PMEs – No need for more hare brain schemes

Every time I heard of more schemes and training programmes for the PMEs my blood pressure goes up. Only people with vacuums in between their ears would think their hare brain schemes are brilliant schemes to solve a self created farcical problem. The only way to put something sensible into the vacuum is to make them PMEs and make them go through their hare brain schemes, put them through their silly training programmes to become dishwashers or table cleaners.

What is the problem sacked and retrenched PMEs are facing, or what is the cause of their problems? What are you going to teach a 30 year experienced PMEs with a string of degrees and technical certificates on? Dishwashing or sweeping the floor? When I look across the job market, it is so exasperating to think that all those middle management jobs are far too sophisticated and difficult for the PMEs when they were in the jobs for several decades.

And I find it a silly joke that 3rd world villagers from chapalan universities have the required skill sets and technical expertise to replace our PMEs who have been practising their trades and professions in a 1st world economy, a knowledge based economy for decades. Who were there to teach them to be better than our PMEs? How many of the jobs given to 3rd world villagers cannot be done by our PMEs? How many of these 3rd world talents possessed better qualifications that are real and from better universities than our PMEs? I have seen many Apapa and Amama universities that straight away raised a red flag.

Do they know what are the real problems on the ground? No, they do not want to know. They only want to bring in more 3rd world villagers and their cousins, and to believe that they are the best talents to bring this 1st world economy and city back to the 3rd world.

Start with a few simple and effective solutions. Civil services, stats boards and GLC companies must stop employing 3rd world half bakes and fakes from chapalan universities. This will stop the PME problems immediately and give back dignity to our PMEs. Please don’t treat them like little lost children that need more training, or like lepers that should be shunned.

Do not betray your own citizens with funny and silly schemes. This is the last straw and they will vote you out in the next GE. If you do not want to take care of their interest and only think of taking care of foreigners, they would not take care of yours either. Every PME losing his job is a family in trouble and a family of votes that would go with them. With a life span of 80 to 90 years, it is a nightmare to lose their jobs at 50 or 60. They have another 20 to 30 years to live and being jobless or a cleaner is not the way to go.

Think, think. Fill the vacuum with something useful, not money and more money.

Kopi Level - Red

Tommy Koh’s To Singapore with Love is fun reading

Saturday’s article by Tommy Koh on his book, with the cheeky title ‘To Singapore With Love’, bears no relations to Tan Pin Pin’s film of the same name should be read like what Tommy said, like ‘loving critics and critical lovers’. The article can be divided into three sections, the past, the present and the future. 90 percent of the article was about the past, 9 percent about the present and 1 percent about the future.

Tommy’s article was culled from the comments of past diplomats who had served in Singapore and their impressions of what this island and govt were all about during their tours of duties. He started with the Mexican Ambassador Eduardo Ramos Gomez who came out genuinely as someone who was in love with Singapore and believed that this was a good place to live and raise a family. His children were educated in ACS and done their national service. And he is back working here in his law firm.

The next ambassador was Joergen Moeller from Denmark, and I quote what he was impressed with, ‘the Singaporean elite focused upon doing something for Singapore, thinking of the future for the country, and being fully aware that their prime duty was to look after the interest of the nation – not their own interest’. As I said, these were viewed formed from the past. I have no comments on the phrase, ‘not their own interest’.

Patrick Van Haute of Belgium said this, ‘Keeping its economy open, joining the fight against protectionism, building a world class education system, investing in the skills of its workforce, in knowledge based assets…’ Today, anyone in the know and knowing the dearth of talents and skills among the daft citizens and how many foreigners were imported to replace them even in low skills jobs, and knowing how screw up these foreigners are, with questionable educations, I think this Patrick Van Haute may want to change his opinion on our world class education system and the investment on the skills of our workforce. We are a bankrupt country as far as local skills and talents are concerned. We depended on 3rd world half bakes to do all the works for us. When 3rd world half bakes are better than us, we do have a problem. And the trend is gaining steam. Our only skills are taxi driving and be security guards. Please feel free to disagree with me.

