TOTD - SAF Waste Basket of Talents

Thought of the Day - SAF Waste Basket of Talents

Have you noticed Singapore has produced quite a number of Generals every few years which will take up various positions in GLCs, Statutory Boards and such in the past?

For a small army which has NEVER fought a major war before to chunk out so many Paper Generals is rather amazing! If we were to count the "General - Army personnel" ratio, I bet we will be one of the HIGHEST in the world!

No wonder our Defence Budget is so high because we have to pay so many Generals as well as all other Colonels supporting them.

PAP government has followed its past traditions of giving out SAF scholarships and President Scholarships to the Top A Level students every year.

Yes, our Elitist PAP also select people based on A Level grades and you will be assured of good life ahead if your A Level results are one of the Best. PAP's flawed and extremely Elitist Meritocracy is determined solely by A Level grades which a 18 or 19 year old kids could get!

A friend of mine lamented in private chat over this.

In Economic theory, this is "crowding effect" of talents with bias tendency. And this is detrimental to the growth of our economy and private enterprises.

These Scholar-Paper-Generals (SPG) wasted more of their time in army for 20 over years before they were asked to leave and chuck into some GLCs or statutory boards. They have totally ZERO real life corporate experience but just helicopter into high position to lead any organizations assigned to them. Those who have been working in these organizations, amassing great amount of experience in the field, were passed from such promotions. I wonder how these people would feel, having a totally "Clueless Idiot" in the field to lead and tell them what to do! eg. The latest SPG former navy chief jumping into MOE to become Perm Sect.. Hey, he is totally clueless about Education!

The worst part is to have these SPGs to parachute into such important positions such as "Permanent Secretary" which has become rather "impermanent" nowadays! Every 2-3 years, Perm Sect will change. How could they have garnered enough experience and contribute to the Ministries adequately? In the past, we used to say, even if you put an idiot as a Minister or Minister of State, the Perm Sect will be able to run the show. But in the end, our Perm Sects are now totally lack of experience and "Half Barrel Filed"! it will be left to the mid-high level Directors of the Ministries to run the show! It will be extremely unstable and chaotic for these Ministries and definitely the sustainability of the whole system will be in question.

I do not expect a Perm Sect to stay in that position for more than 2 decades but definitely not this type of "touch and go" situation!

Short tenure for Perm Sect will create a serious problem. These people will only aim for SHORT TERM VISIBLE results but ignore LONG TERM beneficial planning! Just like the NOL saga! Selling assets off will of course create "huge value" for the government in the short term but what is the long term strategic implications?

Worse of all, the new Ministers may not even be well verse in their own Ministries as many of them have been "Merry Go Round" rotating among the Ministries... how could they possibly be contributing to the LONG TERM planning for the Ministries and Singapore as a whole with such short term tenure? It is seriously a situation of "the clueless leading the blind".

SAF has become a Waste Basket for "Talents". The current practice of SPG Elitism should be reviewed because it has proven to be detrimental to the development and growth of a Nation's economy by crowding out talents from private sectors as well as making them invalid to the corporate world after decades of "Yes Man" molding. We are starting to see the great harm that such system is doing to us now.

Goh Meng Seng

TOTD: Terrex the Jialat Ministers

Thought of the Day -Terrex the Jialat Ministers

I believe many people may be wow or fooled by Defence Minister Ng's exclamation that it is "illegal" for HK to impound our Terrex by the argument of "sovereign rights" over these war vehicles but anyone with that bit of common sense will see through the fallacy of such naive and illogical argument.

First of all, HK Customs didn't even know who own these military vehicles when it first seized them. They were acting on their own law that any shipping companies which are doing transshipment should follow, regardless whether these are sovereign assets or not. Thus, there is no illegality in HK Customs' action but ironically, the one which has breached HK law is SAF and the shipping company, where both failed to make declarations and apply for proper permits.

Our Defence Minister has aggravated the situation by making such unfounded accusation. Instead of lowering the tension, he has instead heightened it! Imagine if you were the Chinese government or HK authorities, instead of having Singapore admitting that they have done wrong, you are being accused of acting illegally! How would you feel? Will you return the Terrex? It is no wonder that such irresponsible and untactful speech by our Defence Minister drew sharp retort and warning from China by saying, please watch what you are saying! Basically, the actual diplomatic message behind is, please stop talking cock!

So I guess our Defence Minister is not interested in getting back these Terrex at all but his only aim is to justify that he and his Ministry are not in the wrong!

If our Defence Minister is really interested in getting back the Terrex or at the very least, want to diffuse the tension, he should have put it in a more a tactful way.... let me teach this undeserving overpaid Minister how to talk skillfully....

"I believe it is a great misunderstanding between us and HK that resulted in the seizure of these military assets. There is a gross oversight on our part in working according to HK law but I believe we have sovereign ownership of these military assets, unlike any other cases of military transshipment. I hope that both sides could resolve these issues amicably...."

The above speech would convey the same message of sovereign rights but at the same time, give enough space for both sides to work out a resolution.

The second point is that having sovereign rights over these assets doesn't give you immunity from not abiding local law. For example, as Alex Au had agreed with me, if a country tried to send massive military weapons to a terrorist organization to carry out a war against another sovereign country, do you think your claim of sovereign ownership will work? This is a real life situation whereby the Americans or Saudi or other countries are sending arms to those terrorist groups in Syria!

The third point is, apparently this is more of a diplomatic issue rather than just a legal issue. But our undeserving overpaid Foreign Minister has instead tried to play it down by shifting the focus to legal issues! This will further agitate China and in the end, the problems may not be contained within this Terrex issue but may just escalate into some other issues later on. Please bear in mind that Singapore has over $100 billion investment in China!

It is apparent that China is not satisfied with our Minister's assurance of adherence to One China policy. However we cannot succumb to its demand of cutting all our ties with Taiwan. This will need, first, a show of commitment more than just reciting the mere mantra of One China policy. We need to add to that although we have military training in Taiwan but this is not a support of Taiwan's Independence movement. This is purely a move to meet our own military training needs. At no time will we support any Taiwanese attempt to declare independence from China, neither in diplomatic nor military terms. We are all for a peaceful progressive development of One China diplomacy which we have contributed in the past and will continue to support in the future.

By putting up such assurance and reminding China that we have been working and contributing towards the One China policy will in fact, subtly enhance our position that we need to maintain ties with Taiwan in order to continue to contribute towards this role.

Both our Defence and Foreign Ministers have failed badly, epic failure in fact, in handling this Terrex diplomatic crisis. Of course, the biggest culprit is our PM Lee who has ignored all well meaning warning from everyone including opposition of his dangerous diplomatic stunts against China.

While Singaporeans should stand up against big countries like China or US if they assert unreasonable demands, but we must also realize that all these could have been dissolved or avoided totally if we have more competent Ministers instead of these current undeserving and overpaid Ministers.

Goh Meng Seng

Supplementary input from a FB friend:

Fact

1) Ship manifest does not reflect armoured vehicles exist on ship. It is the same as smuggling, undeclared goods.

2) Military goods must have special permit to transit. Plus standard Export Control declaration, as required by international shipping law. Since there are no documents, means special permit not done. Export Control declaration not done.

Terrex armoured vehicle is being smuggled on the ship. Breaking Taiwan law, Sinkaland law, China law, HK law and international shipping law.

Could any white supporters please tell me which country would consider smuggling armoured vehicles without documents as legal ???

