The things I would like the PAP MPs to raise in Parliament

There are many national issues that the people are unhappy about.  And these are not play play things like no water festivals or no tickets to watch the National Day Parade. They are very serious matters that affect their lives and livelihood. But these matters are somehow only raised by the opposition MPs. PAP MPs may disagree and want to tell me they have raised them too. I choose to disagree.

Perhaps the PAP MPs may want to prove me wrong by raising more issues that the people are unhappy about like 6.9m population, jobs for the unemployed or underemployed PMEs, discrimination by foreigners, including CEOs for recruiting their own kind and sacking Singaporeans in the process, scholarships/university places for foreigners, CPF withdrawal age, high COEs and unaffordable car ownership, housing for Sinkies that are banned from buying public flats, foreigners taking control of banking and finance industry, our universities being dominated and controlled by foreigners, etc etc.

There is only one reason why PAP MPs would not raise such questions. They do not see them as problems and are fully in support of govt policies in these matters. They believe the govt policies are right, on the right track. True?

If that be the case, let’s hope that when they left office, they would not stand up to say, actually they don’t agree. It would not reflect very well on them if they do so. It would by hypocritical. Now is the time for them to stand up for the people if they think the policies are not good for the people. It is now when they can do something, to say something, and not after they have left office and no longer consequential.

Funny, didn’t the people elected them to say things for them? Didn’t they say that if elected they would speak out for the people? There are many questions going to be raised in Parliament next week. Just watch what were being raised and are there anything that really mattered to the core interests of the people.

Kopi level Red yesterday.

Tommy Koh wants China to go ICJ to settle territorial disputes

Tommy wants China to place itself under the jurisdiction of modern day international laws when China’s claim to the South China Sea Islands was based on historical precedents during a time when it was finder’s keepers. China is claiming these islands that were uninhabited and they were the first to arrive on the islands to claim it.

Compares this to the Americans’ claim to North America and the Australian’s claims to Australia, the British’s claims to New Zealand, and other colonised countries, would the Americans, Australians, British New Zealanders be willing to go under the jurisdiction of the international courts if the native Red Indians, the aborigines and the Maoris make a claim to their land? Would the Americans go to courts with the Pacific Islanders wanting to reclaim their islands in the Pacific Ocean?

In the case of China and the South China Sea islands, once China agrees to go to the ICJ, it will open the Pandora box to every littoral states of the South China Seas to make their claims. And if the ICJ once decided that the new international laws supercede historical claims, China would stand to lose practically every island it claimed and under its sovereignty.

Why would China want to go to court and risk losing anything to anyone that can just make a claim to the ICJ when it is already exercising sovereignty over these islands? Are the Chinese leaders idiots?

There is a big difference in the thinking of the Chinese leaders versus the Singaporean mindset. The Chinese leaders would not give up their territories to anyone. They had lost a lot of land during the era of colonialism and conquest by the western powers and Japan. Today they are able to defend their territories and they will not yield an inch without a fight. The Singaporeans would give their country away willingly on the ground of ‘meritocrazy’, the fittest shall inherit their country, regardless of nationality. It is going and soon will be gone.

Exceptionally talented politicians

Looking at the quality of life today, not the future, and comparing it with the pre independence era, material comfort is definitely incomparable. The convenience of life has improved tremendously at this point in time, putting aside the extremely high cost of living that is building up daily. PAP has a glorious past record and chalked up a lot of goodwill among the older generations. Until the year 2000, political analysts could have concluded that this party would go on and be elected for the next 100 years. As a political party, it has done very well to uplift the material comfort of the people, education, healthcare, safety and security, to the envy of countries around the world. The citizens really have very little to complain about.

And don’t forget it has so much money stashed away as the nation’s reserves. Just by spreading this money to the people to make their lives better would assure their reelection year after year. But that is not necessary. The money can be used to pay their top salaries and the salaries of those managing this money and the Sinkies would not care a damn, if only they stop squeezing them with higher housing, medical and the price to own a car. They have no reason, with so much money in the reserves to want to squeeze the people for their last drop of blood and leading to a lost of faith in their leadership. Funny thing is that they chose to do it this way.

In less than 15 years things have changed so dramatically. There is now so much anger against the party due to so many bad policies affecting the lives of the citizens, and going forward is really not looking pretty. Of course the PAP does not think so and still thinking it is doing all the right things and very proud of their achievements.

