The simplicity of it all

As life gets more complicated, as solutions to problems get more complex, some things are getting simpler. The Little India Riot is a case in point. It was all because of alcohol. Stop the selling of alcohol and the problem will go away. And the govt did just that over the weekend, and yes, no more rioting in Little India after the ban. It was a peaceful and quiet little place for the families and children to walk around and feeling very safe from the fierce bottle hurling and car burning mob. This is like a miracle.
 
The solution is simple and effective, like what Singapore is all about. It also sent a signal to all the drinkers around the island, if they want to continue to enjoy their booze, keep the peace. Any sign of trouble will mean no more booze. Yes, got it. Who says complex problem needs complex solution?
 
In the MyPaper today, Dr Koh Poh Soon diagnosed his election defeat to something he said or should not have said. The offending statement was ‘everybody has a car’. And to make it worse, he added that he and his wife had two cars, one each, caused they were professionals. Another reason was the parachute. He was seen as a paratrooper dropping in from the sky. These two reasons caused his electoral defeat to an unknown. And the margin was quite a trumping.
 
Dr Koh is still walking the ground in preparation for his next election. By then he would not be seen as someone dropping down on a parachute. So this problem would be a non issue. As for the two cars he and his wife owned, he can either not talk about it, or to make a bigger show, sell one away. This should make him more like everybody else, owning one car and could give him the votes for a victory.
 
Thank God that life is getting so simple. Time to reconsider cutting the salaries of ministers when solving problems is so easy.
 
What do you think?

150th anniversary of Sin India fraternal relations

I remember that 2015 has already been earmarked as the year to celebrate the good relations between India and Singapore and a long list of activities will be planned for this great event. The presidents of both countries will pay homage to each other with their entourages of courtiers and royalties. Dunno who is paying for this great year long party. Maybe they will provide for it in the next budget.

As a warm up to this event, it would be appropriate to build up the tempo early to get the people of the two countries in a celebration mood and to be emotionally prepared to love and hug each other when 2015 arrives. The little isolated incident at Little India may mar the mindsets of the two people at the moment and both may be looking at each other with suspicion. Those who listened and believed what TV Sun had broadcasted over the air may not only be harbouring hatred against the Sinkie Chinese, some may even be planning some vengeful treats in return. It is thus of utmost importance to cleanse out this bad and wrongful thought that had been planted in some unthinking minds, of course done unintentionally, just an innocent mistake.

Make 2014 a year of love and peace between the two people prior to the year long celebration in 2015. And this can start almost immediately, now, and encouraging all Sinkie households to adopt an India worker and play host to him till 2015. The Indian workers can be invited to stay with Sinkie families and enjoy the tender loving care of Sinkie families and our way of life. This would definitely be the best integration exercise of all integration exercise. This would not only build a damn good relationship with the people of India, it will also save a lot of other problems, like housing, saving them on food and lodging, govt no need to build more dormitories to ‘angrify’ the neighbourhood, and the Indian workers need not go to Little India to feel at home, thus reducing their tendency to drink and get drunk and ending in rioting.

Singaporeans will also not be attacked and blamed for xenophobia. The whole country may be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for building a harmonious relationship with poor foreign workers needing shelter and love and a home away from home. Hey, if every home has one, there should be enough to go round with half a million of them here and more to come, there would not be any enclaves forming. They will all blend in nicely with the families and the housing estates.

Now would not this be nice? And come 2015, we can celebrate together all year round with Indians visiting here and Sinkies visiting India. The visiting should not be confined to just the Presidents and govt dignitaries. That would be too selfish. Let the joy be shared by the people of both counties. I am already looking forward to it.

Inviting the wolf home 引狼入室

The wolf cub is very cute and cuddly to play with, just like the Alsatian dog. But it will grow up fast. When it becomes an adult, it will still be quite cuddly and friendly, a very good pet to keep for company. It would still wag its tail and give the owner a very warm smile. The only difference is that the teeth are sharp and shiny and the jaws are huge. And it has a very big appetite. Just feed him well.

Just feed him well and good. Don’t ever provoke it or step on its tail. When it turns against the owner and snaps its jaw, it will be too late to regret. A wolf is still a wolf. Don’t pray pray.

And don’t let the weak and vulnerables unattended, especially the infants. You just won’t know. There is an animal inside the friendly and apparently harmless beast.

Economic cleansing by Gilbert Goh

Below is the first part of a long article by Gilbert Goh on the grave changes in our socio, economic and political landscape. I will post the other parts as a series.

