5/24/2011
Politicians are servants of the people too
Politicians are servants of the people. Are civil servants also servants of the people? Why should civil servants serve the people in the comfort of govt offices built and paid by the public coffers while politicians have to meet the people in void decks or in places at their own expense? Is the work and service of politicians less important than those of civil servants?
We have built comfortable office buildings for Town Councils and Community Clubs for the PAs to serve the people. Is it too much to provide a reasonable office place for the MPs to serve the people in these institutions?
The allowance paid to MPs will not be enough if they have to pay for an office space just to look after the people. In principle it should not be so. It is public service, and free service to the people. It is also a duty to the people. The MPs are elected by the people to serve the people and solve their problems. If the civil servants are entitled to proper office space, why can’t the elected representative of the people be entitled to one as well?
It is pathetic to see the people meeting their MPs in void decks which are not meant for such purposes. Would there be a mindset change? Maybe we cannot afford such basic necessities for a servant of the people. The servants of the people can only meet the people in void decks or any little corners that are permitted by the authorities, or they will have to pay for the place. How many would accept this kind of logic inherited from the past? Change? Change is a very difficult thing to do if the heart is not there.
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6 comments:
The problem is the PAP has always treated the opposition parties with contempt, regardless that these opposition members are now elected MPs - people's choice. They have by so doing, intentionally or otherwise, extended this contempt to the people of these wards. Just like the upgrading carrot.
Well, carry on like that and I wonder how they are ever going to win any opposition-held constituency back. In the scheme of things, these may not be big issues but they all add up and people are not likely to forget.
Change? Reform? Tranform?
a picture tells a thousand words.
seeing an MP holding his session in a void deck may invoke in people a sense of the difficult condition that he has to contend with and thus instil empathy for him or her.
perhaps the party of the MP concerned has chosen to operate it in this way and elicit mileage out of it?
I propose to make the MPs pay for the use of space for office for meet-the-people sessions.
Thus it will be equally available to PAP and opposition.
Space in CC, PCF and RCs. All built by public funds. Why should be restricted to PAP affiliated only?
I believe it was done on purpose, to make the opposition look bad, bearing in mind the Ogre's pronouncement that the PAP is not out to help the opposition and those who voted for them. QED.
But they forgot that most Singaporeans are less particular about opposition venues for meet the people sessions, because they know the odds that their opposition MPs have to go against.
Don't they forget who is the master. When MPs are serving the master, it is only proper to serve the master in a decent place. Don't punish the servant to punish the master at the same time.
Why is it that staff of Town Councils and PAs can have a proper office when the most honourable MP, the people's elected representative, cannot have a proper office?
There should be a decent budget provided for a MP to function appropriately. It cannot be left to rich man big office, poor man small or no office. Sori, I mean rich MP and poor MP.
The opposition MPs should continue to meet the people on the roadside and invite the foreign press to report on them, with colourful photos to show the world the work place of a first world MP when all ministers are paid in millions.
Channel News Asia did telecast the Workers Party Members Of Parliament meeting their constituents at the void deck.
The Sin Government did not keep the footages under wrapped(concealed), it is just that aliens are hardly interested in anything about Sin. Show it to the World and they will take it as not their business. The International Human Right of the United Nation ever intervened in the human right abuses in Sin? If it did not, why should others be bothered?
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