AGO’s report on lapse in recovering university loans

The two universities, NUS and NTU granted several million dollars of loans to mainly Singapore students whose parents could not afford to pay for the cheap tuition fees that are already highly subsidized. In the AGO’s report where it did some sample tests, it discovered that the recovery of student loans in 23%  of the cases were delayed by 3.5 years, ie student unable, could not or somehow did not repay the loans in time.  MOE has responded that it is working hard to recover the loans but in some hardship cases it has to delay or reduce the repayment sum.

What does it mean, young university graduates in hard times and unable to service their student loans? Were they not gainfully employed after graduation? Is there a problem that young university graduates are facing financial hardship and unable to repay their loans in time?

There was a time when getting into university was something that called for great joy and celebration, on the path to riches. And on graduation, crossing the last hurdle, life was supposed to be good. Today, on graduation is the time to face disappointments in getting a job, don’t bother about getting a good job. Some were unable to get jobs over a year, some graduates ended up working as temp workers! There is nothing to celebrate about on graduation.

Some thought they got to do better, went on to get a masters degree only to be more disappointed after wasting the money and time, unable to find a decent job. What is going on?

Nevermind, this is the new life of a graduate. What is more disheartening, actually I thought it was a good thing that students were helped by the universities with study loans. On second thought they would be better off if they were foreigners, being helped in a big way by the same govt, with free scholarships, no need to pay back, no need to worry about loans in arrears or rescheduling loans. How lucky are these foreign undergraduates. And how unlucky are our own undergraduates. Should not they wish that they were not citizens of this country?

By the way, how many billions were thrown to the foreign students in scholarships? Why no one think this money should be given to our own children? Why no one think this should be raised in Parliament, that out taxpayers’ money must be given to the taxpayers’ children, not to children of people that we have nothing to do about, who did not pay any taxes to us? Why are chasing after loans that the students cannot afford to repay while foreigners had a free ride with free scholarships?
Stupidity has no cure. Or is it more than stupidity?

Patrick Tay – the only voice to the PMET’s plight

Is there really a problem that Singaporean PMETs are running out of jobs and hitting the wall? It is no joke in this most expensive city in the world to be unemployed and at a critical age when the financial burden of bringing up children and housing loan are at their peaks. And after this stage, the twilight years are not going to be a bed or roses when the children could not get a good job even with a degree and savings for old age are not enough.

How many of the elected leaders are listening and seeing the problems faced by the PMETs who voted them to power and would want to look after their interests? Don’t seem to hear much from the political leaders about this, maybe they have more important things to do than to worry about the PMETs becoming unemployed or under employed.

For those who took notice, the recommendations are hardly of any help and often very demeaning and undignified. The funny training courses that the PMETs have to put up with are quite insulting and a big waste of the talent and experienced that the PMETs have acquired for a whole life. The rubbish brought into the country to replace the PMETs are anything but rubbish and glossed over as valuable talents.

The lone voice calling for something to be done for the Singaporean PMETs came from Patrick Tay, supposedly responsible for workers welfare, not PMETs, but understood how serious the problem has become. Many of these PMETs have another 20 or 30 years to get by.

So what’s up Patrick? Short of ideas other then training and retraining? One simple suggestion, go to Parliament and tell them to stop the ministries and stats boards from employing foreigners for the interim years and get them to hire the PMETs. And foreigners mean PRs as well. Get the problem of unemployed Singaporeans solved first, and this include young graduates, before relaxing to hire foreigners. Is this so difficult to do?

Another thing, get the MOM to freeze issuing EP and SP passes until things get better for the PMETs and young local graduates.

Is the welfare and interest of Singaporeans going jobless not important enough for the govt to have a new policy to hire Singaporeans first? And watch out on those GLCs that are still hiring foreigners, especially those that hired foreigners to run their HRs.

Patrick should go to Parliament and shout like auntie Bee Wah. What is so difficult? Singapore must be for Singaporeans. Singaporeans must come first. Hire Singaporeans first. MOM, please stop issuing those EP and SP passes so freely like Santa Claus to foreigners.

Who is in charge of MOM?

The best scheme so far that could offer the PMETs a more respectable option after being replaced is the trading courses proposed by IE Singapore this morning. But all the measures are not addressing why PMETs are being discriminated and replaced by foreigners and companies continue to do so with easy access to EPs and SPs issued by MOM. Who is the cock that allows this sad state of affair to continue unabated?

What has Asean become today?

It was created at a time of big power rivalry and Cold War between the Americans/West on one side and the Communist bloc led by the Soviet Union on the other. The wise leaders of Asean knew then that this is not their cup of tea. It is better to stay out when elephants fight, and not get trampled. There was nothing to gain to be on either side. So the created Asean and refused to be roped into the American creature called SEATO. And Abdul Razak came out with the concept of ZOPFAN, Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality.

