The Emperor's New Clothes: Is it Defamation?

As we all know, in the story, the Emperor was stupid enough to be fooled into believing that he has worn the most beautiful clothes which is in fact, nothing, and paraded around the country.

If the boy shouted, "That mad, crazy, gila and stupid Emperor is wearing nothing and walk around like an idiot...." will that considered as "defamation"?

In my view, this is NOT defamation because what the Emperor did indeed give EVERYBODY the impression that the Emperor is a madman, even though most people are afraid to say it out loud, unlike the boy. This is because what he has done has reasonably made any sane man to come to the conclusion that he is CRAZY, although they would not know that he has been fooled by the fraudsters. You can't blame or charge anyone who come to this conclusion, even though they can't "prove" the Emperor is crazy, for thinking so. If there is any defamation culprit, it is Emperor himself, for doing things that make others to think so.

Similarly, if a person keep making decisions and doing things that are full of conflicts of interests, it would naturally be INEVITABLE for people who come to know about it, to come to the simple conclusion that what he has been doing, is basically to benefit his own cronies or family members, even though there are so called "due processes" have been made.

The most obvious case in mind is the NEA Brompton bikes tender incident. The immediate impression given to the public when the case was first exposed on the internet, is that there are corruptions involved. This is despite the fact that there were no concrete evidence of a transfer of benefits (either in kind or cash) from the supplier to the officer in question. The only link was that they were friends and the supplier was prompted by the officer in advanced for the tender.

Any sane person who keep seeing a guy who put all his own clan or family members into important PUBLIC positions which benefited HUGELY from such appointments, would inevitably come to the conclusion that this guy has breached all counts of conflicts of interests and corrupt, no matter how good the reasons he has for doing so.

For public office holders, they must not only act diligently and clean without corruption intention, most importantly, they must be SEEN to be clean and incorruptible. Else, they cannot blame others of defamation if what they have done would make them seen as corrupt, irregardless of whatever reasons they may have to justify their actions. He can only blame himself for his own actions which leads to his own defamation, if any.

The more responsible way of carry out the duties of a public office, is to exercise "avoidance of conflicts of interests". It means that as long as there are great potential conflicts of interests, the public office holders should avoid it at all cost. This is to safeguard the moral authority of the office holders and to prevent any single doubt of integrity from arising in the public opinion.

Goh Meng Seng

WP's wavering stance on NMP scheme?

Before I start, I must state that it is really regrettable that I have to criticize Mr. Low Thia Khiang in this post. I always have high regards of him and even regarded him as my First Teacher for my initiation into Singapore Opposition Politics. Even though we may have differences in opinions but I have always given him the respect of a teacher or "shifu" to me.

However, this NMP issue is just blatantly against the very fundamental principles of Democracy and Democratic Electoral Process. It is just too important to me as a matter of principles, to state categorically that even my "shifu" is just obviously wrong to be involved in this undemocratic process of selecting NMP.

When I read the news on Asia One with regards to the Select Committee of Nominated MP (NMP), I was quite puzzled with the composition of the Select Committee. It was reported that Mr. Low Thia Khiang, Secretary General and Party Whip of Workers Party, was included as a member of this Select Committee.

Members of the Special Select Committee are:

- Speaker Halimah Yacob (Chairman)

- Dr Ng Eng Hen, Minister of Defence and Leader of the House

-Ms Grace Fu Hai Yien, Minister, Prime Minister's Office, Second Minister for the Environment and Water Resources and Second Minister for Foreign Affairs

- Dr Janil Puthucheary

- Ms Ellen Lee

- Low Thia Khiang

- Masagos Zulkifli BMM, Senior Minister of State, Ministry of Home Affairs and Ministry of Foreign Affairs

- Ms Sim Ann, Minister of State, Ministry of Education and Ministry of Communications and Information

I am puzzled because as far as I can remember, when I was still a CEC member of WP, WP's position was that NMP should be abolished. This was written in GE 2006 WP Election Manifesto. I double check on WP website for its GE 2011 Manifesto, this position has not changed. It is clearly stated in Chapter 1, Section B, Para 5 that "The Nominated Member of Parliament (NMP) scheme should be abolished."