An Open Letter to President Xi of China

致中国国家主席公开信
尊贵的习近平主席先生

贵国最近通过香港扣押了九辆我祖国新加坡最先进的装甲车。据说这些装甲车里包含了世界级的高科技装备，是我祖国自行研法生产的骄傲。

无论这是否是贵国刻意使计由香港扣押我祖国的这批装甲车，我本身也意识到这整件事都是我们国防部的疏忽才导致这事件的发生。无论贵国是否决定归还这九辆装甲车，我们在国际社会里和军备市场中都已经是损失惨重。这是因为就算贵国没有趁此机会去对这批装甲车进行军事科技研探，国际社会的准军备购买者的脑子里都会对这军备的可靠性暗存疑问。

无论如何，我本人觉得这次事件的确是我祖国犯了低级错误，如果军备被贵国没收，也是无话可说的。于情于理，我们都输得彻底。我也认了。

从一个新加坡反对党的角度看这件事，我也只能对我祖国的领导鞭笞，追究责任，也无法理直气壮的对贵国指骂。

如果这真是贵国以计谋导致事件的发生，我本人不得不佩服为贵国出谋献策的智囊团的高明。可是，贵国如此做，也必须付出一定的国际政治代价。没有一个泱泱大国会喜欢国际社会在明或在暗批评以大欺小的。更何况是中国，一个打着和平崛起的旗帜发展经济与周边国家发展政治与贸易联系的大国。更重要的是您本人伟大的政治策略，“一带一路”不只是要靠金钱去发展，还要靠国际政治信誉去赢得参与国的信任。为了新加坡这个小国而冒着国际社会的不良反应，您认为值得吗？

再者，贵国对于我祖国新加坡在台湾进行军事演习提出抗议，我想我祖国的人民肯定感觉到非常反感。就连身为反对党人的我，也不得不站出来对贵国的抗议表示不满。

在贵国邓小平同志领导的时代，他展现了一个大政治家的洪量与风范，确实将心比心，以事论事，站在其他小国的角度看问题。他也谅解新加坡有土地的局限，到台湾借用地方做军训，是形势所逼，并非是要针对中国做出任何军事威胁或卷入贵国的内政。我们小国寡民，就算是真要与贵国搞军事对抗，也没那种能耐！那岂不是白痴说梦话？说了也不会有人相信的！

现在贵国要以这个借口要挟我祖国，打压我们，国际社会里，明眼人一看就知道贵国是故意刁难新加坡，以大欺小了！试问，这样一来对贵国有什么好处呢？

再说，如果贵国要是打算以这做借口开始对新加坡进行经济制裁，这更说不过去了！试问，谁才是真正对贵国进行军事抗争的？或防止贵国统一台湾的？那当然首推台湾人民嘛！但是贵国竟然没对台湾进行经济制裁，反而给台湾人台胞证，让他们到台湾去投资发展，您说，如果贵国要制裁新加坡，国际社会上说得过去吗？

对一个所谓军事反叛岛屿省份的人民给予优待，到大陆去投资发展，反而对一个只为了解决本身土地不够而到台湾军训的友好国家进行打压，经济制裁，这怎么能说得过去？

再说，要是新加坡没有跟台湾打交道，打好关系，政治上我们也没法有效的当大陆与台湾的桥梁了。试想想，为了一个不是理由的理由对新加坡打压，硬要把新加坡切断与台湾的关系，这符合贵国长远的政治利益吗？

说穿了，我们大家都必须务实一点。没有人想在东亚再打仗，因为这对所有东亚国家都不利。维持和平现状，各国为自己的人民福祉努力发展经贸，才是所有国家人民的真正愿望。

我在此恳请习主席，念在我们两国以往都是以互惠互利和务实的原则发展彼此深厚的关系，仔细的思量彼此的立场，核心利益和观点后，才做出谨慎的决定。

我本人身为新加坡反对党人，对本国的领导最近的表现都非常不满，对这次事件的发生，也觉得是我方之错。贵国要如何处置那批装甲车，我都无异议，认了。我相信我祖国对这笔损失千万或甚至几亿的军备收入，还是负担得起。钱输了换来一个刻骨铭心的教训，那也罢。钱可以再赚回来。高科技产品失去了，还可以再研发新的。

但要是贵国如要以不是理由的理由继续打压我们，针对我们国防的核心利益进行攻击，这个我相信所有新加坡人都不会容许发生的。

我更相信这对贵国也会是有伤害。我们两个友邦，以往都是以互惠互利与务实双赢的原则共存共荣，为何如今要以双输的形式自残？

尊贵的习主席，我相信以您的睿智，您必能理清这种种的利害关系。

吴明盛敬启

How to Die for Our Contry?

When I was young, I was pretty dead serious in serving my country. I took my National Service very seriously and with every pride. I couldn't quite understand why some of my peers would "Keng" or skive, avoiding contributing their best.

But throughout the years, I realized the reasons. You will be "penalized" when you are too serious in serving NS. When you get yourself injured or hurt, the State won't really take care of you.

Thus throughout my years of reservist training, the only top priority in my mind is the safety of my man, nothing else matters more than their safe returns to their families, because I know the State will not take care of them if anything bad happened to them.

It is an irony. I have learned from history, the only way to ensure or motivate the soldiers to go all out and put in their best efforts in fighting and even willing to die for the State, is not only to make sure they will be well rewarded but also to give assurance that if anything happened to them, they or their families will be well taken care of.

But this is not how PAP government runs the conscripted army. Our boys are paid peanuts as ALLOWANCE when they are expected to give their best or even die for the country. But when they get hurt or die for their Singapore, the State will not take care of them or their families.

Goh Meng Seng

PAP's Elitist Entitlement Mindset and FAILED Meritocracy

Prime Minister Lee has recently lamented about "Singaporeans' entitlement mindset" but I would say that he should take a good look at himself in the mirror as well as his backyard of Elitist cronies.

Through over 50 years of autocratic rule, his party has created a whole system of pseudo Meritocratic Cronism which lacks the very fundamental principle of ACCOUNTABILITY that TRUE Meritocracy is built upon.

Those so call "High Flyer Scholars" along with the various cronies in the whole system has taken the strong foundation which our forefathers have built up, for granted. These people milk and feed upon the wealth of the system with no accountability nor shame with FULL ELITIST ENTITLEMENT mindset. They abuse the Key Performance Indicators (KPI) to the max by setting dubious standards which put up pseudo accountability system which most of the time rewards themselves with undeserving salaries and increments. Worse of all, when they indulge in doing whatever they can to meet these KPIs so that they could gain their perks and rewards, instead of doing good to Singaporeans as a whole, they have instead brought more undesirable results to the Nation as a whole.

It started right from the Top Political Leadership. When GDP growth is the single most important KPI used to judge whether the Ministers should get hefty bonuses and salary increment, we end up with the Growth At All Cost strategy which resulted worse quality of life for Singaporeans.

The same applies to many other sectors under PAP Government control. Look at SMRT. The trouble started when Saw just have that singular pursue to increase profit so that she could increase her bonuses and salaries throughout the years of her "glorious years". She went to such an extent that SMRT maintenance has been grossly compromised.

We thought that with her departure, we would get better people to run the system but we were proven wrong by PAP. They sent an Elitist PAPER GENERAL who has ZERO Corporate experience in running a train service to run the show! This elite continue to enjoy increment in his salaries while the train services continue to suffer numerous small and major breakdowns throughout the years! Yet, by using some OUT OF REALITY TOUCH KPI, he tried to justify how the train system and services have "improved"!

He has totally disregard the reality that Singaporeans have experienced on the ground and SMRT just avoid the label "breakdowns" whenever they can by putting up a false front of "delays" to mask away the reality! This is how they tried to GAME the system of KPI!

Similar thing happened to other GLCs like NOL. Another PAPER General was sent there and he continued to enjoy millions of dollars paid every year, with increments, while the company continues to bleed profusely! How? By showing that he is able to "cut cost"! But that doesn't help as the company continues to suffer great losses over the years and eventually, Temasek Holdings is going to sell it off!

It is a total shame that we are going to sell off our Nation's Flagship and key assets. NOL has special iconic value for a nation like Singapore which pride itself to be one of the busiest port in the world! But these Elites have no shame. Why? It is because they only have this Elitist Entitlement Mindset and they could just explain their GROSS incompetency away by hiding behind that KPI system.

PAP must understand that KPI should be a means to an end, to serve the people and Nation, not just a silly ploy for people to get hefty bonuses and salary increments. One may excel in ALL KPIs set but in the end, due to the methodology used in achieving these KPIs, they may create more harm than good to the Nation as a whole!

Most importantly, PAP must understand that no matter how elite you are in paper qualifications, if you do not have the necessary skill sets and knowledge of the business, you will fail! This especially true for top civil servants, government scholars and Army Paper Generals! If PAP continues to abuse the system of GLCs to feed their elitist cronies instead of assigning such important positions to people with real talents and expertise in the various fields, Singapore will be doomed with the fake Meritocracy buried under the dubious KPI system.

Goh Meng Seng

My Dear Prime Minister, Singapore doesn’t belong to Foreigners!

I was first shocked to read what was reported from an INDIAN online news website that our dear Prime Minister has uttered the following words:

"Singaporeans, new arrivals, people who are on permanent residence here, people who are on employment pass here, all participating in one big Singapore family... So that we feel that this is a place which is special, which belongs to all of us and where we all celebrate one another's festivals and happy events together."

I thought I have read wrongly or that the Indian news website has misquoted our dear Prime Minister but after checking with Channel News Asia news report, those were the exact words quoted as well.

From my understanding, our Dear Prime Minister is basically saying, “Hey! Foreigners like you, whether you are PRs or just working here under employment pass, we treat you as one big Singapore family and this land belongs to you as well and we would be glad to celebrate any festivals or happy events with you here!”

