TOTD: Back to Fundamental of CPF

Thought of the Day -
Back to Fundamental of CPF

I was talking to a friend over CPF issues recently and it seems that I have some of the more "radical" thought over CPF.

CPF was supposed to be meant for retirement financing but in the end, it becomes some sort of "piggy bank" for PAP as well as Singaporeans for many purposes.

First, PAP allowed you to use CPF to buy properties. Most Singaporeans are happy with such arrangement as they feel that they will be able to own a property in their lifetime. I also used up all my CPF available to buy property but that is because I do not trust PAP with my money. This is another issue for another day.

Then PAP says that you can use your parents' CPF or your own CPF to pay for higher education. On top of that, you can use your CPF to pay for your parents, children, brothers, sisters etc medical fees!

Singaporeans thought that these are all "good arrangement" but the truth is, it will create two/three problems:

1) Over consumption of housing, education and medical care
2) Depleted CPF for your retirement
3) Kicking the can down the road

On top of that, it will create other problem of another dimension:

1) Over reliance on CPF money for anything, everything
2) Weakening of Financial management skills and planning
3) Total lack of saving habits

Most financial planners will tell you that you will need to save a certain percentage of your salaries every month for future retirement. It is normally set at 20% to 25% of your income, depending on your income level.

But due to PAP's conflicting policy needs, it has totally messed up the CPF system and in the end, it resorts to setting some unrealistic arbitrary "minimum sum" which many lower income earners could not meet mainly due to the over consumption of housing. i.e. they were allowed to buy properties which they couldn't afford and shouldn't buy in the first place, if they were to stick to the 25% savings rule for retirement!

The only right way to due with this situation is set the saving rate for CPF at 25% (contribution of employee and employer add together) while banning people from using it for just any other thing, especially for housing and medical fees for other family members!

Employer's CPF contribution should stay at 17% while employees' contribution should be cut from 20% to 8%. This would mean that employees or Singaporeans will have additional 12% of their income in cash. If they need to buy property and use it to pay their mortgage, they can use this additional 12% cash to do so. However, they should not use any CPF money for mortgage payment.

For young people, they should start to learn how to do financial planning and I reiterate this point that basic financial planning concepts and knowledge should be taught in the common school curriculum! They should make it a habit to save for down payment for their first property purchase and plan for their mortgage payment as well. In general, for middle-lower income earners, they should not be using more than 35% or 40% of their income to pay for mortgage. This will prevent them from over-consuming housing and it will keep property prices in check.

If they intend to start their own little business, they could save up these extra 12% of their income for future business plan!

Our property prices have been artificially pushed up due to the excess liquidity which PAP allows Singaporeans to use CPF in doing so. This applies to prices of Medical care as well. It is precisely that Singaporeans do not "feel the direct pinch" from using their CPF money to pay for Medical care or housing, they tend to not mind spending excessively on these products and services. Of course, HDB and hospitals alike, are also happy to charge higher prices because "it is affordable" to Singaporeans due to the excess liquidity provided by CPF!

PAP has abused the system in skewing the "affordable" argument. It is not affordable when Singaporeans are paying more than 35% or 40% of their salary for a 30 year mortgage. That is totally rubbish argument of affordability because if you purchase your property at the age of 30, by 60 years old, you will have very little left in your CPF account for retirement!

The proper way of inducing better financial management by Singaporeans is to make them manage their finances according to the fixed CPF retirement saving rate (which could be adjusted according to income level) so that they would make better rational choice in their spending in housing, education as well as medical care.

This may sound "radical" to many unthinking Singaporeans and they may just jump up and down denouncing such plan but this is the only right thing to do in the face of ageing population.

Goh Meng Seng

Why Singapore PM Lee is so concerned about TPP?

I happened to read about an article on TPP posted on TOC (The Online Citizen) website
but I found it has misrepresented some of the things on TPP. I have written the following in response on my Facebook:

There are some erroneous or inaccuracies written in this TOC article. Apparently, it is not written by someone who is well verse in Economics.

First of all, TPP is not just about Trade. It is about Free Market Globalization. i.e. Besides the free trade of goods and services, it also includes free mobility of capital as well as labour.

The reason of "Protectionism" vs such Free Market Globalization is not only because it protects companies and their products, but it also protects its wages for the labour as well as certain sovereignty issues in prevention of critical assets of a country being acquired by foreign countries.

While the article is right to say that most of the time, it is the more well off countries which will resist such agreements, but there are also costs to poorer countries. For example, there is "Economic Colonization"; i.e. all critical resources would be exploited or plundered by the richer countries.

As for wages, it is not a guarantee that workers will benefit from TPP just because companies can sell to a larger market or consumer base. In fact, more likely so, workers will be exploited by wage suppression as they could be replaced by a larger and cheaper source of workers among the countries. i.e. supply of workers suddenly increased many thousand folds. This is actually what is happening right now in Singapore.

Moreover, bigger companies benefit the most as compared to the local companies. All these will result in great wealth and income disparity. i.e. Big companies shareholders will be richer while workers suffered lower wages.

There is also an issue of structural immobility. In Keynesian Economics concept, Free market is good as the invisible hands will solve everything. But the truth is, this doesn't take into considerations of many things. Product life cycle is becoming shorter and thus, we see a lot of structural displacement of skilled workers who will suddenly find themselves irrelevant. Talking about re-training and restructuring is easy but execution will be difficult.

The only reason why Singapore needs TPP badly is due to the fact that it is a small open economy without much agricultural sector. Not even much organic industrial sector to start with. We all depend on MNCs and GLCs. MNCs needs mobility of funds. GLCs and our sovereign funds like Temasek and GIC, needed ease of mobility of capital to effect greater returns with less cost in capital investment. These are the main REAL benefits for Singapore.

Small and Medium companies may benefit from bigger market but the truth is, as stated in the article itself, we already have quite a lot of FTAs with most of the individual countries listed in TPP!

But the cost to us, Singaporeans, in return for GIC, Temasek and all those big GLCs to have more investment opportunities, is continued suppression of our wages. Income and wealth disparity will continue to be widen and only those ruling elites and their cronies in these GLCs will earn higher exorbitant bonuses and salaries.

On top of that, as the article says, we will face HIGHER cost of medicines with the elimination of generic drugs.

BTW, when Japan can sell more cars to USA, it doesn't need to use our port facilities. That's utterly wrong to say that. They could well ship direct to US across the pacific. (For anyone who want to doubt me on this point, please refer to this website on a freight forwarding shipping company specialized in car-cargo transhipment)

In short, the reason why our PM Lee is so concerned about TPP is not about Singaporeans'  well being; in fact, TPP will make most Singaporeans worse off, with bigger wage suppression from a larger pool of foreign labour from the Third and First World countries. Singaporeans will face higher healthcare cost and we will face a deepening of income and wealth disparity in Singapore.

The only reason why PAP wanted TPP so badly is because TPP could enhance its GLCs, Temasek Holdings and GIC investment opportunities overseas. We have seen this in CECA which we have signed with India in which we promised easy access and migration for Indians to come to Singapore and work, in return for investment opportunities in Indian's financial industry and such.

This will only help to enhance the ever rising salaries and bonuses of the top management of these entities, the elite cronies of PAP.

These are the crux of the matter, not so much about "free trade" alone, lest about jobs creation for Singaporeans.

Goh Meng Seng

Minister Gan Please Resign or Be Sacked!

I am not interested in the name of the staffs punished in the SGH Hep C outbreak but on how lenient they have been treated. Most importantly, when Minister Gan is going to resign for being a blur sotong throughout the 5 months right after the outbreak happened.

There are excess Ministers in PM Lee's cabinet. In fact, there are TWO ministries with TWO ministers. PM Lee should consider removing the Blur Sotong Weak and Incompetent Minister Gan and replace him with other minister-caliber people in his Cabinet!

Ignorance cannot be claimed as innocence and it could well become the source of incompetence. Thus, Minister Gan's claim of ignorance of the Hep C outbreak for the 5 months could well be the greatest sign of incompetence. PM Lee should just Sack him!

Else, there will be no accountability system to claim "meritocracy" under PM Lee's rule.

Goh Meng Seng

Call for the Resignation of Minister of Health for Weak Leadership

For Immediate Release

Call for the Resignation of Minister of Health for Weak Leadership

The Singapore General Hospital (SGH) on Thursday (Mar 17 2016) announced that it had meted out disciplinary sanctions to 12 SGH staffs in leadership positions and 4 Ministry of Health (MOH) senior officers were also disciplined for the lapses in the Hepatitis C outbreak which lasted from April to June last year.

The Panel of the Independent Review Committee's (IRC), which was commissioned by MOH, recommended to further strengthen the hospital’s infection control and disease outbreak surveillance and management mechanisms.

Among the various recommendations made, we are surprised that certain basic routine cleaning work has been singled out. It is apparent that SGH has been operating without clear SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures) on the issue of cleaning and disinfection of contaminated surfaces. We find it totally unacceptable for the management of SGH to neglect such basic SOPs on maintaining hygienic environment in the hospital.

We would expect punishment which would reflect the severity of the mistakes committed to be handed out to all relevant mid and top management personnel. This would include the Minister of Health himself for his inability to get timely information on such matters in order to make the appropriate decisions corresponding to the seriousness of the matter.

Minister Gan’s leadership is put into serious doubt when he just lost track of what was going on in his own Ministry and the hospitals which were put under his purview. We regret that the Prime Minister is not able to see the problem of Minister Gan’s weak and incompetent leadership and does not asked for his resignation. This is a glaring lack of accountability and it puts doubts into the meritocracy system which PAP has always boasted of.

There is an apparent lack of transparency when it comes to accountability meted out to the other staffs responsible for these lapses. The amount of financial penalties was also not revealed, there was no demotion and nor any staffs found to be in the wrong asked to leave. The Ministry has promised an Independent inquiry into this outbreak but what good would it have if there was a total lack of transparency in detailing the problems, lapses and the linkages to the corresponding punishment meted to the respective staff?