Thus, I am really puzzled why Mr. Low Thia Khiang accepted the appointment of member of the Select Committee of NMP! Mr. Low in particular, was strongly against the NMP scheme. When the parliament was debating about Constitutional Change to include the NMP scheme, he was seen clapping his hands after Dr. Tan Cheng Bock has categorically stated his stance of opposing the NMP scheme.



The first doubt surfaces in my mind is, has Mr. Low or WP change their stance with regards to NMP scheme? If not, why is Mr. Low in the Selection Committee of NMP?

Before any WP apologists would jump in and use GRC as a justification for Mr. Low's involvement in this NMP Selection Committee, I will make distinctions between the two different issues.

First of all, even if WP or any other opposition opposition parties are against the GRC system and call for its abolishment, but do they have any CHOICE of not contesting in GRC? If they are not going to contest in GRCs, then they will make PAP very happy as that is exactly what PAP wants: to monopolize power without the need to fight for seats! And the ONLY way of changing the GRC system is to beat PAP in its own game and rules until it loses power. This could only be done by contesting in GRCs and win the seats there!

Thus for the issue of GRC system, it is a matter of the lack of alternative ways to effect a change if we do not contest in GRCs. i.e. the ONLY way to change the GRC system is to contest the GRCs even though we are against it.

But for this NMP scheme, you do not need to participate in the whole selection process which inevitably give legitimacy to the whole scheme, in order to get rid of the scheme. Thus there is absolutely no legitimate reason, in my opinion, for anyone who oppose this NMP scheme to get himself involved in the Selection Committee at all. He is practically giving support and legitimacy to the NMP scheme which is totally undemocratic by being part of the Selection Committee.

Such contradiction is just too glaring to ignore. It is a matter of big principle here; Democracy is definitely not through appointment politics. Anyone who wants to sit and speak in parliament, must go through the democratic electoral process to earn his right of representation of his constituents. The votes he gets from his constituents are the basis of his right to be part of the parliament. This is why anybody who really believe in Democracy, any self respecting Democratic fighters would go against NMP scheme as it is allowing people to walk into parliament via the backdoor. It is just blatantly wrong for Mr. Low to be involved in the Selection Committee of NMP and yet declaring his objection to this NMP scheme. He has the right and choice to decline the appointment to the Selection Committee but he chose to be involved instead.

I raise this issue here because this is of public interests and not some private matters which should be taken lightly. I believe many WP supporters, like me, would like to know why this is so. Why Mr. Low has done something which seemingly contradicted WP's as well as his own stance against NMP. Has WP and Mr Low changed their stance with regards to NMP? Have they lost their Democratic Principles? Are they just paying lip service to their belief in Democracy? Do they believe in Democracy at all?

Well, only Mr. Low Thia Khiang can explain these questions and the contradiction of his action and the words embedded in WP Manifesto.

Goh Meng Seng

After Note: Some people have suggested it may be good for Mr. Low Thia Khiang to be in the Selection Committee so that he can ensure good people and not just Pro-PAP people are nominated as NMP. They are afraid that PAP anyhow choose people to be NMPs.

I would say first of all, he is just one person against several other PAP MPs in the committee and I doubt he can prevent any "Pro-PAP" or mediocre people to be nominated as NMPs. Furthermore, if he is NOT in the Selection Committee, these "bad choices" would be seen directly as the choices of PAP alone and Singaporeans can blame PAP for that. However, now that Mr. Low is in the committee, things will not be that straight forward at all. These bad choices (if any) will be seen as the COLLECTIVE CHOICE of both PAP and WP.

This is where the legitimacy that LTK has given PAP on this NMP scheme!

CPF: The Middle Finger We Need To Show PAP

I have been telling my close associates since 2010, CPF is the hot issue that may create tremors on PAP's power base but back then, GE2011 is not the right time to blow it up as the main issue. I have tried to raise the CPF issue way back in GE2006 but it didn't gain much traction because the demographic time is not right.