Mohamed Abdel Rehim El Zorkany of Egypt said Singapore’s success drew on ‘tolerance, respect, justice, the rule of law, a fair share and sense of ownership, for each and every one’. I agree he is correct, almost fully correct in what he said. He should add, ‘for each and every one coming here to work but not necessarily the citizens’. The Singaporeans are really, truly tolerance of foreigners, respect foreigners, justice and rule of law were practised to the last letter to protect the foreigners, to give the foreigners a fair share of the country and a sense of ownership. This is how magnanimous and generous Singaporeans are to foreigners. If only the foreigners who are benefiting from the Singaporeans generosity are reciprocating in kind. Singaporeans should be very grateful if they are not insulted, beaten by foreigners or replaced by foreigners in their jobs.

And Alan Hunt of England had all praised for LKY. ‘Much of the credit for Singapore’s remarkable success was attributed to the foundations laid by Lee Kuan Yew. I have to agree to this when the past is concerned, and I know many would not agree with me. That is fair.

Another American had this motherhood statement to say. ‘Living in Singapore reinforced my conviction that the quality of leadership is the most decisive factor in human affairs.’ How to disagree with him? I think living any where, the quality of leadership matters most. When you got good leaders, it shows. When you got asses as leaders, it also shows.

Education seemed to impress the ambassadors. Juan Martabit of Chile wrote, ‘The education of Singapore is the key to its rapid success, generating the human resources necessary to compete with the best in the world.’ His comment is obsolete. The truth is that our education system has degenerated our human resources to a point that they are unable to compete with the worst from the rest of the world. Not true?

Now for a bit of the present. Frank Lavin noted the eight rules of the Singapore school of diplomacy and Takaaki Kojima of Japan identified two. That is all the good things these two ambassadors could think of, and of course Tommy Koh took the queue by not saying anything more. The South Korean Ambasssador ‘Ryu Kwan Sok cited three cases in which Singapore had not given in to pressure by the great powers and said that Korea should emulate Singapore’s example’….I may add, by not becoming a semi colony of any great powers.

And here comes Tommy’s punchline. ‘It is natural that several of our European and American friends should find our political system to be sub optimal. What, what, sub optimal? So kind and polite of Tommy as usual. Diplomatically he added, ‘When such criticisms come from our Asian friends, however, we should reflect deeply.’ And Tommy quoted Dr Park Sang Seek of South Korea about Singapore’s three Achilles’ heels: ‘democratic deficit, economic inequality and a pseudo non aligned foreign policy.’ The Korean was equally diplomatic.

China’s Yang Wenchang told Tommy that LKY had told him of transforming ‘the country into an olive shaped society, the middle class was the majority at the centre’ with the rich and poor at both sides and smaller. Tommy added that Yang would be disappointed as the society today is like a pear instead of an olive.

What about the future of Singapore. Tommy only volunteered one comment from Yoichi Suzuki of Japan. ‘Singapore faces a bigger challenge than others being the only one without a hinterland…I wish Singapore will play the game as smartly as it has done until now.’ You can sense the tons of reservation by the Japanese.

The article actually told the Singapore Story in an indirect way. A lot of past glory to crow about, not much of the present to talk about, and the future is still out there.

I am waiting for someone to offer me a million bucks to write a glowing tribute of Singapore for the SG50 celebration. Serious, I can write really good stuff and in great style.

Kopi Level - Red

Assault on Red Bean Hill

Battle order was given for an Internet Brigade to assault Red Bean Hill. The mission was to heckle and harass the occupants at Red Bean Hill. The occupants put up little resistance and the first wave of attack let by a Gongmando was a sweeping success. The Gongmando mustered a force of 120 insurgents for the attack against a force less than half its size. It was a walkover.

The defender retreated and set up a second line of defence with a half of its strength intact. This time the Gongmando won the battle with only half of his insurgents under his control.

The defenders retreated further and moved into deep bunkers and fortified walls. This time Gongmando was out of wit. His insurgents could do no damage as the defenders were protected by strong defences. He could find any holes to break in. In desperation he called for a mission to go all out to destroy the defenders instead of heckling or harassing them.

The defenders called for reinforcement. A blue force was sent to search and destroy the insurgents under the Gongmando. Intercepted transmissions revealed that the Gongmando was order to retreat with all his insurgents and not to engage the blue force. Subsequent intelligence reports disclosed that Gongmando was reprimanded for going overboard, defying his order for heckling and harassing and went amok instead, and going for the kill.