Regrettably and ironically, such Black Box operation of the Independent Review Committee has just enhances the perception of the consistency of the flaws which led to the Hep C outbreak: i.e the lack of transparency and accountability when the outbreak was first discovered but no information was released to the public in a timely manner.

The most important issue that alarmed the public was the delay of reporting the crisis to MOH, it took 2 to 3 months for SGH to report to MOH when the problem was serious enough to warrant a high alert. MOH was notified of the cluster in late August and the minister of health was informed on the 18 Sep. So it took more than 18 days for the minister to be notified. There was no mentioning of delays, does it mean that the delay was not an issue or was it not even investigated at all?

There are also no mentions if the family of the victims are compensated and if the compensations are adequate.

MOH had promised an “objective and critical review” but the report seems to have left out many critical issues. In order for public trust in healthcare to be restored, we urged MOH answer and publish the information the pertaining to the above-mentioned questions.

We reiterate our point that the Minister of Health should take full responsibility for the Mess of this Hep C outbreak due to his weak leadership in which such severe cases of infectious outbreak were not reported IMMEDIATELY to the Minister himself. It is unimaginable for the Minister to be KEPT IN THE DARK of the whole period of serious outbreak for at least 5 months before he was officially notified. There is no satisfactory explanation for such disastrous situation to happen other than WEAK and INCOMPETENT Leadership.

Goh Meng Seng
Secretary General for PPP CEC

Consistency, Transparency and Accountability in Governance

TAN TOCK SENG HOSPITAL sacked Roy just because they say he used hospital computer for his own blogging about CPF and social issues while at work.

But SGH and MOH only issue "warning letters" to 16 staffs after causing more than a couple of dozens patients infected with HEP C permanently for life and worse, death of 8 patients.

Do you see the logic or injustice?

This is a case of the lack of consistency and worse, a sense of proportion and common sense. What is worse, is the lack of transparency.

Ministry of Health is supposed to have an INDEPENDENT Inquiry but somehow, nobody has any idea what report has the committee  submitted and how the Ministry has arrived at these decisions of just issuing Warning Letters to the 16 staffs.

Most important of all, there is ABSOLUTELY SILENCE on the matter of compensation. It is only fair for the Ministry to compensate the infected patients adequately because Hep C Infections will have long lasting effects and not to mention, the families of the dead patients due to the infections, should be compensated as well.

It is only fair for the infected patients and families of the dead to have a full view of the report done by the Committee's findings so that they could take legal actions if there was none or inadequate compensations made.

This is a serious lapse of medical care and it also affects public health and interests in the long run. The matter should not be shredded in secrecy with a total lack of proper accountability, both by the staffs involved as well the Ministry of Health in terms of compensations.

Goh Meng Seng

What is Trans Pacific Partnership all about?

PAP government has signed the TPP agreement on 4 Feb 2016 WITHOUT any Public Consultation NOR public debates at all.

There is not even parliamentary debate over this important issue and our only labour union NTUC has been acting Deaf, Blind, Mute and Dumb - Hear no Evil, See no Evil, Say no Evil and Think no Evil!

To understand the flaws of TPP, you can lick on the following:

TPP in 10 cards

I shall extract out two parts of which I am deadly concerned about:

The following information is on how TPP could compromise our sovereignty, in effect, selling away our sovereignty to huge MNCs which will dictate on what our laws can and cannot be.

What's ISDS, and why is Elizabeth Warren so upset about it?

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) is one of the TPP's most prominent critics, and her campaign against the deal has focused on an otherwise obscure provision called investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS). The goal — to mediate disputes between a government and foreign investors — might sound innocuous. But Warren warns that ISDS poses a threat to American sovereignty and could inhibit robust regulation of industries such as banking.

ISDS rules are designed to address a real problem. Suppose an investor from one country spends money building a factory in another country. Then a new government comes to power there and nationalizes the factory. That's unfair to the investor, and in the long run it's likely to be bad for the country with the factory as well. ISDS is an arbitration process that uses trade sanctions to pressure governments to compensate investors whose property is seized.

Obviously, the United States has a robust legal system that doesn't allow this kind of naked expropriation. Nevertheless, the TPP is expected to allow foreign investors to make ISDS complaints against the United States. And Warren argues that could "tilt the playing field in the United States further in favor of big multinational corporations" in a way that would "undermine US sovereignty."

TPP opponents worry that foreign companies could argue that the way America regulates banks, the minimum wage, or the environment constitutes an unjust taking of their property. If an ISDS panel agrees, the United States could be on the hook for millions of dollars in damages.

There are two aspects of ISDS that have raised particular concern. One is the fact that, as with most trade dispute settlement panels, the process is overseen by arbitrators rather than independent judges. Warren worries these arbitrators, who may also represent corporate clients in other cases, will cause panels to be biased toward big companies.

Second, while the ordinary WTO dispute settlement process only allows complaints by governments, ISDS allows any foreign investor to complain. Critics say that removes an important check on misuse of the dispute settlement process.

Defenders of ISDS say Warren's concerns are overblown. The White House notes that there are about 3,000 trade deals around the world with ISDS provisions, including about 50 that involve the United States. According to the Obama administration, the US has only faced 13 ISDS cases under those treaties, and has never lost a case. The White House also says the ISDS provisions in the TPP will have stronger safeguards against abuse than those in previous treaties.

And it's important to note that ISDS can't actually force countries to change their laws or regulations. The most an ISDS panel can do is impose a financial penalty.

The next part deals with drug patents and how TPP will compromise our Healthcare Cost by giving extensive power to huge Pharmaceutical Companies.

The problem with drug patents in TPP is much more devilish than I initially thought.

It prevented Generic drugs from being available as there are clauses that set the barriers to it, even AFTER the patent expires.

For biologics, it applies the barriers HIGHER and for other drugs, it allows the original patent holders to just TWEAK the formula and thus, extending the patent longer.... ever green extension of patents forever!

Why are some public health groups opposing the TPP?

Public health groups such as Doctors Without Borders and the AIDS research group amfAR have warned that the TPP could delay the introduction of generic drugs, boosting drug prices and ultimately costing lives. Here's how that could happen.

Laws in the US and around the world grant patents and other legal privileges to the first company to invent a new drug — a reward to encourage research and development. After these legal protections expire, other companies can make cheap generic versions of the drugs.

Of course, big pharmaceutical companies hate this competition. So they've lobbied for the TPP to include rules delaying the introduction of generic drugs into the market.

For example, one proposal would expand the types of inventions that are eligible for patent protection to include modifications of existing drugs. Critics say this would make it easier for drug companies to engage in "evergreening," a process where drug companies make minor modifications to their products in order to extend the effective length of patent protection.

The TPP requires governments to extend the term of patent protection if the patent office processes a patent application too slowly, or if regulators delay approval of a pharmaceutical patent.

Another provision concerns complex drugs called biologics. Before these drugs can be introduced to the market, the Food and Drug administration requires drugmakers to prove they are safe and effective. Often, data from one drug's clinical trials is useful to other companies wanting to introduce competing, biologically similar drugs. But a controversial US law requires competing drug manufacturers to wait 12 years before they can use this data in their own applications. That makes it harder for generic drugmakers to get into the market, raising prices.

The Obama administration reportedly pushed for language requiring that all countries adopt a similar 12-year requirement. That was surprising because Obama's own 2016 budget suggested reducing the exclusivity period to seven years. Ultimately, US negotiators didn't get what they wanted; the final text of the TPP requires countries to provide five to eight years of data exclusivity for biologic drugs.

In short, the TPP can be expected to reduce competition and therefore raise the prices of drugs in some TPP countries. The deal probably won't have much effect in the US, where biologics already receive 12 years of protection and the law is relatively friendly to evergreen patents, but it will have a bigger impact in other TPP countries.

Singaporeans have to get themselves more involved and concerned about this implementation of TPP as there is absolutely NO ESCAPE Clause once it is signed and ratified by parliament.

PAP government did not put up the full text for public information and scrutiny, most probably for fear of massive objections.

If you want to know the exact text of TPP which Singapore is one of the signatory countries, you may not find the details in any Singapore portal. Countries who signed this pact are supposed to put up information for public debates so to get consensus and parliamentary ratification but PAP didn't even want to talk about it, lest hold any public debate or consultation.

You could find the exact text and details from New Zealand government website. Only more responsible government will be transparent and open about their dealings, instead of hiding in Such black box operations

You can find the Full text in the following link to New Zealand government website:

http://www.tpp.mfat.govt.nz/text


Now you would understand why massive people around the world would march and protest against TPP or its similar agreement which was imposed on the European Unions.

This so call trade pack is not merely a simple trade pack but a whole list of legislation which will sell off our rights to cheaper Healthcare and our Sovereignty. It will not only affect us alone but for ALL our future generations.

It is up to Singaporeans to get themselves information on all these important trade agreements being signed QUIETLY away, selling our future to the big corporations of the world. Go to your MPs and demand an explanation or lodge your complains against TPP. Do it and put pressure on PAP to think twice about ratifying this TPP.

Goh Meng Seng

SGH Hep C Outbreak: Systemic Deficiency, Human Resource Mismanagement & Proper Compensation

For Immediate Release Date: 09 Dec 2015

SGH Hep C Outbreak: Systemic Deficiency, Human Resource Mismanagement & Proper Compensation

We refer to the report put up by the Independent Review Committee (IRC). We are glad that the report has shed some light on the timeline of events and the weaknesses of the current system.

However, we noted that all the stakeholders, including the various departments in SGH and Divisions in the Ministry of Health, lack a fundamental sense of urgency in handling this outbreak. It took more than two months for SGH and the divisions of MOH to determine that this outbreak is a serious case that warrants a Serious Reportable Event (SRE). It is even more amazing that it took more than one month for the CEO of SGH to decide to hold a face-to-face meeting with MOH to report on the seriousness of this case and to decide on whether to make public the outbreak.