Well, I may not have scored A in my English or General Papers but I believe my comprehension is as close to what our Dear Prime Minister has said. In fact, a simple check with TOC FB or TRS or TRE sites, all those who have commented on this statement have the same understanding as I have. It could not possibly be that hundreds and thousands of Singaporeans have misunderstood what he has said.

My Dear Prime Minister, just a few days ago, you have chided Singaporeans for protesting against PIDC (Pilipino Independence Day Council) for organizing a PUBLIC celebration of their country’s Independence Day at Orchard road as “a disgrace to Singapore”. Your fellow minister has also insinuated those who are against PIDC as “bigots”. With all due respect, I was wondering why PAP minister and our very own Dear Prime Minister have such harsh words against our very own Singaporeans without really understanding what we are really protesting.

I should save the details on how PIDC has been truly disrespectful, breaking our law and such but even on the surface, you and your colleagues should know very well that a PUBLIC celebration of Philippines sovereignty aka Independence Day is against well established Diplomatic protocols. Such public event is not just a simple festival event nor cultural event but basically a demonstration and celebration of another country’s sovereignty on our land publicly. This is totally inappropriate and trespasses on our country’s sovereignty.

With all due respect, my Dear Prime Minister, you are an Army General and trained to protect, defend and die for our country’s sovereignty. You have allocated over 10 billion dollars EVERY YEAR in our National Budget to defense spending and male Singaporeans have spent years in basic military training and suffered disruptions to their work and businesses in order to attend ICT yearly, just to defend our home country. I really cannot understand why, as a Prime Minister, you would not only willingly allow foreigners to trespass our sovereignty but on top of that, chided our own patriotic brothers and sisters for trying to defend our country’s sovereignty and dignity!

I also cannot understand why you could just GIVE AWAY our country by telling foreigners working and staying on this land that this country also belongs to them willingly without anybody firing a single shot! Aren’t we wasting our billions of dollars in defense spending and the time, effort, sweat, blood and even lives of our Singaporeans in National Service when your government is so readily to allow foreigners trespass our sovereignty or even own our country?

I have lived to believe in a country call Singapore in which I belong to and for which I shall lay my life to defend it. For all my life up till now, as an army officer, I have given numerous pep talks and speeches to my fellow Singaporean comrades in arm, to provide them the very reason and need for their sacrifices in training to fight and defend this country. My Dear Prime Minister, unwittingly, your remark here has just destroyed years of efforts made by thousands and thousands of officers trying to convince their men the need for them to make the necessary sacrifices for this land which we call home. Do you really know what you have done? Or do you really know what you are saying?

Only the true blue Singaporeans who really belongs to this land, this country, this home, will put in the effort and even risk their lives to train and defend it. Will your foreigners who just happen to stay here, work here or study here risk their lives to defend this country if there is really a war? My Dear Prime Minister, the answer is no. They will be the first ones to flee this country at the very first sight of trouble and you jolly well know that! In fact, you should know that every year there are thousands of "second generation PRs" who have chosen to give up their PR status just to avoid National Service! Thus, My Dear Prime Minister, how could you ever utter those words, saying this land, this country also belong to the foreigners who are PRs or those with employment passes?

We are NOT Xenophobic, neither are we racist against foreigners who came to work or study in our country. We are not against foreigners staying here to celebrate their festivals or organize their cultural events. However, make no mistake about it, My Dear Prime Minister; Singaporeans will always be the only owners of this country. Celebration of foreign country’s National Day or Independence Day public in Singapore is deemed as a total disrespect to our sovereignty. Any foreigner who wants to belittle or trespass our sovereignty, disrespect and break our law or even try to claim that our country belongs to them, will have to be dealt with respectively. Does our country belong to foreigners staying here? Over my dead body, My Dear Prime Minister.

My Dear Prime Minister, you have enraged so many Singaporeans in one master stroke by making your unwarranted remarks. Just read all those comments on the internet sites! You have evoked so much anger from Singaporeans and congratulations, you have outdone all the past Prime Ministers of Singapore. In all my life, I have never heard or read any well respected political leaders in the world history, not even ancient Emperors and Kings, telling foreigners that their own land or country belongs to the foreigners!

My Dear Prime Minister, you have indeed lost the respect of so many Singaporeans and most important of all, the honour and moral authority to lead Singapore by such utterance. I would urge you to apologize for making such disgraceful remark, resign and step down from your office. That would be the only last dignified thing you can do for Singapore, our country, our home land.

Goh Meng Seng

NSP Response to Budget Statement 2011

NSP Response to Budget Statement 2011

The National Solidarity Party is very disappointed that the PAP government has not addressed in this budget the fundamental question on whether the current economic growth model of “Growth at all cost” based on indiscriminate importation of foreign workers at ALL LEVELS of employment should carry on. Instead, it tries to address the “ill symptoms”, which are caused by this flawed economic strategy, in such an inadequate way.

While the excuse of low fertility rate is cited as the main reason to import excessive foreign workers into Singapore, the miserable $300 to $400 Child Development Credit is totally inadequate to address this problem. We would expect healthcare cost to be lowered or a comprehensive social safety net for children up to 18 years old or heavy subsidy for pre-school education etc. The little top ups to students’ Edusave by $130 could hardly offset the enormous increase in tuition fees over the years. Apparently there are not enough subsidies given to tertiary institutions to defray the rising costs. On the other hand, there are no new initiatives to strengthen work-life balance for couples so that they could enjoy family life with their children.

The only “real” solution to the low fertility rate provided by PAP government is to depend on the influx of foreign workers. Although PAP has increased worker levies but it falls short of giving us the assurance that the number of foreign workers, thus population, will not grow any further.

The first critical problem of having excessive foreign workers is, either citizens' jobs are displaced or wages are suppressed by them. PAP has chosen to increase workers levies while giving more workfare to citizens to address these problems. However, we believe that without a minimum wage scheme, the effectiveness of both the workfare and worker levies will be dampened (due to substitution effects).

The influx of cheap foreign labour has apparently suppressed wages and thus widened the income disparity. According to the chart shown in the budget speech as well as what the Finance Minister has said, the real income growth of the 20th percentile in the past decade would only be 5% instead of 8.1% if it was not for the workfare. The income disparity has widened when the real income growth for the 50th percentile is 20.7%!

There is no doubt that workfare has managed to close the gap of the widening trend just a bit but the most important question we have to ask: is this economic model sustainable in the long run? Can the PAP government guarantee that it will keep giving out more and more workfare in the years to come in a bid to cushion the impact of the widening of income gap?

We are very doubtful about the Finance Minister’s assertion that the real income of all our workers could grow by 30% for the next decade. While we are only able to raise the income of the 20th and 50th percentile by 8.1% and 20.7% in real terms respectively with a corresponding average growth of 4%-6% in GDP for the last decade, how can we possibly achieve a higher growth of 30% in real terms for ALL Singaporeans when our Finance Minister only expects our economy to grow at a slower pace of 3% to 5% for the next decade? We believe that only the million-dollar salaried ministers will enjoy more than 30% increase in real terms in the coming decade!

In the mad pursuit of more foreign workers, the PAP government has taken the lead to cultivate the mindset that only foreigners are “talents” while Singaporeans are not. The government should not put too much emphasis on foreigners as talents. Our homegrown MNCs should emphasise more on grooming our Singaporean PMETs instead of replacing them with “foreign talents”.

We do not think that the effort to raise productivity would bear fruits in raising our citizens' wages as long as PAP continues to let the whole world supply us with cheaper and younger foreign labour indiscriminately. The economic growth model needs a major overhaul. Comprehensive plans should be put in place to groom local SMEs as well as local talents with global view.

The sudden rapid increase in foreign workers has also caused a whole range of other problems, from rising inflation to inadequate public transport and healthcare infrastructure as well as high housing cost. However the PAP government has not effectively addressed all these issues at all.

The Minister says he wants to help Singaporeans to fight inflation but yet he has conveniently avoided mentioning anything about GST. Either GST should be reduced or at least stay permanent at 7%, but there is no commitment from PAP at all.

In spite of a shortage of hospital beds, the budget for Ministry of Health has been reduced for 2011 resulting from a cut in “development expenditure”. We are surprised that the government has cut healthcare funding but increased the defence budget by a substantial 5.4% instead.

On the property front, we believe that the key issue of high HDB price lies with the pricing policy of new HDB flats. NSP advocates cost-plus pricing for new HDB flats. Giving more grants to low-income buyers will not solve the burden of 30-year mortgage tagged on these flat purchases.

In conclusion, NSP would want to make an open call to the PAP government to set its priorities right. The PAP should not merely focus on giving away goodies to voters in this election year. but focus on the long-term structural problems of our economy. As long as the ruling party refuses to realign its economic growth model for the coming decade, we will forever face the critical problems raised above.