This concept served Asean well for several decades. Today, Asean is becoming more like the feared SEATO, an American creation to contain China. And some members of Asean are screaming that there are Chinese Trojan Horses in Asean and wanting to boot them out of Asean. Would Asean then be renamed as SEATO, the nightmare the founders of Asean tried so hard to avoid?

Asean is now infiltrated with many little USAs and they are calling the shots. They did not see themselves as little USAs. They did not see that their sugar daddy is the USA while pointing the fingers at the Trojan Horses and accusing them of playing by the dictates of their sugar daddy in China.

This is the height of hypocrisy in Asean today. Oops, should Asean be called SEATO? How many Asean states would want to be in SEATO to be dictated by the American sugar daddy?

The funny thing is that while some of these little USAs are sleeping with their sugar daddy, they are putting up pretences to want to curry favours with their ‘enemy’ sugar daddy and wanting to enjoy the market and economic opportunities China is creating for them. And they think China could not see through their pretences and would continue to let them ride on the Chinese gravy train while shitting on them behind their backs.

How neutral is Asean today? Has Asean changed or is it transforming itself into another American satellite organization? Who are the main drivers working to turn Asean into SEATO? Who is behind the ejecting Cambodia out of Asean agenda?

9 dash lines versus many straight lines

One of the major objections to the Chinese 9 dash lines in the South China Sea is that national territories cannot be written like that on a map.  National boundaries must be drawn as extension from the coast of a country out to the sea, 12 nm and the EEZ should be a further extension to 200nm. The 9 dash lines must be a joke. Where got borders drawn like that one?

Or can national boundaries be drawn in straight vertical lines or straight horizontal lines? Would straight lines drawn on a map, a flat piece of paper using rulers more legitimate? Where got such things, national boundaries cannot be straight lines lah.  Straight lines are like the 9 dash lines, simplistic geometrical lines, not natural, cannot be like that one.

Has any of the boys and girls seen the maps of African or Middle Eastern states that were drawn up by the colonialists? Anyone bother to look at the borders of Libya and Egypt and many other African states, yes, they are straight lines, drawn conveniently by the colonial masters, with rulers on a map on the table. That was the reality of the time. 

Times changed, the development of pens and papers did not happen over night, did not exist in the beginning of civilizations. The ancient people cut marks on pieces of woods, on stones, on tortoise shells as official documents then. Many ‘books, maps and documents’ were done in those primitive forms.

Not counted? Cannot be like that, must be in thick voluminous books, like what we have in the libraries, or the law journals in the courts of law then got count? You think the bible was written on paper like what you have now, that you can buy them from the bookshops? No, they were written on plant fibres, leaves etc.

Now, what is so different between China drawing 9 dash lines on the map and the straight lines drawn by the colonial masters as national boundaries in Africa? Do you know how the British and the Dutch divided the region up as their colonies? They drew lines on the maps then, like the 9 dash lines.

The European colonialists cheated the natives of the land they conquered by asking for documentary proof of ownership of their land. The colonialists demanded signed legal documents. What do you think the natives showed the British the Europeans? Signed documents like those printed in London, or pieces of barks or wood or stones?

The world yesterday was not like the world today.

Money laundering the most lucrative banking business

The big American and European banks are making really big money in money laundering and fraudulent banking practices or selling questionable derivatives and products.  Money laundering seems to be the most profitable business for many banks. And they have been fined handsomely by the US Federal Courts to the tune of billions. The total came to US$150b by some 10 big banks, including BoA, Citi, JP Morgan, Wells Fargo, BNP, Deutsche, Credit Suisse, UBS, Barclay and HSBC to name a few.

These banks are willing to pay the fines happily, for good reasons, as none of their CEOs were found guilty, or would be found guilty, or made accountable for the offences. The banks continue to run as per normal, and so were the employments of the CEOs, all sitting tight and happily as if nothing had happened. Surely they did not know the banks were involved in money laundering. With such latitude, would they be back to their monkey businesses again? There don’t seem to be any accountability or responsibility. It is business as usual and the banks are going to continue to make more monies laundering more money and selling fraudulent derivative products.

Actually the biggest winner of all the bank fraud is none other than the US Govt. They pocketed US$150 billion practically doing nothing, and doing something very legal. How many businesses can make this kind of profit with nearly zero cost? Is there a conspiracy between the Federal Court/US Govt and the big banks, with the banks allowed to do what is profitable but illegal but willing to pay the fines and the courts to enrich the US Govt’s coffer, like I scratch your back you scratch mine?

Who are the big gainers and who are the big losers in this game of money laundering? What a great game to play for the CEOs of these big banks. No responsibility when caught, only pay fines. If not caught, can chalk up big profits to justify big bonuses.