I seldom felt so enraged when I received emails from our readers until I received one from Francisthe other day.

Francis wrote how he was ousted from his company – a global Fortune 500 conglomerate, by a foreigner Indian IT director from India. He is now happily resettled in Melbourne – one of the tens of thousands of Singaporeans forced by the recent economical circumstances to relocate elsewhere in search of greener pasture.

What irked me was how easily the Indian IT director could replace our own local executives, without any repercussion, with his own people from India. Something is wrong with our human resource policy here and so far the ministry of manpower has kept quiet about this hiring discrimination….

Economic cleansing being practised here?

Though we may not have entered into such grotesque activity yet, the signs are there and its pretty ominous.

Nevertheless, we may have enter into a dark period of economic cleansing – foreigners arriving on our shore invited with open arms by a regime to take over our jobs and hiding a sinister agenda for political gain.

The agenda though subtle is equally damaging as economic cleansing has driven many of our citizens into deep depression and some have even attempted suicide. Those who can emigrate will do so – leaving the country to well-to-do foreigners with good paying jobs to gain control.

One in three workers in Singapore is a foreigner now and at least 1.5 million foreigners, carrying all kinds of work permits, have settled down on our tiny island state – artificially inflating our population to a miserable 5.1 million and stretching infrastructure and employment opportunities to the maximum.

Amidst this economic sizzle which is supposed to benefit its own people, entire companies have been replaced by foreigners and one only needs to walk along busy financial centre at Marina to witness the ugly manifestation.

Singaporean executives ironically remain a rare representation in our best economic model thus far – the financial sector.

Deustche Bank, Barclays, Credit Sussie, Hong Kong Shanghai Bank – all banking giants out to clamour for a lucrative piece of the Asian economic miracle here could only mysteriously employ a majority of foreign executives on its payroll. We don’t have enough talents – so say the employers and agreed by our government.

Let the foreign talents come in – not by the tens of thousands but hundreds of thousands as our own local workers sit by the wayside and envy the smartly-dressed foreign executives filing past on their way to work in gleaming glass-towered buildings! Never before has any country in the world imposed work discrimination so obviously and maliciously played out - against its own people mind you.

For the first time in history, more foreign doctors (60%) last year registered with our Singapore Medical Council (SMC) than local ones – a reflection of economic cleansing that will continue unabated in the near future.

The government has also shamelessly used tax-payer money to lure foreigners via a comprehensivewebsite meant to simplify procedures for immigrants coming into our country.

Government-linked companies, multi national companies and even small and medium enterprises splashed out full page advertisement abroad in search of foreign workers to fortify their economic prowess as companies continue to shun local workers labelling them lazy, choosy and hard to please.

The government has always asked its own people to welcome foreigners into our midst as if not – jobs will evaporate, investors will run away and the economy will collapse.

However, it could not properly explain why capable well-educated citizens continue to stay jobless or enter into under employment by driving cabs and taking on low level jobs in order to survive.

If this happens in any country in the world, citizens will gather together and speak out against such employment discrimination but in a law-abiding country like Singapore - whereby even a lone demonstrator can be arrested, we are being denied such basic human rights and can only count emigration as a way out of our misery.

The attack on Sinkies has just begun

Sinkies are xenophobic, very bad, they must reflect on themselves, to treat the foreigners nicer, help them to be civilised, to have good manners, to be like them, oops, but not the xenophobic part. Arising from the riot in Little India, the attacks and vehements are all targeted at Sinkies. It is all the sinkies fault. The foreigners are nice people. Only a minority is bad.

Seriously, fucking seriously, to all the fuckheads, who started the rioting? Sinkies? Who are the rioters? Sinkies? Who got beaten up? Sinkies? Who overturned police cars and ambulance? Sinkies? Who burnt the cars? Sinkies?

Why are Sinkies now at fault, and are called xenophobic when they had nothing to do with the rioting? The leaders are blaming the Sinkies, the media are repeating it, forum writers are also adding fuel to fire. Sinkies must reflect on their behaviour and how to treat the foreigners better. Sinkies are guilty of xenophobia!

Who are getting displaced by foreigners in good jobs? Who are being discriminated by foreigners in this island? Sinkies?

For fuck sake, the Sinkies are not that daft to be branded as xenophobic when they are not. But I bet you, the daft Sinkies will take this with a smile, a shrug of the head and walk away. If Sinkies are not prepared to defend their rights in this island, their rights to be respected, their rights to good jobs, their rights to an orderly and peaceful country, safe and clean and harmonious, they deserved to be kicked out of this island.