The key method of controlling the outbreak of such diseases is first to isolate or quarantine the source of infections followed by timely announcement to the public of the outbreak. It is apparent that both the SGH and MOH staffs and management did not regard timely public announcement of the outbreak as an important measure for public safety.

This is unacceptable as we expect MOH and its group of hospitals to have learned from 2003 SARS outbreak that timely public announcement is one of the most important measures in curbing further massive infections. We view this as a serious systemic problem inherent with the current bureaucratic practices which needs to be addressed thoroughly.

We also note that the IRC has stated that there were serious lapses in the hospital’s staff whereby they have not adhered to established protocols as basic as hand hygiene which subsequently caused contamination to other medical equipment. We suspect that this is a symptom of a bigger fundamental problem of MOH’s Human Resource policy.

Our hospitals have employed a substantial number of foreign healthcare providers over the decade. This is due to various reasons which include increasing demand of hospital care due to explosive population growth in the past decade. We also learn that many locally trained nurses have left the industry due to unfavorable shift work schedule.

Nursing is a professional job but apparently the salary scale for nurses in Singapore is only half of the salary scale paid by Hong Kong hospitals. It is apparent that MOH has allowed hospitals to employ cheap foreign substitutes from Third World countries instead of making the effort to look into the shortage of Singapore nurses seriously. Training and certification of nursing in these foreign countries may fall short of our expectations and this might have compromised the safety and standards of our healthcare system. This may well be the reason why SGH nurses have breached even the most basic requirement of hand hygiene.

People’s Power Party strongly advocate a change of mindset, HR policy and hiring practices. Nursing is a profession that involves the matter of life and death. It is not the so-called “low skilled job” as opined by PAP Minister. Nurses should be professionally remunerated and at the same time, more stringent requirement, far more demanding than the mere paper qualification from Third World institutions, should be set out in the employment of foreign nurses. They should be put through the similar tests or examinations that our local nurses have gone through before they become qualified nurses. We also recommend that the shift scheduling system be standardized according to other uniform groups and essential services.

It is only when our hospitals start taking nursing as a serious profession which makes a great difference to life and death, instead of treating it as “low skilled job”, then we could avoid the risk of having more unfortunate medical incidents such as this current Hepatitis C outbreak.

Last but not least, we urge the Minister of Health Mr. Gan not to avoid the important issue of compensation to the victims as well as their families of the dead patients. This is a serious healthcare crisis and a proper compensation should be made to all those affected. This is the least SGH and MOH should do in being accountable to the whole saga.

Goh Meng Seng
Secretary General
For People’s Power Party CEC

Press Statement on SGH Hepatitis C Mass Infections

Date: 11 Oct 2015

For Immediate Release

Press Statement on SGH Hepatitis C Mass Infections


SGH and MOH Should Take Full Responsibility and Do the Right Things

First and foremost, our deepest condolences to the families of the patients who were dead due to the outbreak of Hepatitis C mass infections in SGH. We also empathize with those families of frustrated patients who are infected and suffered from Hepatitis C infections which may have long term impact and implications on their health.

We are angry with Ministry of Health’s (MOH) and the Health Minister’s, Mr. Gan Kim Yong, obfuscation over this serious incident. MOH and Mr. Gan should take full responsibility for the failure of making public the information on the incident immediately when SGH informed them in late August.

PPP noted SDP commented about the issue. But we would like to look at the issue beyond the political angle --- this issue is so serious and it should be beyond politics. We share the point made by Singapore Democratic Party that there are reasons to believe that such deliberate delay of release of information in late August was based on political consideration of the impending General Elections. We condemn such act as it puts PAP’s party interests on top of public health interests. Such decision is totally irresponsible as it puts public health at risk.

PPP noted that Mr. Gan said he wanted to maintain “transparency” but such 'transparency" of delaying of information release is undesirable as it put patients to SGH in health risk directly, and Singaporeans indirectly. If this is the kind of “transparency” Mr. Gan is trying to maintain, we would be utterly disappointed. We urge Mr. Gan to make a public apology and step down for failing to inform the public in a timely manner. Such low standard of “transparency” would put even more Singaporeans at health risk if there were to be other major mass outbreaks of infectious diseases in the future.

PPP noted that MOH has stated in response to criticism that hospitals are to report on Hepatitis infections only for acute cases. We wish to point out that MOH’s standing order and protocol are totally outdated and show that it has learned nothing from the SARS outbreak in 2003. Any mass outbreak of infectious diseases should be reported and made public as soon as possible regardless of its nature. If there isn’t any standing protocol for immediate reporting of the cluster outbreak of such infectious diseases like Hepatitis C, which may result in serious complications as well as liver cancer, then we question MOH’s competency in its regulatory role.

MOH should review its standing protocols to include mandatory report by hospitals within a stipulated time if there is any suspicion of outbreak of any infectious disease. Such information should be made public immediately to keep patients alert while investigations are carried out concurrently. This is the level of professional standard of transparency we expect from MOH and all hospitals.

The information released by MOH and SGH so far seems to suggest that they are free from any forms of human errors or negligence. We find the report incredible and we hope this is not the standard of “ownself check ownself” logic which was promoted by PAP during the General Elections. 8 lives had been lost, and that has to be investigated by police as they are coroner cases, before one can rule out foul play or negligence.

The report by SGH suggested that the infections were most probably caused by multi-dose vials. As pointed out by SDP, all renal patients would have been screened for hepatitis before their kidney transplant. Thus there must be human error involved either the screening were not done properly, SGH staff has contracted Hepatitis and infected the patients or that there are lapses in the administration of injections of insulin into the patients.

It is incredible for SGH’s report to blame only the outbreak on the use of multi-dose vials without mention of human errors and lapses. We understand that such mention would have implications on SGH’s legal liabilities towards the patients and the families of those who died of the infections but it is important to be upfront and forthcoming on such matters and review its staffs on the safety of their current practices.

Regardless of whether it is due to human negligence or inappropriate protocol set for the administration of injection from multi-dose vials, we feel that it is totally inadequate for SGH to only be responsible of the treatment of Hepatitis C of the patients without mention of any compensation made to those who were affected. Hepatitis C is not just an ordinary infectious disease which can be easily cured. Some may be affected for the rest of their life. Although no amount of money could compensate the grieve of losing one’s love one but at the very least, the government and SGH should demonstrate their sincerity in making amends of their mistakes which have caused death and sufferings to the patients.

What was done cannot be undone and it is totally unfortunate for this outbreak to happen. The very least MOH and SGH could do is to be open and transparent in their handling the aftermath with the aim of reviewing the inadequacy of current protocols and administration so to improve public health safety in future. At the same time, we hope that SGH and MOH would assume all responsibilities of this outbreak and make appropriate compensations to the patients and the families of the dead.


Goh Meng Seng

Secretary General
For Pro-Tem Committee
People’s Power Party.

Press Statement on Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement

For Immediate Release
Press Statement on Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement

1) The conclusion of the negotiation of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) has been announced by the President of United States as well as our Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on 5 Oct 2015. However the negotiation was done in total darkness of a black box operation in which, up till now, there is no formal public revelation of the details of all the 33 Chapters embedded in this agreement.

2) While the Minister of Trade and Industry Mr. Lim Hng Khiang has painted a rosy picture for Singapore SMEs to benefit from this TPPA, but we know that for every Free Trade Agreement, there will always be tradeoffs for every country.

3) It is inadequate for our Prime Minister and Minister to only talk about the potential benefits of TPPA without telling Singaporeans the tradeoffs we are going to make in return.

4) We urge the PAP government to make public all information with regards to TPPA as early as possible so that debate on this extremely important FTA could be carried out rigorously. We note that the government is obliged to make public the details of this agreement within 30 days from the signing. We would expect PAP government to fulfill this obligation.

5) It would be more helpful if an independent panel of academia, economists and experts could be set up to explain the potential implications of all the 33 Chapters.

6) We are particularly concerned over the impact on the income growth as well as job prospects of all Singaporeans, medicine cost, cost of living and population growth.

7) We are also concerned on the social and national impact of TPPA. In particularly, will TPPA give overwhelming powers to big corporations and MNCs to dictate our local legislation based on compliance clauses stated in it?

8) People’s Power Party is against black box operations for any legislation or ratification of any Free Trade Agreement without much transparency, open debate and scrutiny. If TPPA was proven to be overly controversial, we would want a referendum over its final approval.

9) We hope that PAP is more forthcoming and transparent with all the information of TPPA and do not shy away from public debate over this agreement.


Goh Meng Seng
Secretary General
For Pro-tem Committee People’s Power Party

The Mother of All Problems - Unchecked Population Growth

Reporter called to ask me on my view of PM Lee's NDR speech. The key point lies on the "sensitive" Foreign Labour-Population growth policy.

I have issued a SERIOUS warning to PM Lee and his PAP team. This "sensitive" issue of unchecked population growth has reached a dangerous social boiling point. It is no longer about simple trade offs but rather, when will there be social uprising against this senseless GDP growth at all cost which resulted in explosive population growth if there is no immediate measures to moderate it.

It will no longer be whether we can have good economic/GDP growth but whether our social fabric will rupture and social disgruntlement will turn ugly, creating instability.

PAP ruling elites should stop running the country by burying themselves in their world of digits and economic theories.

PAP has made two critical mistakes in managing the population growth:

1) Inadequate corresponding infrastructure development to cope with sudden rapid population growth. It is definitely amazing for the supposed top talents who are paid millions every year to make such amateur, common sense mistake. Take hospital beds for example. for the last decade, there is a growth of over 1 million population but there was only an increase of 500 beds. It will take more than another decade before another 2000 beds to be added in the immediate future. However, PAP is planning to have another more than 1 million population growth! This is totally unacceptable.