The baby boomers of 1960s to 1970s (I am born in 1970) have not reached the "CRITICAL AGE" past 45 years old whereby they will start to think about their retirement financing.Thus in GE2011, among the 5 Hot Button Issues (HDB Mortgage Enslavement, Lack of Hospital Infrastructure, FT policy, Public Transport and CPF ) I have chosen HDB issue as the key issue. This is because HDB high pricing is linked to the adequacy of CPF for our retirement financing.

But now, I am already 44 and by 2015, most of my generation of baby boomers will reach the critical age whereby retirement linked to CPF will be our main concern. 

Although my prediction is that BOTH CPF and FT policy (now termed as 6.9m Population Policy) will topple PAP government eventually, but FT policy is an emotionally highly charged and divisive issue which will create explosive impact if it is not managed properly. CPF on the other hand, will keep us in solidarity against PAP's absurdity in carving the present CPF policies. It is going to be an explosive issue as well but all the explosion will be aimed at PAP directly.

PAP government isn't stupid and it knows this very well. This is why they are very very afraid and frightened that this CPF will explode right into their face. They have used all means to try and stop people from carrying out effective discussions on CPF issues.

At first glance, PM Lee's libel suit against Roy Ngerng is about his first article which has defamed him. However, if you notice how PM Lee, through his lawyer, tried to ask Roy Ngerng to remove a few more articles on CPF, citing "aggravate damage" to his reputation, you will realize that this is not merely about defamation only. These articles were written moons away in the past and the CPF issue they have touched on have no impact on the current defamation issue! I can only conclude that it is an attempt to curb free speech and discussion on THE CPF issue which may just create a big dent in PAP's legitimacy as the ruling party.

Beside trying to silence Roy, who undoubtedly has made stupid mistake in making such a direct defamation of PM Lee,  PAP machinery has done into overdrive to put up scare tactic and instill FEAR in everyone. First, it was targeted at property owners who used to support opposition parties and NGOs by renting out their conference rooms for forums organized by these organizations. Suddenly and strangely, everyone has one common reason to decline rental, even return deposits at the very last minute, citing "CPF ISSUE VERY SENSITIVE" when NSP tried to rent the room to conduct their forum or dialogue session on CPF issue.

But nevertheless, NSP still went ahead to conduct the dialogue session at their HQ and has its HQ totally packed. It was a successful event.

Then you have banner printers who usually don't mind printing banners for opposition cause, including the 6.9million protest, suddenly refused to print simple words like "Return OUR CPF"! Yes NONE of the printers dare to print, again citing the SAME REASON, "CPF issue very sensitive"!

Then you have stage supplier suddenly decline to build the stage for tomorrow's (7 June 2014) CPF protest because not only "CPF issue very sensitive" but they are afraid of losing business for the NDP dinners and lunar 7 month Hungry Ghost celebration! (Elaborated by Uncle Leong)


My Dear Singaporeans, this is definitely NOT a coincidence but rather, a COORDINATED effort to threaten and instill FEAR in all vendors and service providers, to deny any logistic support to anyone who is organizing any forums or protest on this "sensitive" CPF issue.

It is IRONIC for all these things to happen right now when in parliament, PAP claims that it wants "Constructive Politics"! Is this "Constructive" at all? In a normal functioning Democracy, opposition organizing public forums to discuss hot button topics and holding protest are all NORMAL workings. There shouldn't be any interference or FEAR instilled to prevent smooth organization of such activities. So, why is "Constructive Politics Advocates" like PAP trying to deter people to have a HEALTHY PUBLIC Discourse on such an important issue like CPF? The only conclusion I have is, they are just self-serving.

PAP knows that it can't possibly defend all aspects of its badly manipulated CPF system and there are more and more people with adequate knowledge and expertise to put up a good challenge on its current position. Public Trust has been lost when PAP keeps manipulating the CPF system for reasons only known to itself. It has scrambled to regain public confidence by putting up token notion of "CPF Refrom" but what they are willing to give, are just token tweaking only.