A responsible government should take the welfare of our citizens at heart in longer terms instead of engrossing itself in populist policies which may temporarily alleviate unhappiness on the ground but are totally unhelpful in solving our longer term structural problems.

Goh Meng Seng
Secretary General
National Solidarity Party

Afternote: I have some feedback, including from my wife, that some of the technical things are difficult to understand. Especially the part in bold.

The logic is this, the Finance Minister Tharman claims that in order to continue to have real income growth, we need GDP to grow continuously. But the question is, by this logic, how could we have HIGHER REAL INCOME growth with LOWER GDP growth? He was talking about 30% REAL INCOME GROWTH FOR EVERYONE! But, in spite of the fact that we had HIGHER average GDP growth in the last decade of 4%-6%, the real income growth for BOTH 20 percentile and 50 percentile is far lesser than 30%. He then projected that we will have LOWER GDP growth for the next decade at 3% to 5% but expect REAL INCOME growth to be HIGHER! On top of that, with the present economic growth model the real income growth is going to be unequal and income disparity will widen. It is really impossible to have EQUAL real income growth for everybody. It is really an amazing contradiction or simply MISSION IMPOSSIBLE.

Reservist as an Officer

I have just completed my annual In Camp Training (ICT) in January and I guess many of the Mindef people are waiting for my usual reports on this blog with regards to the ICT.

It is always good to meet up with old buddies and men. However, many of them will MR (i.e. completing their NSmen cycle of 7 High Keys and 3 low keys or going to pass 40 years old). But some officers have completed more than 7 High Keys (ICT more than 5 days is considered to be 1 High Key) and some like me, are 40 years old or above, are still serving.

Ever since Mindef announced the changes made to the 13 year cycle to 10 year cycle, there are confusions among the officers. Many officers thought that they will only need to finish 7 High Keys and 3 Low Keys and they could MR. This is not true. Officers are liable for reservist training UP TO 50 YEAR OLD.

But some officers are "lucky" that they MR together with their units; especially those "mono-intake" infantry or Guards units way before 40 years old. Thus the confusion was deepen when logistic officers who are in "evergreen units" like mine are required to serve way beyond 7 High Keys and 40 years old.

This disgruntlement is primarily due to poor manpower planning of succession. At the end of each and every of my ICT, the discussion on succession planning always dominates the meeting. Succession planning for officers as well as key NCO postings like CSM, CQ etc is pretty weak. Officers with special technical skills like signal officers are lacking.

Even for my position, MTO (Motor Transport Officer) is lacking. I was sent for two courses during my reservist, both about 2 to 3 weeks each. These are supposedly to be considered as High Keys but it seems that there are rumors courses attended during reservist period are not considered as High Keys! This created much unhappiness on the ground and if Mindef did not come clear on this issue, we will find less officers willing to attend prolonged courses like mine.

Two to three weeks off from our normal work routine to attend military courses are big sacrifices to NSmen officers. It would be unfair to them that all these time spent are not going to be considered as High Key ICT.

Such treatment will aggravate the succession plan for Officers. i.e. If no Officers are willing to attend courses, how could they take on the roles of their predecessors?

Quite a number of officers (as well as warrant officer) in my unit have completed more than 7 High Keys. Some of them chose to sign on as Rovering key appointment holders. Their dedication to National Service is really commendable.

But I think it is unfair for other officers who have completed the needed 7 High Keys and who have reached 40 years old and above to be made to stay just because of the failure of succession planning by the S1 or G1.

Service Officers should be treated fairly as the Combat Officers. If Combat Officers could MR even before they reach 40 years old, why should Service Officers made to stay on beyond 7 High Keys and 40 years old? Such unfair treatment is going to affect the morale of the Service Officers.

I am raising this problem not because my fellow officers in my unit are complaining nor unwilling to serve. We treasure our comradeship and companionship. But in this highly competitive job market, people are worried about their jobs being taken away by FTs who do not pose such disruptions to the company's work routine. Whether we are Officers or men, we face the same constrains and competition on the job front.

The additional problems we officers face when we are serving above 40 years old is IPPT. For any servicemen, you are required to take the IPPT even when you are 40 years old and above. However, we have to take the FFI (a medical check up to certify fit for IPPT) every year. Sometimes, the FFI may drag due to additional medical check up needed. By the time the FFI is done, the window left for IPPT will be very limited.

After going through all the trouble of FFI, we are required to take only THREE stations for the IPPT. This is pretty ironic.

Most reservist officers who serve beyond 40 years old are service officers (logistic officers) like me. Our main role is to provide combat service support to the frontline troops. We are not required to go on physically strenuous combat missions but most of the time, we do a lot of planning on logistics deployment. i.e. We are using more brain power than muscles to complete our missions.

Thus it is kind of inconvenient irony that we are still put through the hassles of FFI and IPPT. The main risk in taking IPPT after 40 years old lies in the 2.4km running. There is totally unnecessary for service officers to take such risks especially so when they are already serving unfairly more than Combat officers.

Personally I am most willing to serve up to 50 years old if the hassles of FFI and IPPT are taken off. Almost all my men in my unit know I am "the opposition man" but I always tell them, even opposition man can be a good soldier. It is a kind of National Education by example that opposition members can be "deadly patriotic" too.

I hope Mindef, especially G1 has to come out and clarify certain things for officers, especially for logistic officers who need to attend courses. I also hope that succession planning for logistic units should be done properly by G1 so that most logistic officers would be treated equally as their combat counterparts. Last but not least, the requirement of IPPT for those NSmen officers above 40 should be reviewed or scrapped totally (especially for logistic officers).

Goh Meng Seng

Afternote: BTW, I am very sorry that I may have caused some anxiety within my unit's admin.

This article is specifically written for higher authority (i.e. G1 & Mindef) to reconsider their policy directions and not meant to doubt the efficiency and effectiveness of my unit's administration.

The key issues here is about fair treatment to Service Officers vs Combat Officers, as well as the redundancy of the IPPT requirement for those NSmen who are above 40.

Imagine that every year you are required to go through the hassle of medical check up and ended up with a watered down IPPT (i.e. required to do 3 stations instead of 6). It really doesn't make economic and practical sense to me.

国民团结党：别遗弃任何人

国民团结党对人民行动党只对现有的战备军人表彰而对以往对我国国防和稳定做出贡献的老兵置之不理感到震惊。

行动党可以轻易地说这钱不太重要。但行动党并不了解如此刻意的把老兵之置于这奖励表彰制度之外已经伤了他们的感情，而这并是那$9000的奖励可弥补的伤害。

当总理宣布会对每一位战备军人付与$9000以表彰他们为国家的贡献时，很多新加坡人都为执政党能正视人们对国家的牺牲感到非常高兴。就算我们当中有一些会得到比较少的表扬金，我们也可理解这是政府对我们象征式的奖励。

然而，我们万万没想到行动党会把两三代的老兵给完全忽略掉！这批四十岁以上的男性公民肯定会对如此对待感到气愤。这是不是意味着当人们因老了而再也没有“利用价值”时，这国家就会遗弃他们，对他们以往的贡献完全置之不理吗？这也暴露了行动党那种以实用主义治国的冷酷无情。

不要遗弃任何人。这是军官训练营所提倡的精神，也是国民团结党所坚持的。行动党也附和这口号，但它并没真正履行它自己所提倡的信仰。

国民团结党秘书长
吴明盛

NSP: Leave No Man Behind

From Mr. Brown...

Like many Singaporeans, NSP is shocked to learn that the PAP is only giving due recognition to present NSmen while ignoring those past NSmen who have contributed to the safety and stability of this country.

It is easy for the ruling party to say that it is not just about the money. However, the exclusion of those NSmen in Mindef Reserve from such rewarding system has hurt their feelings more than the mere $9000 in question.

When the Prime Minister mentioned about this hand out of $9000 to NSmen, many Singaporeans are happy and glad that the PAP has not forgotten of the sacrifices and contributions that Singaporeans have made towards this country. Even though some of us may not get the full amount eventually, but at least it is a token of appreciation by the government that matters.

However, we do not expect the PAP to miss out a whole two or three generations of older male Singaporeans who have completed their full cycle of National Service. This leaves a bitter taste in them and it seems to indicate that once they have passed their “useful” time to the Nation, the PAP will just abandon them aside. Such move betrays the cold, clinical pragmatism of PAP rule. It also makes us wonder whether PAP will abandon all of us when we become old and incapable to contribute to the country in time to come!