2) Disastrous management of population growth whereby there is practically no proper checks done on the qualifications of those who wanted to come to Singapore to work. MOM has the gull to say that it is the responsibility of employers to do due diligence on the qualifications of their employees! Furthermore, the FTAs signed with other big third world countries have put in terms of allowing "UNLIMITED NUMBER" of people from these countries to come to Singapore to work! For example, India has over 1 billion people. Singapore, as a tiny little red dot, has actually signed CECA which allows unlimited number of Indians to come to Singapore to work in 127 professions! Can we accommodate even 1% of Indian population of 10 million people? Here again, I do not know why such intelligent breed of PAP leaders could have such simple common sense escape them!

My take is, if PM Lee and his team still continue to ignore all the disturbing signs from the ground while keep talking about "painful trade offs", it will be just a matter of time before social unrest blew up right in front of their faces.

Goh Meng Seng

CNA Censored PPP's Challenge to Minister Gan

 Since PAP prefer its type of smearing and mudslinging kind of Elections.... 

I was told CNA actually changed their news title as well as content to leave out my CHALLENGE to Mr Gan to have a public debate on Healthcare issue!

Below is the original news report.

It reported that Goh Meng Seng wanted to challenge Gan Kim Yong to a public debate.

http://sgtalk.org/mybb/Thread-Goh-Meng-Seng-challenges-Gan-Kim-Yong-to-come-for-healthcare-debate

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/ppp-s-goh-meng-seng/2054074.html

People's Power Party (PPP) secretary-general Goh Meng Seng on Sunday (Aug 16) said he is open to engaging in a public debate with Health Minister Gan Kim Yong on healthcare issues.

On a walkabout near Teck Whye in Chua Chu Kang GRC, Mr Goh said he was looking forward to taking on the People's Action Party (PAP) team of Mr Gan, MPs Low Yen Ling and Zaqy Mohamad and newcomer Yee Chia Hsing in the coming General Election. "I feel great because basically Mr Gan is staying as contestant in this GRC.

“My strategy is minister-specific in a sense. So I'm going to raise issues on healthcare, MediShield - MediShield Life particularly, as well as the hospital bed crunch. I hope we have a good debate and I would like to invite Mr Gan to a public townhall debate. I am looking forward to having a robust debate over the period."

Mr Goh also said the PAP has fielded “a good slate of candidates” in Chua Chu Kang GRC and is not planning to change his line-up for the constituency. “We expected more or less on that. There are no surprises from them, but hopefully we will have some surprises,” he said, adding that PPP may introduce its candidates for the four-member GRC in the coming week.

Asked if his team is ready to take on the challenge from the PAP, he said: "Yes, gloves off."

This is the MODIFIED News Content:

Below is the changed news report.
There is no mention of Goh Meng Seng challenging Gan Kim Yong for public debate anymore.

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/ppp-s-goh-meng-seng-to/2054074.html

People's Power Party (PPP) secretary-general Goh Meng Seng on Sunday (Aug 16) said he would like to tackle healthcare issues in his campaign for the coming General Election.

On a walkabout near Teck Whye in Chua Chu Kang GRC, Mr Goh said he was looking forward to taking on the People's Action Party (PAP) team of Mr Gan, MPs Low Yen Ling and Zaqy Mohamad and newcomer Yee Chia Hsing in the coming General Election. "I feel great because basically Mr Gan is staying as contestant in this GRC.

“My strategy is minister-specific in a sense. So I'm going to raise issues on healthcare, MediShield - MediShield Life particularly, as well as the hospital bed crunch. I am looking forward to having a robust debate."

Mr Goh also said the PAP has fielded “a good slate of candidates” in Chua Chu Kang GRC and is not planning to change his line-up for the constituency. “We expected more or less on that. There are no surprises from them, but hopefully we will have some surprises,” he said, adding that PPP may introduce its candidates for the four-member GRC in the coming week.

Asked if his team is ready to take on the challenge from the PAP, he said: "Yes, gloves off."

I guess this is not the FIRST time local Main Stream Media has censored their own original news posting which may sound "embarrassing" to the PAP govenrment. But I just find that all these censorship is totally unnecessary.

I am pretty sick of the Third World electioneering we have here in Singapore for the past few decades. General Elections are supposed to be a period whereby every political parties will contest based on their political ideas and ideals.

Policy debates should be welcome and the main focus of a First World Democracy but apparently, Singapore is far from being a First World Democracy.

Our past and present Genearl Elections are full of petty political bickering and mudslinging. For the current "Elections Hot Period", ever since the Electoral Boundaries Report has been announced, our main stream media is flooded with sensational smearing and mudslinging news. Even a simple photo of an opposition MP eating food in some constituency can become a spat between politicians!

So far, nobody has talked about any meaningful discourse of policy views or issues. Nobody is interested in Policy Debates which will give voters a clearer picture and information on each party's policy views.

It is really regrettable that PAP Minister Gan has declined to take up my challenge to debate on such an important issue which Singaporeans have indicated having great concerns in various surveys.

I hope PAP should grow up so that Singapore could mature into a First World Democracy.

Goh Meng Seng

Healthcare AFFORDABLE?

The last time when I brought up the issue of HDB prices, Mah Bow Tan also sing the tune that HDB is "Affordable" but is it really so?

As long as you have Restructured Hospitals which aim is not just cost recovery but also profit making, there is no guarantee that medishield life or pioneer package can help to lower actual payment by Singaporeans via cash or their medisave.

The truth is, once Pioneer Package is given out, even Government polyclinics have raised prices immediately! It is just a matter of left pocket in right pocket out and eventually in the long term, we will have a runaway medical cost.

The truth is, If we look and compare carefully of some of the charges included in polyclinics or restructured hospitals, initial prices were inflated so much so that they were more Expensive than private clinics and hospitals! Eg. Polyclinics consultation fees can be very much higher than private clinics before subsidies!

Such tactic is used to hoodwink Singaporeans to believe that PAP Government has given us hefty subsidies but in actual fact, such figures are grossly inflated.

Goh Meng Seng

Campaign Trail - Meeting & Challenging Minister Gan

Campaign Trail - Meeting & Challenging Minister Gan

Today was supposed to be like last weekend whereby we would just go around CCK greeting residents and introducing our relatively new party. Although a few reporters called up the previous day but I assumed it was just a routine call as they have done for past two weeks.

I didn't expect any reporter, lest CNA camera man to turn up at our area of ops. But unexpectedly, TNP reporter and the team of CNA camera men turned up. Most likely they were there because they have just covered the incumbent Minister Gan's walk about or announcement of PAP's CCK candidates.

Well, the smell of CCK is really sweet and our small campaigning team was pretty encouraged. I am personally surprised by the warm response from the residents at CCK.

We paused for a media interview by the TNP reporter with the camera on. I have issued a challenge to Minister Gan for a Town Hall debate on his healthcare policies as this has been my consistency in applying my "minister specific" strategy since 2011.

I wanted a very different type of campaign for not only my party PPP but for Singapore as a whole. Whenever I read the online and offline news, there were too much petty inconsequential bickering between some opposition parties and PAP. Imagine that even a simple photo and caption of someone having some good food at a perceived HOT SMC could become the focus of bickering and media attention! Do we seriously lack of anything more important or substance to report on the media other than such petty bickering?

If we seriously reflect on the past elections in last 50 years, how many of them really focus on important current issues of the day? How many serious debates have been made over various policy issues or how many insightful public discourse and policy views have been made during the elections hustling?

Past elections have been marred by endless smearing, mud-slinging, character assassination and inconsequential petty politicking and bickering.

I had wanted to change this bad electioneering culture of Singapore/PAP once and for all. Let's debate on serious stuffs. General Elections should be an open contest of political ideas and ideals. This is what a First World Democracy should be.

Thus, I have been trying to get PAP Ministers to debate on pertinent current issues since last elections GE2011. But it seems that even though PAP Ministers would have tremendous advantage as they have the whole army of civil servants to back them up in research and as a huge think tank, they have repeatedly declined to take up such challenge. I was disappointed when Mr Mah Bow Tan refused to hold a public debate with me on HDB housing issues back in GE2011.

I was hoping that Mr Gan Kim Yong would react differently and agree to have such debate.

Nevertheless, I have my answer right from the horse mouth not so long after I have issued my challenge to Mr Gan via the MSM. I met Mr. Gan right at the end of our activity when we were resting and preparing to leave the coffeeshop.

Mr Gan was game enough to come to our table and shake our hands when he saw us resting and drinking tea at a table. I took the opportunity to request to have a Town Hall debate with him. He said I could go ahead and hold a Town Hall meeting and he will respond when needed. It means that he would rather not to sit down face to face and have a live debate with me but prefer to go through my points raised and then decide whether to respond through the media! Well, that would be most advantageous to him tactically as he could get his army of think tank and civil servants to formulate any response if need to.

I asked again why not we hold such debate. He gave a weak excuse that the election rules don't allow us to do so! I said we could do BEFORE the elections is called as this is POLICY Debate and it is not some "combined rally" or whatever. As far as I know, there are no rules against policy debates outside of parliament!

And even if it is within the Elections period, I do not think there is a ban on political debate in public space.

Well, anyway, I guess that is the final answer from Minister Gan and I am really very disappointed. Ministers should always be ready to defend their own policies at all times, be it in or out of parliament. This is especially important during elections time because it is the time where the ministers should convince voters that they deserved their votes and support because they have come up with good policies! Running away from such public debates or challenge is totally unhelpful for us to mature into a First World Democracy.

Policy debates during election time are very common all over the world. This is not something new. If PAP is confident that their brains are the best and their policies are good, then it should not shy away from such challenge! It seems that PAP isn't that confident of their own policies and ministers at all.


I still hope Minister Gan would reconsider to take up this challenge. No matter who wins or loses, we will change and up the level of political contest many notches to achieve the REAL First World Democracy.

Goh Meng Seng

Campaign Trail - Understanding PAP Supporters

Understanding PAP Supporters

I have a few talks with some of my school mates and classmates recently. Most of them are doing pretty well in life, have good jobs, good business and families. More than half of them are PAP supporters while I am the only opposition politician among my cohort.