Don’t the Sinkies feel violated, the peace and tranquillity of their island home is now threatened and are the Sinkies expected to keep quiet, and even have to sayang the foreigners because they are such nice people but are being bullied by the Sinkies, and like the Sun TV report, being beaten up by Sinkies and are hiding in fear?

The foreigners are exploited for sure. By who? Who are the exploiters? Not the ordinary Sinkies that are being blamed for xenophobia. The riot is expected given all the factors that are conducive for a riot. It is only a matter of time and how severe it would be. It is not just the exploitation. Pay them well, give them the best in everything, but if you have a mob of tens of thousands, a hundred thousand, all hungry and lonely men, bored, far away from their home and family, a little spark is all it needs to start a mayhem, a pandemonium. You have all the ingredients for a bloody riot in a big crowd, not necessarily in Little India, but in any corner of the island when you have such a big gathering of single males, foreigners, workers, and from the less developed parts of the world when violence and rioting is normal.

Please stop putting the blame on Sinkies. Please stop calling the Sinkies xenophobic. The Sinkies are innocent bystanders. There may be a few minorities in cyberspace venting their anger. And can you blame them when they saw the peace and safety of their country going up in flame? It would be worse if they really sheepishly and meekly say nothing about this violation of their country. It is only natural and understandable for Sinkies to be angry. It is good to be angry when you are wrong. Some may say things a bit too harshly, but none of them are out there beating any foreigner or burning cars.

Would the assholes stop attacking and branding Sinkies as xenophobic? They are trying to pass the buck, to make Sinkies feel guilty for their devious ways.

Little India Riot – a 500,000 puzzle to solve

There are half a million single men women workers from all over the world working here in the numerous construction site. On weekends or day off, there are half a million men and women not working. What would they want to do? Where would they want to go? What were they thinking? What were they dreaming?

There are these half a million lonely men and women away from their homes that have social needs, human needs, emotional needs. How to take care of them? Little India, Golden Mile, Peninsula Shopping Centre, Lucky Plaza etc are where they gathered. If they are not allowed to be in these places, where will they go, what will they do?

The places they congregate are the lesser evils. If they don’t have these places to go, what do you think would happen? Half a million men and women, not counting the PMEs that would make it more than a million, are in need of leisure, entertainment, relaxation, let off steam. They exist and cannot be ignored.

This is the puzzle that people who brought them here do not want to know and think that the problem will go away if no one talks about it. These are real people, the good, the bad and the ugly. They cannot be bottled up in a can. And the people of Singapore are now faced with this problem, to live with them and hoping that nothing bad would happen to them. If it does, it is the fault of the Sinkies.

Haven for FWs

By not letting the FWs have their alcohol, not having buses to fetch them to meet with their friends in Little India, what would the workers do? Stay in their dormitories, watch TV or video, play caram, basketball, volley ball? And they would eat instant noodles, drink tea and kopi and get high? Are there other ways to help them unwind and be happy with their friends and alcohol?
 
If I am not mistaken, the old Turf Club is the ideal place as a haven for the foreign workers. It is big enough, centrally located, big car park, and unused but with all the facilities for a big crowd. All the dormitories can hire coaches to bring the FWs to this great common area to have fun and some private time among themselves. There is no need to disturb the residents, no need to cause traffic jams, no need to pee and shit on the road side as the toilet facilities are more than ample for their needs. And it is a damn decent place with good lightings and security fences.
 
All that is needed is to put up some food merchants to provide everything they need. The liquor licence holders can relocate their stalls in this new haven and no need to kpkb that they have invested so much money and no liquor sale means lose big money. The current foodstalls at Turf City will also be seeing a boom in their businesses and would be very thankful to the govt.
 
Think this is not only a win win for every party. It is a win, win, win, win and win for more than everyone. The entertainment industry can also do their bit to liven up the place. And no one can complain that they have been kept in a slum area. This is district 10, mind you. Ok, Ok, some shops in Little India may lose a bit of business. But allow them to open branches in the new place should help to increase their income. Can rename this place as the Little Taj Mahal.
 
What do you think? Or else rent a vacant piece of land in Batam and send them there during the weekend? Batam businesses will boom and the island will become another vibrant and busy place, more GDP, more foreign exchange and prosperity for the islanders. There will be big demands for food, entertainment and properties and all the services the FWs need. Still better than one of our precious little island that is undeveloped, no facilities and too small.