My Dear Singaporean, I may not be able to attend tomorrow's CPF Protest at Hong Lim Park because I am currently in Hong Kong but my heart is all with them.I wanted to show my anger at PAP which has basically screw up our CPF system for all these decades, since they started "Asset Enhancement Program" in the 1990s. I wanted to show my DISTRUST of PAP in making all sorts of excuses when it tried to delay and limit our withdrawals for our retirement. I wanted to show my disagreement when they tried to replace a totally contradicting system of Life Annuity to dislodge their responsibility as a government to take care of Singaporeans when the CPF system failed to take care of them. I wanted to protest against PAP treating our CPF as a source of cheap fund for them to invest and make money while deprive us with a higher return so that we could grow our retirement funds for our future usage!

I may not be attend tomorrow's CPF Protest but for those of you, my fellow Singaporeans, who are in Singapore, YOU CAN SHOW UP at the Protest to send a very STRONG SIGNAL to PM Lee that he and his PAP government has screwed up our CPF system and you need to show your Middle Finger to them for attempting to silence and deny our rights to question them on OUR CPF money! The most people attending the CPF Protest, the Bigger the Middle Finger you will be pointing at PAP!

PM Lee once said,  “People support CPF cuts because there are no protest outside parliament.”

Do you want our Prime Minister to mistaken your inaction, your absence at the CPF Protest as a "support" of his current CPF policy again? If we fail to have substantial turnout for this CPF protest, he will laugh at us and conclude "Singaporeans didn't show me their middle finger therefore you support me!"

So don't make the same mistake which we have been making all along. We need to send a CLEAR and UNDISTORTED signal to Lee Hsien Loong Administration that we are pissed off by their constant raping of the CPF policy and we want our CPF BACK for our retirement, no delay, no excuse, no all sorts of limits...etc. So, please show them our strength by attending the CPF protest tomorrow. We need at least 5,000 attendance to be credible, 10,000 to put forward a strong message of Middle Finger to PAP. Don't miss it.

Goh Meng Seng

4 June 1989 - Yahoo SG becoming accomplice of the Butchers?

WARNING: This Blog Article contains GRUESOME PHOTOS of the DEAD from Tiananmen Square. These may create great discomfort to viewers. 


I normally write my article in remembrance of the 4 June 1989 massacre in Chinese but this year, it will be a bit special because I have read a very disgusting article written by Gregory Clark posted on Yahoo SG which attempts to obfuscate the fact that a massacre has indeed happened during the 4 June 1989 incident at Tiananmen Square, Beijing.The article entitled "Tiananmen Square Massacre is a Myth, All We're 'Remembering' are British Lies" smacks of an attempt to whitewash away the blood of the butchers.

This is supposedly a conclusion after "research" but it only provides a few "eyewitness" accounts without photo evidence. It mentioned some "video" recording but wasn't presented in the report. This is against the background of hundreds, if not thousands of eye witnesses report of the massacre. But this is the basic common sense, if the army troopers have been shooting and killing all their way to get to Tiananmen Square, what makes him think that they would stop shooting at the Square?

There was a list of casualties leaked from the army's Chief of Staff office that gave detailed figures of casualties in various parts of China. The following is the summary:

 1989年6月1-10日 死亡总人数 Total Death: 31978人
   1。 其中学生(身份确认) Students identified 10974人 

    2。 普通人员(身份确认) Civilians identified 7992人 
    3。 不明人员(不予确认) unidentified 11865人 
    (2类3类人员含工人，农民，教授，医务人员，武警，公安人员，便衣警察，国家部委人员，离退休干部，僧尼，教会人士，外国人等 including workers, farmers, medical staff, police, monks, nuns, church personnel foreigners) 
    被袭军队死亡(身份确认) Military personnel attacked identified 113人 
    军队内部误杀(身份确认) Military cross fired 197人 
    因伤过重死亡人数(医院) Death from wounds in hospital 837人 
   