Almost all of them are well traveled all over the world or have lived and worked in other countries, both developed as well as underdeveloped countries in the world. The PAP supporters will feel that Singapore is the best because in other countries, even for developed countries, their efficiency sucks. Bureaucratic system makes simple task like getting electricity or telephone land lines a big headache.

I know of such things too, way back in the 1990s. Singapore and Hong Kong are the most efficient cities in the world and that is the basis of our success. But for me personally, in most of the aspects, Hong Kong is far more efficient than Singapore while in some instances, Hong Kong may need to learn from Singapore.

While my well-to-do friends appreciate the efficiency we have in Singapore as well as the "safety" they enjoy (at least they don't need to watch over their back or employ bodyguards for the rich ones), they also think that PAP has managed Singapore well in terms of economy. The huge influx of foreign labour doesn't seem to worry them at all and they would even defend the need of such influx of foreign labour.

Apparently they are not affected by the crowded public transport nor the bed crunch in public hospitals. Neither would they mind to pay higher price to drive a car nor understand how increase of food prices affect other middle lower class.

Most probably they won't know how the poor live their lives with foreign labour displacing them while thinking that all of them are lazy that is why they are in poverty. They won't support minimum wage because they are made to believe minimum wage is bad.

All these are inconsequential to them. Some may even think that running a country like Singapore as a company is perfectly the right thing to do....

It actually makes me think hard after these meetings. After graduation, we have moved on very different paths. I would say my cohort would make up the "elites" because we come from some "top schools" in Singapore, but I am definitely not the elite whom I was supposed to be.

Perspective is very different between me and my friends, even though some of them have similar background as me, from poor families. They are thankful to PAP for their "success" in life while I am less of a material person.

Although all of us, including me, have traveled to different parts of the world, but yet, we view things very differently. They may feel that it is a great thing for PAP to make such a tiny red dot success in such a short time while I think it is precisely we are small, it is easier to gain success in such a short period of time. In fact for a city like Shenzhen or even Shanghai which may be bigger in size than Singapore, they gain success within 30 years to catch up with us or Hong Kong!

Of course if we compare to Malaysia, we are better in much better shape. And naturally, Malaysians or New citizens who were Malaysians, would definitely feel that PAP is remarkable and Singapore is a paradize to them. The compare and contrast are too great.

My point is simple. I do not take what we have now for granted and I am definitely not out to destroy it either. A system without a counter balance will eventually be a system full of frauds, abuses and corruptions.

Chinese are made to believe that all those in power are saints and expect them to be saints. Thus they are comfortable with a system with high concentration of powers. But the Westerners have a more pessimistic but realistic view of human beings; human beings will become crooks if absolute powers were given to them.

Thus, Democratic concept of separation of powers come from the westerners. I believe in that just as Dr Sun, the father of New China, did. In this post-LKY era, there will be more reasons and urgency to reform our political system of governance to install real separation of powers to assure us of stability and sustainability.

The fundamental difference between Hong Kong and Singapore is that, despite the fact Hong Kong does not have universal suffrage for the Chief Executive, the British has installed a good system with effective separation of powers in governance. The Free Press is one of the key to the Impeachment power.

My PAP-supporter friends and I may have very different political views but at the end of the day, we have one consensus: we want stability, sustainability and prosperity for our country. We just differ on how we could achieve that.

Goh Meng Seng

What You are Voting For!

When you vote for a candidate or a team of candidates, you are not just voting for some "estate managers" which PAP would like you to think so. This is because PAP wants you to think SELFISH, think of SELF INTERESTS first rather than the BIGGER PICTURE.

You are voting for an MP or a group of MPs who are legislators. These people are going to make laws, scrutinize the laws which the ruling party and government are making which will affect EVERYBODY living on this island. Sometimes, even affect Singaporeans living overseas! (eg. Medishield Life)

You are voting for MPs who will shape what yours and your children's future. You will be voting MPs who will make sure that your jobs are not compromised, healthcare is taken care of, retirement is secured, housing is affordable....etc.

If you continue to vote for the same bunch of PAP MPs, you will continue to suffer job insecurity due to PAP's FT policy, Healthcare compromised due to bad planning which causes shortage of hospital beds, inadequate and illogical Medical coverage for your future and your CPF money will no longer be yours only but subject to "death tax" if you died early due to CPF Life, you may not even see your CPF money before you die! Your children will suffer unaffordable housing and they will not have job security to think about having more children.... You may face increase in GST and squeezed off in this tiny island if PAP has its way to go for 6.9million or even 10 million with the talk of "living in underground city"!

Think carefully before you vote. It is not just about your estate management. It is YOUR Future and My Future you are voting for!

Vote For Change!
Vote for Your and My Future!

Goh Meng Seng

Campaign Trail 8 Aug 2015 - Vote For Your Future

Campaign Trail 8 Aug 2015

Met a man in his forties, most probably about the same age as me. Apparently, he is middle ground voter who has leaning towards PAP. But the good thing was, he was willing to raise questions and listen to my point of views while standing there for more than half an hour. He was accompanied by his young son.

He raised the point that Gan Kim Yong is a good minister and how PAP has done good. I told him that Mr Gan Kim Yong may be Mr Nice Guy and low profile, but that doesn't mean that he is a good minister. He was a bit taken back when I told him that.

I spent quite some time to show him how Gan has not addressed a lot of pressing issues while he was the Minister of Manpower. The resident did not realize that MOM didn't act as the gatekeeper to keep out "Foreign Talents" who made it to Singapore with fake degrees and qualifications. He thought that this was done by MOM!

I told him how PAP government has sold off our Singaporeans' jobs to cheap Third World countries by signing FTAs, particularly the CECA with India, in order to get access to their various markets for GIC, Temasek Holdings and GLCs! I told him that while these entities could earn good profits by gaining access to these markets, but these profits are irrelevant to us because our CPF interest rates are still fixed at 2.5% or at most 4%! Only those running these entities will get fat million dollar salaries and bonuses from such profits! It has absolutely nothing to do with us but our jobs are sacrificed and out for competition to a country which has 1 Billion population as compared to Singapore's 3.5 million!

There will always be CHEAPER foreign labour to displace our Singaporeans. I have shown him examples of how these were happening and why our wages were not growing as fast as it should.

I told him that Gan did absolutely nothing to stop the huge madness influx of foreign labour, especially those with doubtful qualifications. During Gan's time, control of Foreign labour was extremely lax and MNCs have unfair advantage in employing hordes of foreign labour to displace Singaporeans through the loop hole of "Internal Transfers" while Singapore SMEs are forced to follow the strict quota.

His job will be threaten by foreign influx and if he loses his job at the age of 40 plus, he will have a hard time to find similar job with similar pay again! (That's why many PMETs become Taxi Drivers!)

I told him that he is lucky his parents are lucky that they didn't face the problem of being asked to wait for 36 hours for a bed and ended up sleeping along corridors of the ward! And the problem of shortage of beds is not so simple. There is a great shortage of healthcare professionals in Singapore and we have to import foreign nurses and doctors who hardly know local lingo or Singlish or dialects.

He said that this is because locals don't want to do nurse job. I told him that in Hong Kong, nurses are more well paid than Singapore! It is about the paying enough to get locals to work as nurses, instead of trying to use third world wages to get locals to work as nurses. And how about doctors? If foreign doctors cannot communicate effective with patients, how can they carry out their diagnosis effectively?

I also told him the flaws of Medishield Life which has no coverage of foreigners working in Singapore. The aim of having such a huge foreign workers force in Singapore because we need them to help our ageing population. But if these young working foreigners are not made to pay Medishield coverage, how could they contribute to the pool of premiums which could help to cover the expenses of our elderly Singaporeans? I told him that this argument was brought up by WP LTK in parliament but PAP has given an absurd answer that if we made these YOUNGER foreigners to be covered by Medishield, we will be "cross subsidizing" their medical bills! How can that be?

And the problem of Medishield is that the payout rate if FAR too low than industry standards! i.e. compared to private medical insurance, Medishiled is earning MORE money every year in percentage!

I brought up the HDB prices and how MBT has restrained on building BTOs when population was increasing with tremendous rate. Such act only pushed up property prices and who benefited? Those rich people who invested in properties, not HDB heartlanders who cannot just sell off their HDB flats and end up without a roof over their heads!

While some people like him may enjoy "making money" from the sales of their HDB flat and such, but this is really not "real profits" because the burden of high property price will fall on his son. This is just basically a "inter-generation transferred of burden". i.e. he is basically earning "profits" at the expense of his son's future!

And if this went on, his son may never be able to afford even a HDB in future! Even if they could "afford" to buy any HDB flat, they may end up with a 30 year mortgage or more! And they have to make sure that within this 30 years, they will not lose their jobs! This is impossible when they will be facing endless influx of cheap foreign labour because our PAP government has signed all those FTAs with those huge third world countries!

I told him that our father's generation had given up their land at dirt cheap price to the government knowing that this is only good for the development of this nation by providing PUBLIC GOODs like cheap HDB housing, schools and such. They didn't expect that after they had given their land but ended up their grandchildren or great grandchildren will be reaped off by this government!

And the fact that PAP government has put up "cost-recovering" and market pricing of land for even schools, polytechnics and universities at 30 years lease, it means that his son and future generations will have to face higher and higher education fees!

In short:

Has Minister Gan been a good minister who can address those problems related to his ministries, past and present?

Has PAP done well so far?

For his parents' sake, he has to Vote For Change, Vote Them Out.

For his son's and future generation's sake, he has to Vote For Change, Vote Them Out.

For his Own's sake, he has to Vote For Change and Vote Them Out!

After this lengthy discussion, I can see that his confidence and support for PAP has been shaken tremendously. I told him to google search my name and get to my Facebook or blog Singapore Alternatives. Make the decisive decision for his parents, his son and his own future.

