

Is this poll important to the Govt? It depends. It depends on whether they want to believe in it. It depends on how genuine or how close it is to the perception of the whole population. If this is a true representative of what the people perceived the Govt to be, it is definitely not pretty. The Govt and Hsien Loong can only hope that this poll is not representative, not real or biased, or only the views of a small group of anti PAP cynics.

What do you think?

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

The govt must do the RIGHT things NOW!!!!!

Many Singaporeans are crying......

Property prices at record high ..................

COE/car prices for entry level Japanese/Korean cars at record high ...............

Why cant these problems be solved?????????????????

Anonymous said...

When the declared aim of the PAP is to fix the oppositon how can they practice what they preach? GCT has put it another way:the opposition are like cancer cells, to be destroyed.But both the PM and GCT inherited the apparatus to do that from the master of illusion, LKY. You, RB, has asked us to move on. Yes, we should move on from this particular episode. But the saga reveals the extent to which the politicised public organs (state paid hacks, to use that colourful LKY description of the Indonesian counterparts during Confrontasi) and the PAP minions like Jonathan Oh and Ng Kok Khim can be used as the 5th army in the event of loss of power through the ballot box.The AIM saga is another example.Any wonder that LKY refused to answer Catherine Lim's question whether he would call in the army in the event of loss of power as a result of what they call a 'freak election'? Note the use of the word 'freak'. Presumably that appellation would justify such action. The citizens can expect more of such episodes as the incumbents fear of more seats in GE 2016.

Anonymous said...

"Can the Govt change this negative perception?"
RB

No need lah, as long as WP is the strongest opposition.

Then 60% will vote for the party that has a less negative perception, or the lesser of 2 evils.

Because it is stupid of majority voters to vote for a party which is not ready to be govt, tio bo?

Anonymous said...

/// Any wonder that LKY refused to answer Catherine Lim's question whether he would call in the army in the event of loss of power as a result of what they call a 'freak election'? ///

The army has already been called in!
How many generals and admirals are there in parliament?
How many generals are there in SMRT, NOL and etc.?

Anonymous said...

The propect of power loss is great that plan B has been activated. Army personnel are at all ministries and cabinet. Which ever take over power would have a hard time getting rid of them. What an exciting 2016!

Anonymous said...

Sin is in the hands of the Army since National Service was implemented.
And Sinkies love National Service; they have never opposed it.

Anonymous said...

Army no army who cares.....

JUST BRING PROPERTY AND CAR PRICES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anonymous said...

What is this survey compare to those conducted by Reach or those international survey agencies engaged by the Authority?
In the Last National Survey by votes, over 60% of Sinkies have affirmed their faith and trust in the PAP.
There is no doubt that PAP has the most trustworthy and talented calibres to rule Sin.

Anonymous said...

If pap can solve the extremely high property and car prices, they can get 80% at 2016 poll. If not ................they say only XX%.

Ha Ha Ha!

Anonymous said...

I think it will never bother them what is the sentiment of the people else they will not have gone this far. They know very well that they will always win any election. They can always stand by a few carton boxes of votes for most GRC in case of freak results. Anyway, election dept also reports to the PM.

Anonymous said...

Yep, it does not bother them. Same as the scenario of huge crowds at opposition rallies in the past, which they consider as just people out to enjoy the show, and does not translate into votes. But that ground reading was before GE 2011 and is outdated.

Now, I think it is affecting their over-confidence after their loss in BE Hougang and Punggol East.

Ye, it is just a poll. But it does send a psychological message of what is moving on the ground.

Ignore it at your own peril, PAP.