    死亡地区:(以下含军人) Place of death
    颐和园地区 12人 
    北京大学地区 17人 
    清华大学地区 23人 
    万寿路地区 39人 
    木樨地地区 11人 
    燕京饭店外 27人 
    民族饭店外 57人 
    西单地区 113人 
    西单至新华门地区 389人 
    人民大会堂北 271人(尸体堆群) 
    南长安街至南池子大街 933人(尸体堆群) 
    天安门广场人民大会堂一侧 Tiananmen Square Great Hall of People side piling of bodies 3569人(大的尸体堆群) 
    天安门广场历史博物馆一侧 Tiananmen Square History Museum side piling of bodies  5781人(大的尸体堆群) 
    人民英雄纪念碑底南侧 2544人(大的尸体堆群) 
    人民英雄纪念碑底北侧 4633人(大的尸体堆群) 
    天安门广场长安街侧 Tiananmen Square side of Changan Street 9531人(大的尸体堆群) 
    金水桥 289人(尸体堆群) 
    午门 812人(尸体堆群) 
    前门大街 53人 
    崇文门地区 29人 
    北京饭店外 21人 
    建国门外 19人 
    二环建国门至朝阳门 33人 
    红庙地区 17人 
    进入居民宅及办公区处决 1918人 
    医院 837人 
    合计 31978人
    注意:尸体堆群包括别处拉来集中的部分,军队隶属不同,尸体集中地不同,但是销毁火化基本集中处理.如何销毁可以在网络上查到,有人透露过.
    以上的资料来源包括总参两位人士,黄寺大街的总政三位人士及当年参与镇压的某高层校官的日记汇总,其中的天安门地区的人数完全根据总参人士的统计,该部分资料的流出与前几年军队内部要求平反六四有直接的关系,另外三位提供口头资料,即提供镇压时误杀军队人员资料的三位军官(也参与了当时的指挥镇压行动)确认都已经移民美国,并加入美国国籍.

These figures didn't include the numerous secret executions of dissidents happened in the aftermath for as long as 2 years. But never mind, we will just concentrate on the figures here. According to the figures revealed here, there were a total of 18881 dead bodies found piling up at the sides of Tiananmen Square!

Well, people may put doubts or dispute on these figures and rightfully so, then I would ask, why should we believe those few witnesses interviewed by the author?

Maybe seeing is believing. The following GRUESOME photo evidences taken JUST FROM one website here will speak louder than words.

The Tanks rolled into Tiananmen Square. Do you think they will stop the killing after ramming through other places?

The Army clearing Tiananmen Square in the aftermath. What do you think they are building in the background?

 

 This is how the Tanks ramming through humans

This is the remains of a man crushed through by a tank.

Yes, they shot the heads of protesters!

 Bodies were cleared and piled up at designated places.

Dead bodies piled up at hospital.

Citizens tried to identify the bodies in the aftermath.

The massacre continued in the aftermath at Changan Street. Notice the various dead bodies lying on the streets.

This is the MAP of the BUTCHERS, stating clearly where they military had opened fired and killing thousands of civilians, students, farmers etc. And please note, the bloodiest attack was right outside Tiananmen Square! This validated the figures provided by the leaked figures.

Now, back to the author's claim that the Spanish news team video clip has shown that there was "no massacre at Tiananmen Square". That is an attempt to "quote out of context" of the whole video. I shall produce the video which the author based on his writing here.

First of all, it is clear that the first assault had happened even before the Spanish news team has reached the National Hero Memorial Hall. You can see that Mr Liu XiaoBo was holding a rifle and denouncing the violence by the military and tried to break the rifle. You can also observe that students were injured quite badly.

The video has shown that the military actually "tricked" the students to retreat from the Tiananmen Square but only to attacked them by shooting at them using rifles AFTER they have dispersed into various directions. This explained why there were three main piles of bodies surrounding Tiananmen Square. It was due to the despicable trick used by the army to con the students to let down their guard and then slaughter them later! If this is NOT a MASSACRE then I don't know how to describe it!



The following video has proven the fact that the Military has already been fired at the civilians before the Spanish News Team reached Tiananmen Square



The following video is the evidence that the army fired upon civilians and students.




Another video that shows how the army fired indiscriminately upon civilians in the aftermath of clearing the students off Tiananmen Square.



It is ingenious to state "No Tiananmen Square Massacre" but the truth is, there are hundreds and thousands of bodies found in the aftermath!

Now back to Yahoo SG. What is Yahoo SG's motive by putting such article in the of 25th Anniversary of the bloodshed at Tiananmen Square? Is it trying to trivialize the massive killing by the butchers by stating there was NO killing in Tiananmen Square but ignoring the fact of the massive killings AROUND Tiananmen Square?