Leave no man behind. This is what NSP believes in as what the Officer Cadet Course would teach all leaders of SAF. This is also the mantra of PAP but it just doesn’t really practise what it preaches.


Goh Meng Seng
Secretary General
National Solidarity Party

The effectiveness of NSmen system

I have just come back from 3 weeks of overseas reservist training in Australia, well known code named "Ex Wallaby".

Many people wonder why am I in reservist training when I am already 39? Well, I just have bad news for officers: all officers have to serve up to 50 year old, unlike NCOs and other ranks who will have their National Service "terminated" after 10 years of service (7 high key with 3 low key) or retired into MR (main reserve) once they reach 45 year old.

Yes, I was told that Officers are to serve up till 50 year old instead of the usual "7 high key 3 low key" as announced months ago. They have made a mistake in making that announcement without stating that officers will have to serve longer.

I don't mind serving my National Service (well, it would be great if there isn't any IPPT for old bones like me! ;)) but it seems that something is not very right in terms of cost and benefits along with its effectiveness.

I met a "store man" who is actually a GM of a MNC based in Singapore. It is interesting to note that SAF is paying thousands of dollars (I guess his pay is at least $8K or above) just to get a "store man" to serve in the unit. Well, that is not all. Although SAF paid him thousands to become a store man, he could have contributed more as a GM to the economy for the 3 weeks. This opportunity cost of lost productivity is really difficult to be accounted for.

It is very difficult to expect reservist unit to achieve professional proficiency as a fighting force when they only train at most once a year. We do have very good helpful trainers to guide us along throughout these 3 weeks but how much of such experiences could be registered and pass down for future training? Especially so when the turn around time and disruption of personnel is pretty high in a reservist unit. Simple things like setting up tents and field craft have to be taught all over again for each and every in camp training, not to mention important skills and strategic concept of military planning for officers.

While we have various aide memoir, SOPs and trainers' guidance to depend on, it will really take time for officers and men to digest, master and execute properly. Besides, there are quite a lot of constrains during the exercise, from inadequate equipping, staffing to cancellation of some drills which really undermined our training objectives and purpose.

I am not saying that our unit is not performing well. In fact, our unit is performing pretty well in spite of the many constrains we faced during the whole 3 weeks. I have overheard NSF boys conversation commenting about how "on the ball" our reservist NSmen are which is way beyond their expectation. They thought NSmen are just demoralized old soldiers who could do much less in training but we proved them wrong. We have a good core of officers and NCOs to take the training seriously and making it as good as they could with various constrains. In some instances, we are more serious and on the ball than the NSF in training, poking them for many responses to make the exercise more real. However, having said that, we could not achieve higher proficiency as compared to any regular trained army although the cost of having us to train is very much higher.

Although I do not have the exact figures but I think the cost of getting NSmen to come back for training for whole year round would be tens of millions if not hundreds of millions or even billion. Would it not be more cost effective as well as more proficient to use these money to build a couple of divisions of regular, professional army instead?

Singapore has the highest defense expenditure, in terms of total amount as well as percentage of our GDP in this region. Such spending would have crowded out other expenditures like Healthcare, Education or even social welfare spending.

Defense budget is always regarded as "sacred" as the emphasis on defense is always portrayed as the utmost top priority for the Nation. The attitude of "no question ask" is eminent for the past decades even when it escalated throughout the years. Defense spending has long become the top item in our annual budget and intriguingly, nobody seems to be interested in questioning the rational behind the ballooning budget year after year.

Could we achieve more productive, proficiency and effective defense with less money? We could if we stop paying thousands of dollars for just a store man. The whole concept of NSmen system will have to be modified or even changed radically.

We could have maintained a professional army of 2 or even 3 Divisions with supplements from Voluntary corps and even paramilitary divisions via the 2 years National Service system. We could have trained enough drivers, technically skilled soldiers from the early days of 2 years NS. From the cohort, those who are willing to become part of the regular army will form the 2 Divisions of regular Guards while NS officers and NCOs could opt to become part of the Volunteer Corps that will train regularly with the professional army just like what we are doing right now as NSmen. This will close the loop of first tier reserves for the regular army and they could well become the leaders of the paramilitary force formed by the bulk of other ranks in time of war.

The paramilitary force could well be called up for refresher courses 3 (for combat troopers) or 5 years apart. This will minimize cost, be it real or opportunity costs to the Nation's economy in terms of productivity lost. It will also minimize unnecessary disruptions to Singaporeans' livelihood.

War does not occur suddenly in modern times. There will always be a build up time for war to occur, most probably 6 to 12 months lead time. If there is such urgency in the situation of eminent threat of war, paramilitary groups could be called up more advanced training schedule to equip them with refresher program and crush course on handling of new military equipment and such. Stretching over a period of 6 months would be sufficient enough for war preparations.

This three tier defense setup would have saved a lot of resources with certain level of assurance of proficiency in the first contact forces i.e. the 2 Divisions of regular professional army. These forces are back up by the Volunteer Corps which are capable to lead the paramilitary forces into war if necessary.

To maintain a highly proficient army based largely on conscripts is never easy. The problem will be expounded when this is done in a prolonged manner without real threat of war eminent. We are unlike Israel or Taiwan which face clear and present danger of war each other day. Even for Taiwan which is technically at war with PRC, it has cut down its conscription. The besiege mentality of Singapore must change to make ways for better utilization of resources.

There are many other ways to moderate our defense spending and I believe there may be people with more creative, effective and efficient plans to help us in this without compromising on our safety. What I am stating here is just my thoughts of changing our defense strategy and structure after attending 3 weeks of overseas training. It may not be a perfect plan but I hope it could get people start thinking about containing our defense spending, wastage of productivity and manpower etc.

Goh Meng Seng

Protecting Military Secrets...?

I have attended a briefing recently with regards to my overseas NS training in Australia, code name Exercise Wallaby.

During the briefing, one of the more important agenda is about "Security". It is about security of military information and such. There are of course quite a number of military sensitive information embedded in the whole overseas exercise and we are cautioned not to have loose talk or even photographs of military equipment and such.

Photos like the one displayed on Mr. Brown Show website (see below)would be considered as a breach of Military security.



The reason is that the photo includes the military assets (or what we normally call equipment). Take a closer look below and you could see that the photo captures the military equipment.



It is a valid concern indeed. Not so long ago, there was suggestions made by a committee to waive the ban on NSMan to bring camera phones to in-camp training for fear of such military security breach. Some military intelligence experts commented that the ban should stay because a picture of how the military equipment is being handled would be a vital information for military spies. It is not just about the military equipment but the personnel's proficiency in handling the equipment as well as the tactical manoeuvrings that matters most in military intelligence.

Since I am going to be involved in Exercise Wallaby, I did a simple search on google on Exercise Wallaby. To my surprise, there are quite a lot of information available on the net and some of these information are far more damaging than what Mr. Brown has put up on his web.

Take for example, the Razor TV produced by Straits Times which has an extensive report on Singapore's utilization of Australian training ground. (There are a total of three parts in this series.)

http://www.razor.tv/site/servlet/segment/main/news/local/12560.html

If we are talking about security breaches, the reporting in the Razor TV is far more damaging that I have seen anywhere else. From the strategic perspective to equipment utilization and it even includes the classified flow cart of how the integrated information system works etc etc.

The reporter could just walk through the camp compound and do interviews etc. I thought this is an exception case of military security breach but what surprises me is that even the Mindef's Publication has put up reports along with photos of equipments and the operating members behind the equipment.

The following are the photos of CyberPioneer:






Well, maybe all these hype about Exercise Wallaby and integrated Air-Land information system is a deliberate efforts by Mindef to make public. Thus, such sensitive information has been cleared and declassified for public consumption.

But I do feel a bit uneasiness for such sensitive information to be made available. It really makes foreign military operatives' job much easier in analysis and information collection.

Goh Meng Seng

MM Lee, what are we fighting for? II

My response to the Forummer Soh.

Dear Soh1973,

Thank you for your response. You have definitely struck a cord in me.

I have always maintained a very positive outlook to reservist training, even though my logistic unit is not something that anyone would get excited about "fighting". For every reservist training, it is always difficult to convince the need of such army training to my men where they could be more "productive" somewhere else.

Low Morale is the greatest problem for an army, even if it is a logistic battalion. And it seems that over the years, the morale is getting lower and lower. More and more people are asking for deferment and most of the reasons are work related. The most important underlining reason is the FEAR of losing the job to someone else, especially FT.

But even then, we could still maintain basic discipline and morale by giving the basic fundamental reason of the need of having an operational ready army. This is our home land and we are determined to protect it with our own blood. Even though the huge influx of FT have affected jobs and indirectly created a morale problem, we still have a reason to tell our soldiers we are fighting to protect our way of life.