Goh Meng Seng

#VFC #VTO

Campaign Trail @ CCK - Hospital Beds & Medical Tourism

I have met an elderly PAP supporter today at CCK. He questioned me why should he vote for me and what I have done to convince him to support me (in contrast to PAP ).

He sounded quite hostile initially but I kept my patience.

I told him at his age, he must be very fortunate to have such a good health, unlike my own mother who was warded three times in hospital during the past three years. Each and every time she was told to wait for 36 hours for a bed.

This elderly man retorted that no bed of course need to wait lah! "Are you VIP or what? "

I wanted to retort back that of course I am not some PAP MP or Minister or like LKY lah! But I kept that to myself.

I told him that people are made to wait for so long because there is a shortage of hospital facilities due to bad planning and the over population problem caused by PAP.

On top of that, even when public hospitals are having problem of Shortage of beds, they are engaged in medical tourism to make money!

I told him that if these are private hospitals, I don't really care but these are PUBLIC HOSPITALS which are supposed to serve our people first! I asked him, do you think this is good?

He said in a soften voice Is that so? If it is so, of course bad lah!
I told him don't just believe me because I said this to him. Go and find out yourself whether this is true or not.

And who is the Minister of Health? His MP Gan Kim Yong.

Of course I have told him that I have contested against MBT in Tampines on the topic of HDB and that is why he is no longer Minister for MND.

A healthy Conversation with hardcore PAP supporter to make them rethink what they are voting for.

Goh Meng Seng

PM Lee is a TOTAL Failure

A month or two prior to this National Day Rally (NDR) speech of PM Lee, there was much hype about it with rumours that "Major announcement" and Major changes will be made during his speech. But in the end, it is a total let down. Apparently, PM Lee has totally lost touch of the ground and didn't really know nor understand what is expected from him and his government by the people.

The THEME of this year's NDR is supposedly to be "Honouring Pioneer Generation" and retirement financing is inevitably the hottest topic in town after the numerous CPF protests held in Hong Lim Park earlier this year, along with PM Lee suing a blogger Roy Ngern over his CPF articles. A lot of CPF issues have been brought to light and public discourse has been ongoing but PM Lee has just done a cosmetic surgery on the whole lot of issues without addressing the REAL PROBLEMS of the inadequacy of CPF for retirement financing.

Is Singapore our HOME for our Retirement?

I have the opportunities to talk to two "Foreign Talents" with regards to their choice of place for retirement. They are regarded as the "upper middle class" people with very high earnings. One of them is Director M, who is a Regional Director of a MNC, Malaysian citizen. The other is Professor D, a lecturer and head of department from a university, Hong Konger.

Both of them are in their late forties or early fifties. Both of them were having a dilemma of whether they should get Singapore citizenship and retire in Singapore. They were discussing this with me a couple of years ago but this year, it seems that BOTH have concluded that they would rather retire in their respective country or city of birth. i.e. Malaysia and Hong Kong.

Both of them do not know each other but somehow, they have come to the same conclusion that it is best for them to retire in their respective home base. Director M has been a Singapore PR for decades but after learning about the horrendous HIGH COST of healthcare services in Singapore as compared to Malaysia, he has finally decided that it is totally not worth retiring in Singapore after all.

He has a relative who was on treatment for cancer in Malaysia and he only paid Malaysian Ringgit $50 for each jab of chemotherapy! Imagine how much it will cost in Singapore? Furthermore, cost of living in Malaysia is relatively much lower than Singapore! Thus, he has decided that, despite the fact that he is pretty wealthy, he still prefers to go back to Malaysia to retire and live like a King!

Similarly for Professor D. He felt that Hong Kong has excellent healthcare system which is TRULY affordable, unlike Singapore. He said that cost of living in Singapore is really on par if not higher than Hong Kong. There is no reason for him to migrate to Singapore to suffer HIGHER medical cost since it is expected that for an aging person like him, he would have needed more healthcare for the rest of his life.

It is truly enlightening to see that BOTH people from the "Third World" and "First World" places like Malaysia and Hong Kong are shunning Singapore for "retirement". But as Singaporeans, do we have a choice at all? We are born in Singapore and we have little choice but live, retire and die in Singapore. However, under PAP rule, we are going to suffer, after decades of contributing to Singapore's development, we will die poor, having to be forced to sell off our HDB flat for our retirement.

I guess the ultimate aim of PAP has been leaked before, they wanted us to retire in JB (Johor Bahru)!

Who is responsible for CPF's inadequacy?

No matter how much PAP is going to raise the Minimum Sum for CPF, the fact still remains, despite of a high CPF contribution rate over the decades, at least 70% of Singaporeans are not going to have enough money in CPF to meet their retirement needs. Why so?

There are three key reasons why CPF has failed for its primary purpose of retirement financing.

First of all, PAP has deliberately reduced the interest returns for CPF since 1990s to a marginal amount of 2.5% to 4%.

The Second reason is that PAP has increased HDB flat prices since 1980s and it went into full steam of escalating the prices in 1990s in the name of "Asset Enhancement Scheme". This is a plot to siphon off Singaporeans' money from CPF to Main Reserves through "Land Sales" or higher "Land Pricing" for HDB flats. Of course the "Market Subsidy Pricing" logic has helped PAP to escalate the HDB prices for this purpose.

Whatever is left in your CPF is "partitioned off" for Medisave. For this money, you will never see it unless you use it to cover the ever increasing medical cost or until the day you die. Else, it will stay in the Main Reserves and kept in GIC or Temasek Holdings for their investment. Make no mistake about it, no matter how PAP tries to side track or hide the fact, the truth is, part of the funds Temasek Holdings is investing comes from our CPF monies. The high healthcare cost, hospitalization cost accompanied by long waiting time for hospital beds will negate whatever money you have in your Medisave.

It is a kind of irony that PAP tries to make you feel good with "Asset Enhancement Scheme" in order to make you pay extraordinary high prices for a PUBLIC HOUSING flat which you do not really own in essence but in the end, turn around and corner you, forcing you when you are old to sell off your flat for your own retirement needs!

PAP is the MAIN Culprit in creating the situation of inadequate CPF for your retirement financing via their flawed policies in public housing, healthcare and investment returns from our sovereign funds. But in the end, instead of addressing these issues effectively, they turn around and say the best they can do is to help you to sell your HDB flat.

Well, imagine this, first they make you pay high price for your HDB flat and then they will force you to sell your flat cheap back to them for retirement. Or force you to downgrade to some overpriced studio apartment with a limited lease when you do not have enough money for retirement.

When you are old and don't have enough cash for retirement or to pay your medical fees and you think you can approach them for help, the first thing they will tell you and aim for, is to ask you to sell off your HDB flat! Never mind if you have some fond memories attached to your home but you have to sell off your HDB flat and no, they won't provide another cheap rental flat for you to live after you sell your HDB flat.

They will ask you to pay hefty and horrendous prices again, for a small studio apartment which will have only a 30 years lease. This will technically make the value of this studio apartment unattractive because no bank will make any mortgage loan to anyone to buy a property with only 20 or 30 years lease! There is absolutely no value for inheritance by your children even though you have paid a gross $70K or $80K for such studio apartment.

Yes, they will continue to squeeze every bits from you even when you are old, retired and without a job and this is done with such a beautiful name of wanting to help you with your retirement!

They have made up a beautiful empty dream of "Asset Enhancement" to make believe that you will be rich by paying horrendous prices for your HDB flats which technically, you don't really own it. You can't even re-mortgage it if you need to when you are short of cash for anything, least, retirement. So what this talk about "Asset Enhancement" when eventually, you will be forced to sell off every assets you have? Worse still, they pray on your greed but eventually your children and grandchildren will eventually be the ones who will suffer under high HDB prices!

Inadequate Hospital Care with Squeeze You further

My mother has suffered during one of the hospitalization saga. Due to over-population and shortage of infrastructures, there will be but a total lack of C class beds which "promised" a "market subsidy" price to Singaporeans. Imagine when you are so uncomfortably in pain but you are asked to wait more than 36 hours or even 48 hours for a proper bed in the ward, UNLESS you upgrade yourself to those "less subsidize" B1 or A class wards!

Avoiding to Solve the REAL Problems

If you look at the WHOLE picture closely, it is not difficult for you to realize that the main problem lies with the Sovereign Funds, aka GIC and Temasek Holdings. They are just like a HUGE MONEY VACUUM CLEANERS, sucking lots of money into it but not giving the appropriate returns to our CPF.

When PAP raise the HDB prices, it basically justify it by the "market pricing" of the land which your flats are built on. But bear in mind that most of these land are acquired at dirt cheap prices from our forefathers. All Land Sales proceeds via SLA will go into the Main reserves and thus our sovereign funds, GIC and Temasek. At the same time, our CPF monies are transferred to these two entities via the special Singapore government bonds as well, which give a pitiful returns to our people.

The only difference is that funds that acquired from selling HDB flats to Singaporeans will bear no "burden" on these Sovereign Funds to provide returns while the CPF monies via SSGB will require them to produce return. Thus, right from 1990s, they have capped the returns to our CPF monies while increased new HDB prices. It basically means that they are reducing their obligations of providing adequate returns to our CPF as a whole. They have systematically tweak the system and fooling us into believing they are doing good to us via "Asset Enhancement Scheme" and quietly reducing returns on our CPF.

For some strange reasons, it seems that this is just not enough for them. They have also systematically dragged on the period for these Sovereign Funds to give us back our CPF monies. First, Medisave has been created and whatever money you have in this account, you won't be able to see them in broad daylight till the day you die but only be "transferred" as digits into the big black hole of high medical cost you will face in life.

I believe they will try to make it a law that whatever inheritance your children will get from your CPF, including your Medisave, will be transferred to your children CPF accounts in the near future! They have already tried to tweak the system by introducing such similar mechanism into the CPF nomination scheme as "option" but I believe they will make it "opt-out" instead for those who didn't make clear of their intentions. It just reminds me of the HOTA legislation whereby an initial "volunteer option" of organ donation has become the default choice unless you opt out.

