Contact Singapore closing down on April 1

Contact Singapore, Singapore’s on line portal to attract overseas Singaporeans to return home will be closing down on April 1 claiming that it has succeeded in its mission. The statestimesreview has another take, that is if closing down due to its failure to attract Singaporeans home. Which is the truth?

This is Contact Singapore’s mission posted in the statestimesreview, “When the Contact Singapore alliance was formed in 2008, we wanted to make Singapore a place where global talent would call home, from which they could flourish and contribute. Nine years on, we think Contact Singapore has succeeded in its mission.”

I think by reading the above mission statement, Contact Singapore has indeed succeeded in its mission ‘to make Singapore a place where global talent would call home.’ The mission statement is not about attracting overseas Singaporeans to come home but about global talent to make Singapore home. And if you look around Singapore, when more than half of the population is foreigners, new citizens, PRs and EP holders, indeed Contact Singapore has succeeded in what it set out to do.

The notion that it is set up to attract Singaporeans home is not the primary mission. If that is the case, it would be said so specifically. What it said is global talent, not overseas Singaporean talent.

I am sure many overseas Singaporeans would want to come home, after all Singapore is home, where they grew up and all the memories, friends and relatives are. Why would they choose to stay overseas and not wanting to return home? Is it that the good jobs are given to foreigners and Singaporeans were sidelined in favour of foreigners? Looking at the tertiary institutions and many GLCs this is apparently so. When talented Singaporeans find themselves bypassed for top jobs, even terminated or not offered these positions, why should they stay at home?  If Contact Singapore is really serious in attracting overseas Singaporeans home, just offer them equivalent jobs that have been given to foreigners with dubious track records and there would be many willing to come home.

Has Singapore done something wrong to drive Singaporeans away from home? Or Singapore is encouraging Singaporeans to work overseas so that it can replace them with funny FTs to work in Singapore? Which is which?  No one would want to leave the comfort of home behind, to uproot and work overseas unless the offer is so attractive or they are being forced out by the deplorable employment scene at home where foreigners became the first choice to Singaporeans.

What is or was Contact Singapore’s real mission? Did it succeed or did it fail?

Totalitarian mindset in Sin City

Below are extracts from an article in the TRE questioning why students must give all their prizes and trophies won to their schools.

'What’s this new ruling about the Singapore Sports School indicating that any prizes, be it monetary or products, that the students of the school win while representing the school must be given to the school instead? Previously, the student-athletes get to keep their winnings as long as these prizes were not clearly awarded to the school....

Students should not be forced to channel back whatever they have won to the school. Let them enjoy the fruits of their labour. For the school, isn’t seeing your students winning things under your umbrella enough, rather then go after their prize winnings also? By Prem Shankar'

A professional athlete or sportsman would have to share his prizes and monetary awards to his coaches and the organisation that was paying for his training and expenses. That is fair. Why should a school be demanding that students representing the schools must give them their winnings, trophies and monetary awards? What have the schools contributed to the sportsmen and athletes success? Other than allowing them to compete in the name of the school, what financial and non financial contribution and assistance did the school provide to the sportsmen and athletes?

Do the schools know how much the sportsmen and athletes have contributed to their own success in terms of time, expenses in food, supplements, nutrition, medical bills and pain? Many sportsmen and athletes paid a heavy price, financially and the time spent in their sports, many suffered injuries, poor academic results for spending time training and the discipline regime, forgoing other activities and commitments.

The big question what have the schools contributed to the success of the sportsmen and athletes and how much did they contribute financially, not counting physical, emotional and other sacrifices that the sportsmen and athletes have to put in, to demand the sportsmen and athletes to give them all their winnings, awards, trophies and monetary gains? Is it fair?

The MOE has any instruction or policies on this matter? Their diam diam stance towards this matter is as good as agreeing to what the schools are saying. Smell of a totalitarian state.

What do you think? Another syokan incident in the making? Are the schools bullying and taking advantage of their hapless students that got no one to turn to short of offending the school authority?

I hope this thing is not true. Please correct me if I am mistaken.