The opposition parties have been trying very hard to bring down the PAP, or at least challenging its dominant position in the polity but could barely make any inroads. But what the opposition parties failed to do, the PAP and its super talents did very well, to erase all the goodwill built over the years by the earlier leaders and creating so much negativity towards the party. The support of the people is at the lowest level the party has ever hit. It requires exceptional talents to do this, to self destruct, singlehandedly, without the opposition having to do much. This calls for really exceptional talents to do it so successfully.

The commonly acknowledged distribution of voters is 30% opposition, 30% PAP and 40% swing votes. This pattern has shifted quite ostensibly in recent years. The 40% middle of the road voters are actually for the opposition but voting for the PAP because they have no choice due to lack of good opposition candidates. But this is changing. The mindset is that any decent opposition candidate will do, will be better than top grade scholars and top earning professionals. It thus reads 70% for the opposition. Scary right?

What about the 30% hard core PAP supporters? This number is also shaky. Other than maybe 10% that would not switch come what may, the balance 20% voted PAP for vested interests. And if they think PAP is not going to serve them well, some of them may switch camps quite easily. They are political animals and only think of their own interests. The actual supporters for the PAP could be very small in reality and could be less than 30%. A big shift can happen anytime if the PAP is not careful. The PAP can no longer expect the people to be on its side anymore, there is no certainty like in the past.

 Thanks to the super talents in the PAP to bring the PAP to this sad state of affair. It is no small feat to do it. It is unbelieveable but the super talents in the PAP have delivered the PAP support to the opposition. They are making it so much easier for the opposition parties.

This is how I see it. Please feel free to disagree.

Kopi level – Green. Thanks.

The GE is imminent

Many are guessing when the next GE will be held. Given that this govt is only entering its fourth year in office, many are expecting the GE to be in 2015 earliest. There has been no precedence for the PAP to hold another GE anytime so early.
 
There have been signs that the govt is finalizing all the administrative matters for the next GE. The electoral roll has been compiled and finalized. A lot of goodies have been rolled out and a few more to complete the giveaways. The PAP MPs and ministers have been busy doing their walkabouts. Some bad policies have been moderated and some nice and humbling comments have appeared in the main media. Two things are waiting to happen before the game is set, the redrawing of precincts and the rolling out of new candidates.
 
For the latter, it has started. In today’s media, two PAP potential candidates have been named, a Chan Hui Yuh and a Kahar Hassan. It is likely that more new faces will be put up in the coming weeks. When this is done, announcing the new precincts is only a matter of days. Just watch the media closely.
 
The dreaded social media could be easily reined in with the new regulations in place and their voice muted if needed be. Now the big question, could the GE be called any time sooner, this year?
 
Do not be surprise as this would catch the oppositions with their pants down.
 
So, what do you think?

NKF has 8 years reserves!

Leong Sze Hian was quite disturbed by NKF’s 8 years reserves and still wanting to start raising more funds. According to Leong Sze Hian, in year 2013 NKF still had a surplus of $6.6m, not negative or drawing down from its reserves. Actually hor, the reserves should have another $6.6m added. Is this bad? The reserves as at June 2013 stood at a handsome $260m. The $6.6m will mean a growth of 2.5%.
 
Maybe Leong Sze Hian should look at it from a different perspective. As far as reserves are concerned, the more the better. Maybe NKF would want to target a 10 year reserves, or even a 20 year reserves. Maybe NKF could be thinking of turning its reserves into another SWF to generate more returns and be self sustaining like GIC and Temasek. When NKF’s reserves can be self sufficient then it would not have to raise funds in the future right? Won’t that be nice?
 
Another way to look at it, the reserves would need growth to look good. The right number would be a 10% growth, a little less than the SWFs. Growth is good for sure. Everyone wants growth, so it is normal for NKF to want to grow its reserves. And there could be more people needing dialysis from NKF in the future. And it is always good to be ready for that rainy day. These types of logics cannot be faulted right?
 
I think, to cover front side and back side, and every possible scenario, NKF should target to have a reserve of 30 years. Then everyone can sleep well at night just like our CPF, so much money after retirement. Die already still go a lot of money to spend. Jiat buay liao.
 
What do you think?