But the recent outburst of MM Lee as well as some of the PAP ministers have raised eyebrows. The so call "Common Space" provided by our National Pledge and Flag has suddenly become some "unrealistic Highfalutin ideals" only!

I am going back for a one month high key reservist training. I seriously doubt that I have any reasons left to give my men for motivation talk. The only pessimistic talk would be, do it good, do it fast and F off early back home.

Goh Meng Seng

MM Lee, what are we fighting for?

A truthful view of a forumer in response to my earlier article, "Defending Our Nation's Core Values".

As an Army Officer myself, I do feel the difficulty in convincing my men next time I meet (coming very soon!) why are we spending weeks or even early a month this year to go for reservist training when what we are supposed to defend as a Nation has been trivialized as "Highfalutin ideals" by MM Lee.

The following article is written by a fellow Singaporean:

It has been a long time since I came into the coffeeshop. I must say, very little has changed since the delphi days.

I must agree with Goh Meng Seng. I am 36 this year and similar to many average Singaporeans, I am frustrated with the influx of FTs who turns out to be more FLs (Foreign Liabilities) then FTs (Foreign Talents). I am also frustrated with how the newer generation of PAP leaders seem so detached from the grassroots. How our leaders seems to have no direction and how often they focus on excuses.

However, I am really disappointed when I read in "Todays" MM Lee's response to what I view is a rallying call for the average Singaporeans and politicians alike to relook at the pledge. There seems to be an over-reaction by MM Lee in trying to put down this rallying call by viewing it as a potential challenge to how the PAP is currently ruling this country.

On one hand, I can fully understand why MM Lee's reaction as he will need to nip any challenges in the bud before it becomes a larger issue. However, on the other hand, I am sorely disappointed that at the end of the day, all the country's pledge meant nothing.

My 4 year old daughter is now in nursery. She is being taught to recite the pledge in both mandarin and english and so far she has memorised it very well. However, I question the rationale behind memorising the pledge now especially after MM Lee's speech in parliament.

I am against many of our ruling party's policies and have acted in accordance to my conscience by my vote for the opposition. My wife on the contrary voted for the ruling party because her rationale is "can we afford to let some opposition party to try when they do not have the track record?" Naturally we argued quite intensely over this issue but then finally decided it is not worth arguing. We agree to disagree.

When we are in the army, we are constantly brainwashed into believing "Duty, Honour, Country" is everything. (Yes, I am one of those ocifer whom many of the forumers here hates). We were brainwashed to the extent that we really meant what we said when we recite the "...with our lives" portion. How sad when all those brainwashing meant for nothing by a simple speech by our MM Lee.

After many years in the work force, I became very disillusioned. ICT is merely something I have to pay for having that rifle and 2 grenades in between my groin. So my mentality is just take it and pay your dues. Then around 5 years back, MINDEF conducted a 1-1 interview where they got these young NSF clerks to call us up and meet us in civilian for interviews. One of the question in that thick stack of questionnaire was "will you defend singapore if war comes."

I remembered my response. I said "If I can get my family out in time, I will not fight" Then the counter question by the clerk was why? My response was "Why should I fight for a country that treats its citizen as mere pawns and runs the country like a company where a selected few are allowed to call out the shots? Why should I fight for ideals that are not by the people, but rather for a selected and privileged few?"

I must qualify my answers then. At that time, I was very into sammyboy coffeeshop and hence my response were very influenced.

Then after a few years, came the period of time where Malaysian politicians were threatening to cut off our water supply. Surprisingly, when my peers and me chatted about these issue, the general concensus was if it is time to fight, we will fight for the nation's survival and that is a legitimate ground for fighting to retain our way of life. A lot of you may not believe this, but the patroitism at that time amongst my peers (most of us are fat and unfit reservist and likely to be used as cannon fodders to waste the enemies' ammo) was intense. Perhaps all those years of brainwashing did work subconsciously after all.

However, after MM Lee's speech in parliament, perhaps all these patriotism will be eliminated. After all, if the main driver behind modern Singapore do not even believe fully in the country's pledge, then do we have a country in the first place?

I have always believed home is where we want to make it to be. Citizenship is merely a piece of paper. Your family is what makes a home. I do agree with Sam that Singapore do not have a culture. However, we are comfortable with it and that is where we make home to be.

In the past, I have always wanted to migrate because I fell in love with the Australian outbacks. However, now after seeing my kids play with their grandmoms and the joy in the grandparents eyes when playing with them, I shifted my point of view and decided that perhaps it is not so bad staying in Singapore as the family is here.

However, I will hate to disappoint my kids if they ask me this question. "Dad, do we really mean what we say when we recite the pledge?"

It is a sad situation. Very few countries in the world have seen their leaders openly come out and say that the pledge is merely a guideline and not a belief that we should work towards. And that we should ignore any rallying calls.

It is especially disappointing when it came from a man who wept in front of public TV because what he truly believed in did not materialise.

Can we now blame the "Quitters" for a lack of identify?

Can we now ask the finger that points at others to look at the other 4 fingers that pointed back to themselves?

It is a sad speech to hear, especially from the man who believed so much in his ideals and wept when it didn't materialise.

Have a good week ahead.

The World Class Joke!

Yes, this is about the World Class Joke by a self proclaimed World Class Government in Singapore. And it is indeed a VERY SERIOUS and DANGEROUS WORLD CLASS JOKE ever made in Singapore's history.

It is indeed still fresh from our mind that the ministers had just have their pay raised by more than 14% overall but yet it seems that there are more and more "honest mistakes" made along the way. But never before has such a BIG HONEST MISTAKE has been made in Singapore's short history.

The Home Affairs Ministry has a annual budget of more than 2.4Billions last year (revised, see Budget Link), about $400million more than the Ministry of Health and yet, there are such security lapses for a wanted man for murder just walking across the causeway to Malayisa and the most important LIMPING terrorist detainee making a "World Class Prison Break"!

The terrorist detainee was detained WITHOUT TRIAL for the simple reason that he IS a DANGEROUS man that has planned terrorist attacks on Singapore. How could the minister for Home Affairs says that alarm was not sounded initially because they think this DANGEROUS man poses no "immediate harm" to people living nearby? And the fact that the alarm has only been put up FOUR WHOLE HOURS AFTER he escaped! Didn't they listen to MM Lee that you would only need 20 minutes to travel to anywhere in Singapore?

The ironic thing is that if this man is truly posing NO DANGER to anyone, why would the authorities mobilize a whole battalion of military guardsman to help in the search thereafter? Does the minister of Home Affairs really understand the seriousness of the escape of Mas Selamat Kastari? It is not merely about Singapore's security anymore but the safety of all our neighboring countries! Or rather, the WHOLE World's security and safety is at stake! This is precisely why the Interpol has raise the alert a notch higher after Singapore announced his escape!

I seriously doubt the self proclaim World Class PAP government really understands World Class politics at all. They have already made the grave mistake of letting the man escapes and the most serious mistake is to hold on to this piece of important information for FOUR SOLID HOURS which most probably allows the man to flee the country by the time such information are made available.

We may not fault the minister of Home Affairs directly for the prison break although some bloggers do, but for the crisis management thereafter, the minister of Home Affairs MUST be responsible! Pushing such decision to the "security analyst" or judgment of others, is truly lame indeed! The decision on whether to announce the prison break earlier lies on the minister himself and I think for such bad decision made in view of the seriousness of the issue at hand, I think any minister in the world that is in charge of internal security should and would resign.

For a small island state like Singapore, there are no room for mistakes like this one. This is not China nor USA where escapees would need days before they could reach international borders. You could travel to any coastal area within half an hour. You could even swim across to Malaysia if you want to. It only take less than an hour boat trip to any of the Indonesian islands. For the minister of Home Affairs to take FOUR SOLID HOURS to make that "difficult" decision to make public of such important information, is truly a WORLD CLASS JOKE and this joke is not funny at all!

The most ridiculous thing that is happening right now in Singapore is that the PAP government controlled mass media tries to "soften" the impact of this WORLD CLASS escape. In any normal democracy around the world, many tough questions would be raised against the authorities as well as the minister in question. But instead, they run stories like how this terrorist has attempted many escapes or prison breaks before, thus, subtly "normalized" such escape by Mas Selamat Kastari and implying that if he escapes, its not about the incompetency of our "Home Team" (i.e. police force) but because he is good at it. Such utter rubbish is totally unacceptable because the detention centre that caged Mas Selamat Kastari is no ordinary detention centre but the "Famous" Internal Security Department (ISD) detention centre which has underground dungeons and heavily guarded by Gurkha! We are not "Third World" countries but "First World" country with "World Class " government, for goodness sake! Such apologist stand made in the local media will further dent our international reputation as an island of competency and efficiency! Why? They are comparing and making us look like a third world country!

