Doesn’t matter if Town Councils are politicised or not politicised

This seems to be the views of Warren Fernandez and Han Fook Kwang in their articles posted in the Sunday Times. Warren Fernandez wrote, ‘Most people, I believe, are not overly bothered whether town councils are political entities or not. Whatever the set up, they just want to be assured that the place will be well run.’ And this was Han Fook Kwang’s contribution, ‘As a Straits Times poll published last Wed reported, most residents said they were not interested in the politics of estate management; they just wanted their neighbourhood cleaned.’

I agree that the findings are normal. It is just like the citizens do not really care who won the GE and form the govt as long as the country is well run and the people’s interests are taken care of. Generally the majority are apolitical, apathetic to politics, disinterested, and want to be left alone to live their lives while the govt or town councils take care of the environment.

The people do not care if the town councils or govt are politicised. Should they care? Why do politicians want to politicise town councils? The answer is obvious. The politicisation of town councils or any institutions is to serve the interest of the politicians. Period.

Han Fook Kwang asked a pertinent question. When town councils are politicised, is there a conflict of interest? A non politicised town council or institution will work for a stated mission without the entanglements of politicians and political interest. Politicians exist for their own vested interest and political interest. The non political interest of govt or govt link institutions may be compromised by the very politicisation of the institutions. And when there is a conflict of interest, the political interest often takes precedent. And often, the political interest will cloud the interests of the institution and the people it is duty bound to serve. Tiok boh?

Would it happen, has it happen, that politicisation of town councils or institutions has compromised their reason of existence and the good of the people they are taking care of?

Though the people may not be interested in the politicisation or non politicisation of town councils and institutions, they cannot ignore and be not interested in such a development as their interest is at stake and often compromised. It is thus not a matter of the people not being interested. The people must be educated and be informed that it is in their interest to ensure that town councils and govt institutions are not politicised. Failing to educate the people on this important point and allowing the people to be misled into a state of dullness, thinking that it doesn’t matter is irresponsible.



It is in the people’s interest, like it or not, to prevent town councils and govt institutions from being politicised even if in practice it is easier said than done. It is like the sacrosanct aspirations of freedom of speech, protection of the rights of citizens in the Constitution, they must be in the Constitution to protect the people. They cannot be rewritten out of the Constitution just because the people are not interested, do not mind. It matters!

Intoxication, a piece of RAR art

I have selected 10 of my RAR art paintings for artsyshark.com. Artsy Shark, an American arts promoter, will be promoting my paintings as one of their featured artists.

The logic of faith and the logic of law

Six Church leaders of the City Harvest Church that preached prosperity gospel are in court to defend against charges of misappropriation of the Church’s building fund to the tune of $50.6m.

It was alleged that $24m were funneled to support the singing career of Ho Yeow Sun, wife of the Church’s founding pastor Kong Hee. The money was invested in a sham bond investment fund. Another $26.6m was misused to cover up this sham investment.

This case is not simply a legal matter to be judged in the courts of law. It is apparent that it is an issue of faith versus man made laws. Who would emerge triumphant and cleanse at the end of the trial is quite obvious. To the staunch believers, the church elders could do no wrong in the name of God. They have more or less made up their minds and are fully behind the elders and praying sincerely for their innocence and release.

Should they be found innocent, God is great. Should they be found guilty, in their eyes they are still innocent and God is great. It is very difficult for non believers to understand how the believers view this case and how supportive they are for their elders and how strong they believe that they are innocent and were doing the work of God, as servants of God.

I am watching this case with distinterest interest and am in awe at what is happening. I am not making any comment or taking sides which will be seen as provocative and my blog could likely be overwhelmed either way.

At the end of the trial, there will be a humanly verdict pronounced by the courts. What would be the Godly verdict?

Jeremy Chen – Nation Wide Town Council Management System

Jeremy Chen has proposed a NWTCMS for a cost of $1.2m, (700k for software development and $500k for hardware). Or is it $700k as he claimed? Nevermind, the number is just too good to believe in a way when the latest tender was $16.8m.

I was thinking of walking into Sim Lim or Funan to buy the software off the shelf. I don’t think those places have software that costs more than $20k each. But I am no software specialists and maybe they have things like $100k or $200k. Still quite cheap really. Anyway, disregard this comment as I don’t think it can be done this way.

Jeremy Chen’s proposal is more serious and looks like he did some thinking to come out with the numbers. But I still think it is too cheap. I double or triple his price if he can come up with a workable one as he has proposed. I am sure MND would be most happy to have such a cheap system.

Talking about cheap, when I read $700k, I already give up. How can any system be good that is so cheap? Not likely. The bench mark already set, from $23.8m to $16.8m to be reasonable for such a system, and not for the whole island, just a few TCs or a smaller grouping of one TC plus one two single ward constituencies. Jeremy’s number is just too troubling and too unbelieveable.

Even if it works, Jeremy should not put it up as he is saboing the businesses of other vendors and making the buyers looked silly. CBF has no place in this episode. I wonder if MND would throw out a challenge to Jeremy to produce the proposed system and buy it from him at Jeremy’s price with a special bonus of $2m to top it up for doing the impossible?

I am salivating already. Any thinking businessman wants to approach Jeremy, throw him his asking price, get the system working and sell it to MND for $5m? It is still a steal at $5m when the cheapest is $16.8m. Make it $6.8m, sounds better.

Jeremy must be given credit to come out with this outrageous price. You see, everyone is now accustomed or conditioned to think that a TCMS must cost tens of millions. No one would think of anything cheaper. And $16.8m from $23.8m, wow, great savings, good buy. But what is the real cost of such a system, aka, what is the real cost of a HDB flat? Jeremy has said that it could be as low as $1.2m or $700k. This must have woken up many people who have been sleeping or in stupor. Like Boon Wan said, a TCMS is not highly sophisticated software and could be bought over the shelf. The functions are ordinary at best with some addition or customisation to accommodate some local features. What is so complicated about it that it must cost tens of millions?

Many small entrepreneurs or computer science students could develop such a software with no big issue and in double quick time.

Shane Todd case – A test of competence

The Tribunal to reinvestigate the investigation of the Shane Todd death is taking a different dimension. While the objective of all parties concerned is the truth, it has become a test of professionalism of our police force and the justice system. But that is not all. It is also a competition between our very best professionals and their skills in investigating a suicide/murder case against the expertise of the ‘best’ in the US.

Through the process of reviewing what had been done by the police previously, the side representing the complainant has all the information on the table for them to put under the microscope to dissect, and to bring in the very ‘best’ experts they could find that think they have a case to prove and that the earlier findings were wrong or done unprofessionally.

The team that handled the investigation is now the investigated and the defending party, not the merits of the case.  They have to prove their worth, that they are professional and competent, and now, to prove to the ‘best’ from the US that the local team is really professional, competent and pushovers.

The outcome of this case is challenging and a lot is at stake. Can our local talents hold their ground against the ‘best’ foreign talents and indirectly prove the fallacy that foreign talents are better than our local talents? So far our local talents are doing quite well to defend point by point thrown at them, and any inadequacy or inability to fend off the attack will create a big dent in their credibility and professionalism.

Competency is in question and at stake. The credibility of the men in blue is put to a severe test in public. This is like war and they rightly deserve a medal if they could pull through and defend their ground against the attackers. I can only say, do not be cowed by the foreign ‘best’ which look very ordinary so far.