It is totally disgusting, disrespectful and insensitive for Yahoo SG to carry such article which is based on doubtful accounts on few individuals to aggravate hurt on the Mothers of Tiananmen Square who have lost their children during the 1989 massacre and continue to suffer injustice and oppression from CCP. Such article which void of any sense of justice and conscience should NOT have appeared on Yahoo SG at all unless Yahoo SG is set to the cruel accomplice of the butchers to cover up the brutal truth!

I really do not see why such article is worthy of being propagated by Yahoo SG unless it too wants to be part of the propaganda started by CCP to WHITEWASH the BLOOD stains on the butchers of 1989!

Spare a thought to the dead who have died of such brutal injustice. If you are not going to seek justice for them, at the very least, you should not help the oppressors and butchers to get away from the judgment of history.


I would urge Yahoo SG to remove the blatantly disrespectful and nauseating article which has practically insulted the many Chinese people who have sacrificed their lives for their democratic dream. It has also trivialized and poured cold water on the effort of many other people, especially in Hong Kong, to keep the memory and records of the brutal massacre alive in the search of Justice and vindication of the 1989 student movement.  I seriously hope that Yahoo SG will have that little of Conscience as a global citizen seeking for Justice, Rule of Law, Freedom and Liberty, to do the right thing by removing this offensive article.

Last but not least, a reminder here from Malcom X

“If you're not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.”

― Malcolm X

Goh Meng Seng

CPF: Can I trust PAP government with my CPF money?

The answer is simply NO.

There are already quite a lot of articles written by bloggers, Facebook users and internet forummers on this CPF issue. We are beginning to converge to agree on a few fundamental points:

1) Nobody in his right mind would have put money into CPF for its promise of "guaranteed" return of a meager 2.5% to 4% when it could just change the rules on when and how much you could draw your own money anyhow they like without consulting us. If CPF is not compulsory, I don't think anyone with a right mind would want to RISK their money like that.

2) Government guarantee doesn't mean RISK FREE. Yes, please get this right. The only reason why government can give guarantee to CPF is because if everything fails, it can just print money to repay us. However, that will create hyper inflation that will practically devalue our CPF money altogether. So it is NEVER risk free even when it is guaranteed.

3) Returns to our CPF are really understated. We could have invested DIRECTLY into GIC or Temasek Holdings to earn higher returns, instead of going through the government which practically end up making use of our CPF as "National Reserves", invest in GIC and make profits out of these investment. In essence, we have been shortchanged in our CPF returns no matter how we look at it. GIC gave much higher annualized returns of  6.5% to 8.8% for their 20 year and 10 year span. Why are we paid only 2.5% and 4% only? This is in fact a very heavy implicit tax applied on our CPF money's potential returns. i.e. more than 50% implicit tax!

All in all, I find PAP government is just paying lip service when they tried to show "how concerned" they are with our ability of financing our retirement. If they really care about our retirement financing, they won't:

1) Increase the HDB prices so recklessly so much so that most of us will not have very much cash left in our CPF account for our retirement. In the end, they just give us a false option of "monetizing HDB for retirement"!

2) Increase our medical cost so much so that we need to put aside a hefty amount aside in Medisave.

3) Giving a flat LOW return on our CPF for decades under the guise of "risk free guarantee return" rhetoric which basically put the growth of our CPF very much at the lowest pace in the developed world, barely above inflation rate or sometimes, even LOWER than inflation rates.

4) When they finally realize that some people will be really short of funds for retirement, they came up with Life Annuity which is basically totally opposite of the CPF's self financing system! Life Annuity is in essence, similar to the "Social Security System" where retirement financing is basically share pooling of risks. Life Annuity is just pushing off risks and responsibility from PAP government's failed management of the CPF system, by shifting the inadequacy of retirement financing to some other "shorter life" Singaporeans. If you look at it from another perspective, it is shifting the risk to the descendants of those "shorter life" Singaporeans, depriving them their rightful inheritance.