Najib behaving like Aquino

The assassination of Kim Jong Nam in KLIA is turning out to be another big farce and Najib is looking like another Aquino in the making while Malaysia is looking like South Korea during the sinking of a South Korean warship Choenan.

The Kim Jong Nam case should be a criminal case where a person was killed in Malaysian soil and the Malaysian authority should go through the due process of their law to investigate the case, try to apprehend the culprits. The body after autopsy should be returned to the next of kin or the country claiming it. This is the first time that I have heard of the demand for the victim's DNA as precondition for the release of the body. What if no DNA is produced, is Malaysia going to set up a cold store to keep all the dead bodies of foreigners? What is so difficult to return the body to the next of kin, or is the Malaysian authority having doubt of the dead person's identity? What is Malaysia hoping to gain or what game is Malaysia playing by making it so difficult to return a dead body after autopsy has been done?

Now this has been turned into a political row between Malaysia and North Korea, from friends to foes so unnecessarily. What is Malaysia up to? Is Malaysia acting under instruction from some outside parties to make things difficult to the North Koreans? If so, how is it going to benefit Malaysia except to be seen as another puppet of some outside powers?

The way the Malaysians went about arresting so many Koreans is not funny. Imagine the resources put in to cover this case involving a foreigner that has nothing to do with Malaysia other than a crime being committed in Malaysian soil? Even those not North Koreans arrested, an Indonesia and a Vietnamese seemed so questionable. Ok, the Indonesian has admitted that she was part of the team that attacked Kim Jong Nam. What about the Vietnamese woman? She did not look a bit like the woman in white T with the LOL logo on it. It is so obvious that they were completely two different people. Today's paper reported that a photo of the Vietnamese woman was posted in her blog with the LOL Tshirt. Is this an after thought that the two women did not look alike so need further proof to convince the public that they were the same person?

And the story of how Kim was killed kept flipflopping, from injected by needle to splashing water on him and then a video clip of a woman covering Kim's face from behind with a towel. Or the latest, they wiped his face with their hands covered with poison. What is the truth?

And so many cctv clips were shown on the news. Accepted that some were old clips of Kim. But the few that were supposed to be of Kim Jong Nam during the incident showed him wearing dark blue jacket and then light blue jacket. And there were reports claiming that the video showed him stumbled to the check in counter and some said he walked calmly to the check in counter after the incident.

Finally the Malaysian authority admitted that they did not know the cause of his death. The poison theory is yet to be confirmed as no known poison was detected. Malaysia also refused to have a joint investigation or let the North Koreans in to at least witness how they investigated the case, just like the case of Choenan.

Just like the Choenan case, all the fingers were pointing at the North Koreans as the culprits with evidence as well. In the Choenan case the South Koreans even fabricated parts with writings from the North Koreans only to be proven false and the case was dropped and closed.

Would there be fabrication of evidence to show that the North Koreans were guilty and subsequently the whole case fall flat like the Choenan case when preliminary evidence and allegations were all against the North Koreans?

The biggest joke in this case would be that the victim is not Kim Jong Nam but someone else. Cannot rule this out if the Malaysians are asking for DNA to prove that it is him.

Talking about fake news, fake reports, false flags and conspiracy? What is this case all about?