It seems to me that they are doing everything they can to feed these monsters (GIC and Temasek) with money and trying their very best to delay any payment and thus, cash outflow from these monsters.

I do not know why they are trying everything to keep the cash in these two Sovereign Funds but apparently if this is what they are striving for, there is no reason for them to solve the three problems of Inadequate CPF for retirement financing.

1) Low CPF returns
2) High HDB price
3) High Medical Cost

What needs to be done is simply:

1) Raise the CPF returns or liberalize the system to allow Singaporeans to invest their own funds in appropriate trust funds or even directly into Temasek and GIC! To get this work effectively, basic financial management skills should be taught in our schools. If most Singaporeans are to be proficient in managing their own funds, I do not see why we should just settle for that miserable 2.5% from CPF. They could even withdraw their CPF at age 55 and manage their own funds for their own retirement if they can prove their proficiency in financial management!

2) Change the HDB pricing mechanism to Cost-plus pricing system for New Flats. This will reduce BTO prices with minimum impact on resale market.

3) Public Hospitals should remain as Public, instead of thinking making money via Medical Tourism. There should only be one class of beds with REAL subsidies to citizens. A fair Universal Healthcare Insurance should be put in place.

There are many other things that need to be looked into. eg. The CPF Life Annuity system is really a joke. I do not know whether it is just another scheme for PAP to make money or what but the payout is definitely "profit-bias". This has been explained by many other bloggers in Singapore.

Nevertheless, to solve the inadequacy problem of CPF, PAP will have to look hard at these three fundamentals first. 

Conclusion

This is where PM Lee has failed badly. He thought he could hoodwink us with such small cosmetic surgery by allowing us to request (approval is not guaranteed!!!) to withdraw part of our CPF money at 65 years old and putting up some measures for us to reverse-mortgage or sell off our flats to solve the problems created by them, in terms of inadequate CPF for retirement financing. What PM Lee should do is to address these fundamental problems that are creating a huge gap in the adequacy of our CPF which is meant for our retirement financing. It is totally a joke for a country which has a mandatory contribution rate of 36% of our gross salary but in the end, we ended up with insufficient funds to finance our retirement and most of us will be forced to sell our flats for retirement!

But I guess Singaporeans are not that stupid at all. The fundamental question we want to ask is that, will PAP take up the responsibility of providing for those who can't have enough money for their retirement? This is especially a REAL problem for many Singaporeans because apart from the above 3 main problems created by PAP, its ultra-liberal FT policy has basically depressed Singaporeans' wages over these two decades and worse of all, displaced quite a number of Singaporeans from their proper jobs. Many professionals or PMETs were forced out by cheaper Foreign labour and have no choice, to become Taxi Drivers! This will add to the difficulties for these Singaporeans to have enough savings in their CPF to cater to their retirement needs.

All in all, I have basically lost confidence in PAP's manipulation of the whole system and this is why, I do not trust them at all. Not with my CPF money. Their past and present tweaking of the CPF, HDB and Healthcare systems, on top of it, the ultra-liberal FT policy, have basically made me skeptical about their real intentions.

My gut feeling is that there is a bigger problem in this whole system which is totally opaque to us. The only way to find out is to kick PAP out of power first.

Goh Meng Seng

The Protest @ Hong Lim Park 5 July 2014

I am compelled to write this article to record this event not because of the low turnout we have but rather, the fantastic event I have enjoyed should not went unrecorded.

This event is special because it has included a live band singing of songs which inspires political struggles. All thanks to Gilbert Louis, Tina Mercury de Costa along with her long lost cousin, Daniel de Costa. They have uplifted the spirit of the protest with their inspiring songs.

We have impressive young speaker like 17 year old Ariffin Sha to 72 year old elderly layman like Sulaiman to share their views. Of course, not to mention the "agent provocateur" who spoke in support of PM Lee Hsien Loong but was met with unexpected reactions from the crowd who just booed him out of stage half way through his speech.

I have learned something from Mr. Sulaiman. The PAP government has not spent enough money to help Singaporeans and we should not be a "Beggar State" whereby citizens have to beg the government for help. This may sound too simple to many people but it means something very profound to me. It simply sums up how stingy PAP government is when it comes to helping our citizens in need.

There are a few songs sang by Gilbert Louis group. The songs include my all time favourite John Lenon's "Imagine", the infamous song from Les Miserables "Do You Hear the People Sing", "Wind of Change", "Voices That Care", "From a Distance", "Shout" (by Tears for Fears) etc. I personally feel that these songs are great songs which could become a group of Theme Songs for any protests held in Hong Lim Park. These songs are not just any other songs but come with meaningful background and lyrics.



I have seen how the protest organizers in Hong Kong utilize various songs effectively for their events. They even have their own written songs for their own events. The annual 4th  June Vigil is one good example.

Music and songs are powerful medium and tools to create the appropriate atmosphere for such events. These are so powerful and influential that PAP has to ban them altogether for any political rallies held during General Elections. But I believe we need to change all that.

Next, I will come to my own speech, which is in fact, "incomplete" as we were running out of time then. I am going to run through the rationale of my speech here.

The whole theme of my speech is, what are the reasons which will justify an urgent need to ask Mr. Lee Hsien Loong to resign as Prime Minister? I have somehow missed out some important points during the rally as there was a time constrain but the following are my thoughts:



1) Leadership Quality

The role of the government and thus, Prime Minister, is to take care of Singaporeans' welfare and interests. What does a Prime Minister needs, beside eyes, ears and a brain? It is the HEART. If you do not have the HEART to take care of the citizens' welfare and interests when you are making every decisions, then you are not fit to be our political leaders, least Prime Minister.

PAP has always been OVERLY GENEROUS towards themselves while being EXTREMELY STINGY towards Singaporeans in need. As the other speaker Mr. Sulaiman has mentioned, we have become a "Beggar State" under PAP rule. The Singapore Government hardly spent any money extensively on the welfare of Singaporeans. Even hospitals are no longer "Government Hospitals" but business oriented "Restructured Hospital".

There is little help available for Singaporeans who have, for whatever reasons, fallen into temporary hardship. We have to BEG PAP government for that miserable help they squeeze out of their tiny little pocket hole. That's what "Beggar State" is all about.

I am going to talk about the problem of having Ho Ching even though none of other speakers have spoken on this. I am not interested to DEFAME Lee Hsien Loong but the truth is, when he agreed to put his wife Ho Ching as the CEO of Temasek Holdings, he has set a VERY BAD EXAMPLE for such an important leadership position.

There are numerous corruption cases being investigated and charged in court. High level, well paid civil servants are deemed to give special favours or special treatments to their mistresses, students turned girlfriend or simply friends, are charged for corruptions. What is the fundamental problem of all these? Conflicts of interests! (the crowd responded as well) Yes, it is all about conflicts of interests. But in two cases, the accused have been acquitted of corruptions even though there is such a glaring conflicts of interests! Why? Conflicts of interests may not necessarily be considered as "corruptions" even though it might have created doubts or speculations. However, what is considered as "legally acceptable" may not be "politically" acceptable.

When the Prime Minister agreed to put his wife in such a high prominent position which runs the government owned Temasek Holdings, no matter what due diligence has been made whatsoever, it is inevitable that such arrangement will be seen as a problem of Conflicts of Interests! How can the Prime Minister have the moral authority to lead when such conflicts of interests has been displayed? Can the Prime Minister tell the civil servants off if they did the same thing?

The Prime Minister, as the TOP LEADER of the government, should lead by examples. The proper thing for the Prime Minister to do, is to practice AVOIDANCE of Conflicts of Interests! It means that no matter who want to "por" (flatter or attempt to show favor) the Prime Minister by suggesting to put his wife or sister or whoever in his family members at top positions in the civil service or government owned entities, he should DECLINE as a good practice of "Avoidance of Conflicts of Interests"!

Else, he will lose the critical moral authority to lead politically.


2) Really BAD Diplomatic Gaffes

We can't fault Mr. Lee for some of the embarrassing gaffes that he has made over the years, from "Mee Siam Mai Hum" to labeling Singaporeans as "Kao Peh Kao Bu" (Cry Father Cry Mother which implicitly cursing one of making noise as if their parents are dead. ) when we made too much noise in the internet. This is basically because he was born in with a Golden Spoon, has never eve stayed in a Condominium or Terrace House before, least a HDB flat like most of us. But when he made a gaffe that would affect International Diplomatic Relationship with one of the most important country in the world, that will no longer be just "funny" but actually DEAD SERIOUS.

During his visit to Washington and after meeting President Obama, PM Lee recounted a sick joke about Beijing's air pollution, alleging that you just need to open the window to get a "free smoke"! This was speculated to be one of the main reasons why China's President Xi has deliberately give Singapore a by-pass while he was shuttling between Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur while he was attending the APEC meetings in Bali, Indonesia.

If we allow Mr. Lee Hsien Loong to continue to lead us as Prime Minister, I do not know how many such embarrassing and damaging gaffes we would have to suffer in future.


3) Vision? Mission? Core Values? What is Mr. Lee Hsien Loong's Principles?

Does anyone know exactly what is Mr. Lee Hsien Loong's Vision? Mission? Core Values? Principles? The only come to our mind is MONEY $$$ ! (In fact, the crowd responded with the same answer as well.)

We got used with the "Pay and Pay" notion of the ruling party PAP way back from 1980s till now. It is ok for most Singaporeans to tolerate such "Pay and Pay" situation as long as they can have a good job and earn more than enough money to cope with such culture.

However, after Mr. Lee Hsien Loong took over as Prime Minister, the situation is really worse than Pay and Pay. The Core Principle of Money-Minded government has evolved into a bigger monster. We, Singaporeans, have been sold out for whatever money they can get from the deals they made.