Some heads must roll from those who are in charge of the ISD detention centre and the Home Affairs minister must go too! We cannot allow a man that cannot make sound and critical decision at the such a high crisis level to stay on as minister of Home Affairs. We cannot allow a man that will only know how to push responsibility to others for such bad decision made to someone else instead of assuming ALL the responsibility, in his capacity as the highest command, for whatever happens in his very own ministry.

Instead of questioning how such escape could be made successful, why the FOUR HOUR delay in the public announcement and questioning the ability of the minister and his ministry's to handle such big crisis, the local mass media goes on to paint the "bright" side of the whole issue. e.g. how Singaporeans responded with good unity...etc.

When a country shows too much leniency to those in power that make such grave mistakes one after another, we will only breed complacency and incompetency. We are MADE to pay WORLD's HIGHEST SALARY to politicians, in the hope that they will make good judgment and decisions, not merely on daily routine management, but also for their ability to handle crisis. It seems that despite of the multi-million annual salary that Singaporeans are paying, we are getting people that could not really understand the bigger picture and handle such crisis well! If we cannot demand or pressure this minister of Home Affairs to resign over such gross display of incompetency, then we could only hope and depend on our citizens making the right choice in voting him out.

For the mean time, I hope that all Singaporeans would raise their awareness and look out for the limping terrorist that has made a joke out of our country. Hope we could catch him before he could do anything harmful to all mankind.

Goh Meng Seng

Year End Reflection - Role of Governemnt

The most common grouses people are making right now is, Price of Everything goes up, including ministers' pay!

What is the problem with our country? Many people ask. It is becoming a SOP (standard operating protocol) for the PAP government to raise prices all over right after election year! Public transport fares have risen TWICE amidst record profits since 2006. Public utilities, especially electricity has risen based on higher oil price in spite of the fact that our generators are mostly powered by gas. The runaway inflation is partly fueled by rising rentals which are mainly in the control of GLCs (Government linked companies) which own most of the retail spaces in Singapore.

On top of that, in spite of the relative ineffectiveness of the ERP (Electronic Road Pricing) of controlling traffic jams (its the numbers, stupid!), ERP fees has been raised again. In fact, MORE ERP gantries has been set up now. The most absurd thing about ERP is that at some roads, the time has been extended to late at night! The concept of ERP should be based on economic opportunities and not about controlling traffic jams. Traffic jams are merely the symptoms that leads to lost of economic opportunities. It is IMPOSSIBLE to totally eradicate traffic jams altogether without imposing unimaginable high ERP fees.

What difference will there be, when there are inelastic demand on road usage, to have ERP gantries set at all places, at all time vs no ERP gantries at all? Practically no difference. ERP gantries will only work if there are distinctive difference in pricing.... best at with pricing vs no pricing. For example, if I want one of the two roads that joint from point A to B which are running parallel to each other, to be free of jams, the only logical way of doing so is to put a pricing on road A, then road B will jam while road A will be relatively free of jam. Will there be any difference if we have both road A and B to be priced by ERP?

The original concept of road pricing is to stagger traffic flow according to opportunity cost concept. This is to price the road with time difference. It means that during peak hours, some business or jobs are more important than others to command a premium; i.e. for example, stock market and financial business. Those who work in these field will be willing to pay a premium to reach their office on time. This is because the opportunity cost of time is higher to them. The other jobs are less time sensitive and thus, could afford to use the road later. Thus the effective way to make sure traffic is diverted from critical peak period to off-peak period, ERP pricing should only be applied on certain time period, not all.

But LTA seems to have a weird logic in applying ERPs in Singapore. The Central Business District (CBD) has a whole day ERP applied. And now, even non economic-critical time period like evening time period, ERP is being applied! The pricing no longer adhered to the economic opportunity cost concept (opportunity cost of traffic jam to the economy) but rather, ironically, like plugging holes as and when they see jams! It is no wonder that many Singaporeans are beginning to wonder whether the ERP system is really about road pricing to reduce economic opportunity cost or just plain money squeezing machinery for the PAP government!

Of course, how could I forget to mention the increase in GST by two percentage amidst the various inflationary pressure and in contrast, the hefty increase in ministers' pay. PAP government claims that the increase in GST is to "help the poor" but up till now, we have not seen any concrete and comprehensive plans of welfare system. Ironically, there are already many cynical Singaporeans who are fast to relate the increase of GST to help increase ministers' pay as well as the top civil servants' pay! Why do they need to raise GST, in spite of the fact that the PAP government is enjoying surplus with a huge reserves backing it? In fact, I think tax collection from GST will increase even without the raise of the 2%. This is basically because of the projected increase in population size, all thanks to the open FT policy. With an increase of Foreign workers in Singapore, consumption will be expected to increase, thus, GST collection will increase accordingly. It is really a big puzzle on why the PAP government always feel that money no enough!

While singing the slogan of "increase of GST to help the poor", we are slammed with the ideas of Means Testing of healthcare policy as well as the Compulsory annuity for everyone. Now, these two monsters are in fact schemes to reduce government spending on the welfare of its citizens! It seems that the PAP government is practically saying that we are not willing to spend too much to subsidize healthcare for citizens, least, help elderly citizens to live a decent retirement life. You are all on your own! It is to me a very distinctive contradiction of PAP "sales talk" of their unpopular policies like GST!

PAP government has blamed the high oil prices for the rise in prices. PAP minister even question the opposition on whether we could "bring the oil price down". The truth is, petrol prices are controlled in Singapore and the tax imposed on diesel and petrol is pretty substantial. If the PAP government is serious about controlling inflation, the only logical thing to do is to reduce or even abolish the taxation on petrol and diesel. The PAP government could truly help to control inflation by making such moves.

What is WRONG with the PAP government, really? On one hand, they want to increase indirect taxes on the people claiming to help the people, while on the other hand, they are devising all sorts of policies that will reduce their funding to help citizens to cope with various costs of living, from daily expenses to old age financing.

PAP government has rejected "welfarism", claiming that it will bankrupt the government. Or that people will have to pay more taxes to finance welfarism. But the truth is, are we paying any lesser now? Or rather, how much lesser are we paying? There is a delicate balance between taxation and welfarism. A government is NOT a business entity. The primary role of the government is to manage the country, by collecting taxes or monies from the society and then, redistribute these monies to maintain balances within the society. Providing welfare to those less privileged or unfortunate citizens will be one of the primary role of the government. Subsidizing certain vital, critical functions of the country that serve the citizens are the role of the government. The government is not here to make money, squeeze every ounce of juice out of the people, claim credits to have surplus and then to self reward with million dollar annual salary!

Healthcare is one important aspect of citizens' general welfare. Taking care of the aged and elder is another important aspect of the government. PAP has always preached about "Asian Values" as in "Confucianism" but it seems that it is not behaving like one when it decides to leave the elderly and aged to fend for themselves by forcing them to buy compulsory annuity! Every citizens, after working for a lifetime (now, "implicitly forced" to work up to the age of 70!) has contributed to the development of the society in one way or another. It is thus, only right for the care taker of the society, the government, to take care of their needs in return when they aged! How could a self-proclaimed Confucius government not know of such simple reasoning?

It is really a horrendous sight when a government turns into a miser, money crunching machine. When a government begins to just give a token of welfare to the society while emphasizing in getting surpluses and each ministries or departments is to cut spending on the welfare of the people while giving themselves the World's TOP salaries as politicians, it is really time to rethink some of the most basic fundamental values our society holds as a people and a country.

I hate to do this but it is about time to make comparison with Hong Kong government. Hong Kong may be a capitalist city but it basically has a socialist government. Hong Kong government truly take care of its people, in a very different way. Although Hong Kong residents have to pay hefty prices to own their home due to the high land price policy, but the Hong Kong government has in return, put funds back into the society to help its citizens in various ways. Healthcare is heavily subsidized. Whatever illness you have, whatever operations you need or no matter how many blood pallets you need, you will be charged only HK$100 per day which is amount to about S$20.00 per day. You may think this will open to abuses but the truth is, private hospitals are striving in Hong Kong too. The shortage in public hospital supply will naturally force those well to do families to go to private hospitals instead. The ironic thing is, even with a higher healthcare cost we have here in Singapore's "restructured hospitals", the shortages in the supply could be quite acute as well!

Education is another area whereby the Hong Kong government has subsidized heavily. The new policy focused on kindergarten education for the less well to do families! This is to help them to break out of the vicious cycle of poverty and to even out education opportunities right from young.