Such glaring insincerity on PAP's part in taking care of our retirement financing really makes me think that PAP is only interested in milking our CPF as CHEAP funds for them to invest and earn profits/taxes. In places like Hong Kong, MPF contributors will invest DIRECTLY their retirement funds into different trust funds with indications of their various risk portfolios. They can choose to invest in different percentages of different risk portfolios. Although their system is not perfect but the fact is, the government cannot mess around with their retirement funds directly! But it seems that CPF has become a piggy bank that gives PAP very cheap funds to play around with!

My distrust of PAP government further enhanced when they started to play the game of Taichi. They started to claim GIC and Temasek Holdings don't manage our CPF funds, throw smoke bombs about GIC etc.

In GIC's website, it tries to throw smoke bomb and demonstrate IGNORANCE that it is managing our CPF money. GIC is basically trying to obfuscate the fact that it is managing our CPF money by saying:

Does GIC invest CPF monies?

The short answer is that GIC manages the Government’s reserves, but as to how the funds from CPF monies flow into reserves which could then be managed by either MAS, GIC or Temasek, this is not made explicit to us. What we do know from public sources: Singaporeans’ CPF funds are invested in bonds called Special Singapore Government Securities (SSGS) which are fully guaranteed by the Government. These are non-marketable floating rate bonds issued specifically to the CPF Board. These bonds earn for the CPF Board a coupon rate that is pegged to CPF interest rates that members receive. Under the Protection of Reserves Framework in the Singapore Constitution of the Republic of Singapore, the Singapore Government cannot spend any monies raised from Government borrowings. All the proceeds from the Government’s borrowing are therefore invested.

But on the other hand, Ministry of Finance made a reply to ST's enquiry by stating that our CPF money is basically put into GIC and it manages our CPF! Now trust can only be earned by being open, accountable, transparent and most importantly, forthright with simple answers to simple questions. But GIC is basically not telling the truth! And it is totally IMPOSSIBLE for GIC NOT to know the truth because it has BOTH the Prime Minister and Finance Minister on its Board of Directors! How could GIC ever claim IGNORANCE of such arrangement? You mean the Prime Minister and Finance Minister are totally in the dark of such things? That will really worry me! The Finance Minister runs the Ministry of Finance and technically speaking, he is the sole shareholder of GIC!

This is what is written in MOF website:

When government securities are issued, the proceeds are first deposited with MAS as government deposits. MAS converts these funds into foreign assets through the foreign exchange market. However, as a major portion of these assets are of a long-term nature, such as those that provide backing for long-term Government liabilities like SSGS, such assets are transferred to GIC to be managed over a long investment horizon.

Why would GIC want to hide such simple fact? There is only one conclusion I have after looking at the whole thing. PAP doesn't want us to make any direct comparisons to the meager CPF returns they are giving us (2.5% & 4%) with the very much higher annualized returns of 6.5% and 8.8% for 20 years and 10 years respectively!

So, you tell me, how can I place any trust on PAP to take good care of my CPF money? They have used all sorts of method to hide the fact that our CPF money could well get much higher returns than what they are offering!

Why can't we invest our CPF money DIRECTLY into GIC or Temasek Holdings by choosing the risk portfolio according to what we desire? They have even claimed that Temasek Holdings have an impressive 16% annualized return, for goodness sake!

I have totally lost trust in PAP government in the way they manipulated us and our CPF money. High HDB prices basically transferred our CPF money through HDB to SLA so that it is kept away in the already bloated National Reserves (my conservative estimate is over S$1 Trillion).

And they are not interested to help us grow our retirement fund but only interested to make us left with little for our next generation to inherit. i.e.they have coined the idea of "monetizing HDB for retirement" and Compulsory Life Annuity! They are only interested to drag on the withdrawal time and amount of your CPF money and they could continue to enjoy the cheap funds they can take from your CPF! Never mind if you are dead sick when you reach 55 years old or if your health can't last much longer after that.

Can I trust PAP government with my CPF money? You bet, NO!

Goh Meng Seng

After note: It is totally absurd for PAP to show no trust in our ability to take care of our own CPF money after 55 years old, bring up some minority issue of people squandering off their CPF money. But how could that be? We are the owner of our CPF money and IT IS UP TO US to show TRUST or DISTRUST of who handles our money, not the other way round!