Gongmando was subsequently relieved of his command and sent to Obedience School for training. His insurgent brigade was disbanded. Another intelligence report said Gongmando was demoted for exposing his insurgents to unnecessary risk when charging up Red Bean Hill unmasked and unprotected. The blue force could easily identify them and is in the process of arresting them. Gongmando has gone into hiding.

There was a lull of two days at Red Bean Hill. The scouts in the field have reported signs of a few insurgents at the foothill and preparing another attack. This time the leader of the insurgents has an initial starting with J, probably another Gongmando. The occupants of Red Bean Hill are still digging in and hopefully the blue force will be there to take down the insurgents when they mount a new attack. 

Kopi Level - Yellow

New York Central Park is safer

New York Central Park is notorious for mugging and butchery. But that happened only at night and when one was alone, a female in most cases.  Yesterday, after 50 years, we have daylight robbery at Raffles Place in front of a crowd of office workers. And the victim was a well built man, not a physically weaker female. He got a couple of stabs, on his stomach and arm because of his laptop. This was the initial report.

And the good news, the robber was instantly tackled by the public and arrested on the spot with his bloody knife. At least he would not be around to create more mischief unless he is given bail. Can’t imagine if he got away and the whole island going on full alert ala Mas Selamat or the escape tiger in Paris.

Is Raffles Place now more dangerous than Central Park? No lah, Raffles Place is definitely safer even if the dare devil desperate robber did it in broad daylight in front of the lunch crowd. Raffles Place is definitely safe. This thing only happened once in 50 years, this one just in time for the 50 year celebration. You would have to wait for another 50 years for another such incident to happen. That is a long period for Raffles Place to be safe for everyone.

And the robber looked like a foreigner. This foreigner must be mad. The foreigners coming to this paradise island are all very nice people mind you. The only rogues are those angmoh cyclists that threatened motorists or laughing at the poor Sinkies.

Be assured that Raffles Place would not be another Central Park. More security cameras would go up. And there will be more police patrols to assure the crowd that it is very safe, at least for another 50 years.

Now the real story after one day has lapsed. The robber, Arun, is an Indonesian and the victim, Kang Tie Tie, appears to be a money changer or working for a money changer and the laptop that was first reported was actually a money bag with more than half a million in cash and cash cheques.

Does the truth make Raffles Place safer than Central Park?

 Kopi Level - Yellow

Mobile Air no more, Jover Chew no more

In the news this morning, Mobile Air has been sold to a new owner Ricky Lee and Mobile Air will be renamed HJ Mobile. Ricky Lee assured everyone that the new shop has nothing to do with Mobile Air and Jover Chew. He bought over at a good price. So there you are, a new shop and a new owner and business as usual.

According to Seah Seng Choon of CASE, this is what normally happened when the heat is on and the shop changed ownership. And that is the end of the story. The only legal thing for CASE to do is to continue with the injunction against Mobile Air. For what I dunno.  What about Jover Chew? No, there is no law against him, if I remember what came out in the discussion in Talking Point. The law only goes after the company, not the cheats, not the salespersons that committed the offence. Oops, sorry, sorry, no offence committed. Just unethical practice only. Maybe call up the salesperson and give him a warning. Maybe this one also cannot, because no offence what.

And the story goes on and on and everyone is very happy. Can close the case already. This story has been repeated over more than 30 years, over more than just one shop in Sim Lim Square but also in other shopping centres like Chinatown, Funan and Lucky Plaza. On record, this is only one case only what. No need to go hysterical. No need to kpkb. It is normal.  People need to earn a living. The shop keepers and their salespersons are also human beans so their interests must be carefully considered.

So? Life goes on lah. Everyone got things to do and very busy. Let’s move on.

Welcome to Sin City, the shopping paradise of the East. This is a rule of law country and the shop keepers know the law. They are so clever. Or is it? Caveat Emptor. Please come and shop but prepare for the adventure. Wear knee guards in case if you got to kneel down to the shop keepers. The shop keepers are king, not the customers. Got that? And please bring money and more money.

Kopi Level - Green