The comprehensive welfare system that Hong Kong government has set up basically gives enough money and welfare help to those who could not handle the high cost of living in Hong Kong. Their help is based on per-capital basis instead of per-household basis. On top of that, every elderly residents could register and claim about HK$300 in CASH (about S$60) each month to buy fruits! It recognizes the contributions of each and every residents through such a scheme.

After having all these welfare spending on its residents, Hong Kong government did not go bankrupt. Although it wanted to impose similar GST on the economy, it has withdrawn it due to pressure of resistance from its residents. Even without GST, it has managed to accumulate substantial reserves through years of surpluses. And the best part is, Hong Kong has lower taxes than Singapore for many many years!

I would say that any direct or indirect taxes given to the Hong Kong by its residents are well spent. I mean, compare to paying tax to a government that is stingy in spending on the welfare of its citizens, would you be more willing to pay tax to a government that really spent money to take care of its people?

One part of the problem of Singapore is that PAP government is very generous when it comes to defence spending. It has spent more than 20% to 30% of its budget on military spending. This has inevitably crowd out spending on the welfare. While I would not deny the importance of defence, but it is about the balance in deciding how much is enough? Our defence spending per capital is one of the highest, if not in the world, then definitely in the region. Do we need to increase defence spending indefinitely?

The second point is that PAP government has more surpluses than we think. This is basically because it did not recognize revenue from land or assets sales as part of its budget revenue. It is a unique way of balance of payment accounting. Thus, with a "projected smaller revenue", obviously spending on the welfare of our citizens will be suppressed! This explains partly why there is exponential growth in our reserves while the people suffers higher cost of living.

It is totally absurd to have a rich, dominating government with a poor citizenry. It seems that there is no direct correlations between having a world class country and having a world class living citizens. Our "standards of living" (many people mixed up with "cost of living" but in fact, they are sometimes, inversely related) maintains at developing country status even though we have "world class paid ministers". Where is the promise of Swiss standards of living? It seems that we are fast catching up with Swiss cost of living but lacking in the standards of living!

My New Year resolution for the new year, is to hope to have an awaken citizenry in seeing clearly the mutated role of government we have here in Singapore. This could only be changed, if and only if, citizens exert pressure on the present ruling party through the ballot boxes. If we could not get this fundamental role of government right into the head of the ruling party, then we will only continue to suffer in silence under such mutated role they have now.

Happy New Year to all Singaporeans.

Goh Meng Seng

ICT & Defence Budget

First of all, I must thank all of those who have come forward to shake my hands during the ICT period. I know some of you visited my blog quite often and I thank you for all your support.

Although it may just be a little handshake or just a short phrase of encouragement, but it means alot to us, people who are walking on the thin line on the political front. Your little gesture will leave a lasting impression and become a long lasting source of motivation for me to carry on my political work. Thank you.

Although this recent ICT I have is a short one (low key) which involves only range, but it has given me much food for thought. Shooting skill is the most basic skill of any soldier. Thus it is important for the army to provide adequate training to all its soldiers in shooting.

I must say I am impressed by the vast improvement in the accommodation that the Army has provided in the new training centre. The bunk is spacious and the bed is comfortable. In terms of infrastructure wise, the Army has come a long way in improving the basic necessities for NSmen who come back for training.

Unfortunately, while the Army spent money in improving such accommodation and buying high end world class weapons like the Leopard Tanks, it has neglected the most basic need for a soldier; the range that provide the ground to train soldiers with the basic skill of shooting.

Before the range, we are given the opportunity to go through a simulated range, IMT. This was widely publicised as a high tech approach to train shooting skill. However, to our dismay, the program that was provided by the IMT is outdated.

Our battalion was supposed to have range at one single location initially. But due to the breakdown of one part of the facility, half of the battalion has to be moved to somewhere else. This is definitely not good to keep the integrity of the whole battalion intact.

When the range started, there were problems with the facilities. Range has to be stopped intermittantly just to rectify the problems. I was told that similar problems occur in the other range as well! Time was wasted in waiting for such problems to be rectified.

After the range, during the post mortem for the ICT, we have raised the problems we faced during range and it seems that this is not a new problem at all. We were told that G6 Army has been informed of such problems before but apparently no improvement has been made. As for the program for the IMT, we were told that it will cost millions to change the program.

I was quite angry to receive such answers although I know it is not within the powers of the trainers to make amends to such situation. Huge amount of money is spent by Mindef to recall its NSmen back every year for training. Yet, Mindef does not feel that it is a waste of money if the facilities for training of critical skills like shooting is not maintained properly or up to date in order to achieve the necessary standards? I mean if you spend millions each year to get NSmen back for training but training objectives are compromised just because of ill maintained training facilities, isn't a waste of money and NSmen's precious time?

Defence Budget takes a huge pie off the annual government budget every year. It is the largest single item in the annual budget. While it is important for us to buy new high tech equipment, but I think training facilities for our NSmen is of equal importance as well.

Shooting is the most basic skills of a soldier and it should deserve a better maintained training facilities than what we have now. Imagine if we ever being called up for war, the very first thing that we do is to get our men equipped and zero their weapons. If our range is not well maintained, the readiness of our men will be greatly compromised. We could have all the most advanced equipment we could get in the world but if our soldiers cannot shoot straight, all will be lost!

Goh Meng Seng

Anti-ISA VS Anti-Terrorism

Anti-ISA VS Anti-Terrorism

Someone queries about my stand on Internal Security Act or rather, the Internal Security Department. I am fundamentally against detention without trial indefinitely. If the department needs time to gather evidence to make out a case against an individual, then it would mean that it does not have enough evidence to detain anyone. And to detain someone for two decades is totally unjustifiable. It would mean either the ISD is totally ineffective and inefficient to gather the necessary evidences to put up a case against the detainee for the twenty years or so, or that the ISA has been abused to deny a human being his right to freedom for no good reasons.

However, there are times when authority needs to detain certain suspects to prevent them to cause harm to the Nation or innocent citizens, though they have insufficient information or evidence against him. But this does not mean that ISD could detain anyone at its fancy. There must be strict rules and requirement to be adhered to. To detain someone who merely pose a legitimate political threat to the ruling party is totally unacceptable. Unless the authority could justify that this individual is involved in terrorism that would harm the innocent citizens unconstitutionally.

The intention to give the relevant authority the power to detain an individual without trial longer than the normal legal allowance is to give them more time to investigate, not for any other reasons. There are worries that some may receive light sentences if they are being charged under the present laws. This could be resolved by passing special laws on Anti-Terrorism that would provide heavy penalties when one is found guilty of it. There are also concerns that a charge could not be brought to a civil court when sensitive information and witnesses with regards to National security would be exposed. This could be resolved by calling a closed-door hearing. Prosecution witnesses’ identities could be kept secret. The authority must prove its ability and effectiveness to bring forward the charge, if any, within an extended time period. In my opinion, 2 years is the maximum time we could give the authority to further their investigations. If they could not conclude their findings to bring forward a charge, it just demonstrates their inadequacy and the detainee should be released with apologies. Individuals should not be made accountable for the inadequacy of the relevant department. The department should be made accountable for their inadequacy and inefficiency. No further “extension” of detention should be allowed nor entertained.

The question now lies in how do we define Terrorism? Terrorism is an act that compromises the safety of citizens’ lives and properties for their political motivation. Terrorism is an attempt of capturing power through an unconstitutional and undemocratic way, by means of instilling fear in the population through violent and devastating acts of indiscriminate bombings and killings.

I would support an Anti-Terrorism Act to replace the present Internal Security Act. The Anti-Terrorism Act will have a more stringent requirement that will put a check on discriminate abuse of the power provided by the Act. The agents must apply to the court to provide the reasons or reasonable belief they have on a suspect that would engage in terrorist acts that would endanger the lives and properties of innocent citizens. The maximum time allowed for detention without trial would be fixed at 24 months. If the agents could not provide further evidences to formulate a charge of terrorism or treason on the suspect, they will have to release the detainees with public apologies. They could further investigate on the detainees as they deem fit but further detention must be accompanied with a valid charge.

It is necessary to determine the level of involvement of each suspect. Are they

1. supporter
2. junior member
3. senior member
4. key expert (bomb, networking, fund raising,
recruitment, trainers etc).
5. key member / senior leader

The Anti-terrorist laws would have to make differential sentence for different level of involvement. Life imprisonment could be imposed for Senior leaders and key expert.

This will effectively prevent abuse such additional powers provided by such Act and put up a system that does not tolerate incompetence bureaucrats. This will also provide a balance for the need to protect innocent citizens from terrorist threats.

Goh Meng Seng