For example, when there was a huge protest against the White Paper on 6.9 million, PAP announced that they might have to slow down the intake of foreign workers. Which was the first country to make noise about this? India. India government claimed that by doing so, Singapore would have breached the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) that we have signed with India! I did a little research on this FTA which PAP has signed with India. This is what I have found:

The India-Singapore FTA is called CECA which stands for Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement. It was signed on 29 June 2005, just about a year after Mr. Lee Hsien Loong became our Prime Minister.

If you read carefully through the CECA, the main benefits for us is for our mostly banks and companies owned by Temasek Holdings to have the right and access to invest in India, mostly in their financial, telecommunication and real estate industries. (Read Trade in Services):

The sectors which Singapore gets preferential access include business services, construction and related engineering services, financial services, telecommunication services, tourism and travel related services and transport services.

For Financial Services, Singapore owned or controlled financial institutions have been given greater privileges to access the Indian market. In banking, DBS, UOB and OCBC can each set up a wholly owned subsidiary (WOS) in India to enjoy treatment on par with Indian banks in branching, places of operations and prudential requirements. Alternatively, should they choose to set up as branches, they have been allocated a separate quota of 15 branches (for all 3 banks) over 4 years, over and above the quota for all foreign banks.

For asset management, Singapore owned or controlled fund managers have the additional privilege of offering Indian investors mutual funds and collective investment schemes (CIS) listed on the Singapore Exchange (SGX) as well as exchange traded funds (ETF). These instruments offered by our asset managers are free from the restriction that they must only invest in entities which have a stake in Indian companies.

For asset management, Singapore owned or controlled fund managers have the additional privilege of offering Indian investors mutual funds and collective investment schemes (CIS) listed on the Singapore Exchange (SGX) as well as exchange traded funds (ETF). These instruments offered by our asset managers are free from the restriction that they must only invest in entities which have a stake in Indian companies.

India has similarly lifted this limitation for India owned or controlled fund managers. Both Singapore and India owned or controlled fund managers can also invest an additional US$250m in equities and instruments listed on the SGX, including mutual funds, CIS and ETFs. This is in addition to the US$1 billion cap that all asset managers can invest abroad.

For Telecommunication Services, India will bind its foreign equity limit from 25% to 49% for most services including basic, cellular and long distance services and 74% for internet and infrastructure services. India will also ensure that telecommunication providers from Singapore are treated fairly, transparently, and allowed to obtain access to the necessary public infrastructure in order to offer their services, thereby creating a more level playing field in India for our Singapore's telecom providers.

It is all good but at whose expense? We must first remember that although our CPF money is mixed into the Main Reserves and allocated for GIC or Temasek Holdings to invest, we do not benefit FULLY on the actual returns made from their investments. In spite of the inherent risk resulting from the investment made from GIC or Temasek, we are only given a fixed return of 2.5% to 5% on our CPF accounts.

In order to let Temasek and GIC made in-route into India's emerging market, our jobs have been totally sold out to India by PAP government led by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. This is clearly stated under Chapter 9 Movement of Natural Persons. It comes with an attached list of 40 professional fields of jobs which Singapore should allow Indian Nationals to access for employment! Furthermore, not only should Singapore be obliged to allow Indian Nationals to gain employment in Singapore for these 40 professions, but we are also obliged to allow the spouses and "dependents" to gain access to our Singapore job market in ANY OTHER FIELDS!!!

This is clearly stated under Article 9.6:

ARTICLE 9.6: EMPLOYMENT OF SPOUSES AND DEPENDANTS

For natural persons of a Party who have been granted the right to long term temporary entry and have been allowed to bring in their spouses or dependants, a Party shall, upon application, grant the accompanying spouses or dependants of the other Party the right to work as managers, executives or specialists (as defined in paragraphs 2(f)(i) to (iii) of Article 9.2), subject to its relevant licensing, administrative and registration
requirements. Such spouses or dependants can apply independently in their own capacity (and not necessarily as accompanying spouses or dependants) and shall not be barred by the Party granting them the right to work from taking up employment in a category other than that of managers, executives, or specialists solely on the ground that
they as the accompanying spouses or dependants are already employed in its territory as managers, executives or specialists.

Now, let's get this straight. Even for Singaporeans with foreign spouses, Permanent Residencies are not easily granted to their foreign spouses. For the first numerous years, they will only be granted some long term visit passes that do not grant them any rights to work in Singapore at all. Here, we have PAP government under PM Lee's leadership, promising to provide jobs not only to Indian professionals listed in the list of 40, but also to provide jobs to their spouses in any jobs in other fields with absolutely no restrictions at all!

India is a huge country with a huge population of almost 1.3 BILLION people, about 370 times of our population size of 3.5 million! Is it logical for us to provide UNLIMITED jobs to India which has a population so much bigger than us? Got logic or not?

Thus, it is obvious that this India-Singapore CECA is basically a blatant TOTAL sell out of our Singaporeans' jobs to India in exchange for the benefits of Temasek Holdings and GIC! We Singaporeans' welfare and interests can be sold out for their benefits!

Did PM Lee and PAP give any thought to our Singaporeans' interests, welfare and jobs when they sign this FTA with India? Apparently not. They are only concerned of how much money they can make from the opportunities of investing in India and the number of CHEAP LABOUR from India to help their GLCs and MNCs to save more labour costs! And obviously, that is at the expense of Singaporeans' wages and jobs! Our wages will definitely be suppressed by such influx of Indian workers!

Furthermore, did they care about the impact of such move upon our infrastructure? When we complain about the THIRD WORLD conditions in our "Restructured Hospitals" all over Singapore, PAP Doctor MP has the cheek to declare "Don't Politicise Healthcare issues". I have to reiterate again, ANYTHING that affects Singaporeans' lives, interests, welfare and benefits, IS POLITICAL. More so for the CRITICAL situation we have in our hospitals' A&E departments! PAP MPs and Ministers may not have the opportunity to experience first hand how bad the situation is due to their privileged background but I still want to get this message straight to PM Lee, his RECKLESS, ILL PLANNED and IRRESPONSIBLE action in increasing our population size by importing FTs rapidly, is ENDANGERING our Singaporeans' lives!

I speak from my personal encounters when my mother was admitted to KTPH. I believe the other hospitals around Singapore is as bad as, if not worse, than the situation in KTPH. And this is EVERYDAY PROBLEM we are facing in hospitals, not just an outlier happening.

I shall not elaborate here as I have written a separate article on this issue. But my point is, has PM Lee thought about such deadly consequences when he decided to sign this FTA with India? Absolutely no.

Thus, PM Lee has basically led us into some very dangerous situation whereby the concept of Pay and Pay no longer satisfy his vision of $$$. Singaporeans' jobs and interests can be and have been sold off for the benefits of Temasek and GICs!


4) What is Lee Hsien Loong's Economic Policy direction?

Do we know exactly what is Lee Hsien Loong's Economic Policy Direction? There are two. One is Casino. Two, increase labour and MNC investment.

The Casinos, under the guise of "Integrated Resorts" have been introduced after Lee Hsien Loong took over as Prime Minister. Up till now, we are still unsure how many jobs have these casinos created for Singaporeans but we definitely know how these Casinos are killing Singaporeans with so many suicides due to debts, problem gambling incidents and affecting our economy adversely when not only aunties and uncles got hook on casino gambling but wealthy businessmen who should be spending more time to enhancing their businesses, ended up hooked or even bankrupted by casino gambling!

The second madness of PAP's economic policy under Lee Hsien Loong is GDP growth at ALL COST. Why does he need that? To justify his and his ministers' multi-million dollar annual pay!

Basic Economics state that GDP= Labour + Capital Investment + Land.

If you want to grow GDP, just increase labour and capital investment. This is why PAP is so engrossed in opening up the floodgate to CHEAP foreign workers as well as MNCs, even though sometimes, these MNCs are only employing overwhelmingly CHEAP foreign workers instead of Singaporeans!

But did Lee Hsien Loong plan properly? Has he considered the impact on the various infrastructure in Singapore? The impact on inadequate Public Transport system? Housing? Hospital care?

During last elections, MBT kept saying that HDB is "affordable" but when I challenged him to a live open debate on this housing issue, he just siam ah! Who pay for PAP's mistake? Our younger generation Singaporeans! When I suggested the Cost-plus pricing mechanism for our young Singaporeans to lower prices of new HDB flats drastically, MBT proclaimed that this would effect a "raid on our reserves"! Well, my simple retort is, when PAP keep increasing their million dollar pay, isn't that also "raid on our reserves"?

Lee Hsien Loong's administration has gone so far to come up with that infamous "6.9 population White Paper" without first solving the immediate mess that his past screwed up economic policy has created! What is he really thinking in his brain?


5 Clear and Present IMMEDIATE Danger of PM Lee's recent Decision...

I am not so sure whether PM Lee has studied physics or not but he should know that for nuclear substance, there is something called "half life". For nuclear substances, half lives can range from over 60 years to almost 100 years. What does this mean? It means that it will take more than 60 years before the nuclear substance is being half, thus, radiation also being halved.

It means that it will not just take a few couple of years for the nuclear leaks in Fukushima to be solved but it will take tens and maybe hundreds of years before nuclear contamination could be minimized in Fukushima!

How can PM Lee decide to lift the ban on food imports from Fukushima right now when even farmers in Fukushima don't even dare to consume their own produce? Is Lee Hsien Loong putting Singaporeans' health is utter danger of nuclear contaminated food?

Why would PM Lee do that? Now, most probably, it is encourage Japan to get into the Trans-Pacific Partnership TPP agreement!

Do we still want a Prime Minister that would put our immediate health in danger just for some economic benefits from a broad free trade agreement which most likely, benefiting mostly Temasek and GIC again?

Conclusion

Apparently Mr. Lee Hsien Loong has completely lost the moral authority to lead Singapore and he has to be removed immediately because his totally bizarre decisions which will not only compromise Singaporeans' jobs but also endanger our lives. If we were to wait until next GE before we could remove him by voting him out, it might be too late as these irreparable and irreversible harm would be entirely instituted into our system.



Goh Meng Seng