Higher taxes no problem, just think positive

“New taxes or higher tax rates are not causes for alarm, but a call for Singaporeans to recognise that there are difficult things that we have to do together, rather than leave problems or difficulties for the next generation.”
Prices of water was raised 30% and a new tax for motorcycles was introduced in the Budget 2017 announced last Friday. – Lawrence Wong.
‘In a question posed by a radio listener over the rising cost of living due to the water price increase, Minister Indranee Rajah told Singaporeans to raise their salaries instead:
“It all comes back to how people can increase their incomes, and how the revenue that comes into the household can be increased so all the other things can be managed.”’
Both the above quotes were from thestatestimesreview. I fully agree with the two ministers on what they said. The people must think positively. Higher taxes are necessary and it is either now or tomorrow. So might as well bite the bullet and take it now. And once it is out, daft sinkies must be brave and resolute to take these tax hikes positively and think of how to overcome them.
And yes, the best way is to raise your income and all the taxes would be non issues. If you are earning $1m, just a 10% increase in your income would make you rich, what is the problem with a 30% increase on water bills? Better still if you can write your own pay check. And if you are jobless, go get a job and you will not have any problem with more taxes. Regard paying taxes as a privilege like serving NS. You are very lucky if you can afford to pay higher taxes and do NS, to sacrifice for your country and people.
Now get off your butts and go look for a job. There are plenty of jobs at the job bank and there are also many job fairs to attend. If still cannot get a job, go for more training. Ask someone to teach you how to write a beautiful CV. There are plenty of jobs in Singapore, no need to worry, just don’t be choosy.
And if all else fails, go to be an entrepreneur, like being a hawker. Hawkers are earning big bucks. If not, try to be your own boss, like driving taxis. Now driving a taxis got many choices, Uber, Grab, Comfort, SMRT etc etc.
See, after all the good suggestions above, the problem of higher taxes no longer a problem. We are all in the same boat, one for all, all for one. And if still cannot pay your water bills, don’t feel so sad, we can empathise with you and your predicament. Even if you are poor, you are still the luckiest of the poor in the world to be able to afford to live in this most expensive city in the world. It is your good blessing to live in this fine city. Count your blessings.

Tension rising again in the South China Sea

The devil would not go away. The Americans have returned with a nuclear powered aircraft carrier Carl Vinson to patrol the SCS as if it is their private swimming pool in the name of freedom of navigation. China has stood firm and warned the Americans not to challenge China’s sovereignty in the SCS. The gloves are off. After failing to get the Philippines to be the point man to provoke China to stake its claim in the SCS, after failing to get other little USAs in Asean to take over from the Philippines, the Americans have no choice but to challenge China without the veil that it is an innocent bystander. The latest developments in Asean are saying that the little USAs are active again to get Asean to go against China.

Here comes the first batch of trouble makers in the SCS and more would follow suit. The Americans are thinking that they have superiority in bigger and more aircraft carriers and naval ships. So they can bulldoze their way in the SCS with no resistance from China.

The Americans forgot that this is China’s little pond guarded by many batteries of anti ship missiles in the mainland. The SCS is within the range of China’s anti aircraft carrier missiles and every aircraft carrier and big battleship would be tracked and locked on by these missiles a few thousand miles away. This would be a game of picking out the sitting ducks in the pond.

Did the Americans really think that they have superiority in numbers with their aircraft carrier facing a few Chinese coast guard patrol craft? Just be careful not to touch one of these patrol craft or the missiles will come down for target practice. And don’t forget the Chinese submarines are all over the SCS. China may have only one refurbished aircraft carrier, but any war in the SCS would be raining missiles of which China has hundreds or thousands waiting for the Americans to fire the first shot. Would the mad cowboys dare to pull the trigger? They would not know what hit them for the Chinese would be playing their computer games in the mainland, pushing buttons away.  There is no need for any Chinese ship to engage the American fleet.

What the Americans can hope to achieve is to hold their pricks and wave around to show the whole world they are in the SCS. The Chinese patrol crafts would watch them from near distance to see how long they could keep their boys and girls holidaying in the SCS before they get homesick.

Tension no doubt has returned to the SCS with the presence of aggressive and offensive American naval ships. The Americans did not name their warship as aircraft carrier strike group for nothing. They are offensive war machine made to conduct wars, to attack enemies anywhere.  When would the tinder box blow up? Would any little USAs still want to be part of the plot to attack China with the Americans? Shouldn’t have asked this question. In the latest Asean foreign ministers gathering they are already showing their hands. No one needs to ask the little USAs to say what they are up to. They just do it.

PS. Some of you may ask when am I saying these about the evil American Empire? It is necessary for if no one is saying it, some jokers may think since no one is complaining then all the American actions are right. The Americans have been doing these things for decades, branding Iran, Iraq, especially now the North Koreans as the Axis of Evil and Kim Jong Un as a mad man. In fact Kim's father and grandfather were also branded as mad men. The sad think is that many jokers after reading such fake news daily really believe so without thinking and without questioning.

The Americans must protect international law? How silly! Everywhere the Americans are present they are the one that is breaking international law but the stupid just would not want to see it.