Lisa Li / photos by Kirsten Han
Mr J.B Jeyaretnam was never far from everyone’s minds at the Reform Party’s first rally at Clementi Stadium, which saw a crowd of more than a thousand. “Wake up to your rights as a human being!” the MC thundered, echoing Mr JBJ, independent Singapore’s first opposition politician and founder of the Reform Party (RP). “If you want alternative voices, go to the other political parties,” the MC added, “We intend to be the next government!” The crowd cheered.
This brand of gung-ho ambition was evident in the speeches of RP’s West Coast GRC team, comprising Mr Kenneth Jeyaretnam, Mr Kumar Appavoo, Ms Ho Soak Harn, Mr Frankie Low and Mr Andy Zhu.
The first speaker was Ms Ho Soak Harn. She thanked RP members and volunteers, before moving on to familiar problems – crowded trains, jobs going to foreigners instead of Singaporeans, increases in rent and housing prices, GST increases, silence on Temasek losses. “No more!” she declared. “We don’t need a government where the rich and elite come first, and everyone else comes last!”
Ms Ho also told the crowd that RP wants to measure progress differently: not by the profits of casinos for example, but by whether people can get a job, pay the bills and have money to save, by being able to help residents forced out of homes. The party wants an education system that is not about rote learning, but about creativity, one that develops a child to his full potential, she added.
The second speaker, Mr Frankie Low, spoke of the inadequacies of the CPF scheme and assistance for the elderly, as well as Singapore’s immigration policy. “Why do we need 6.5 million people?” he asked. “Are there enough jobs for all?” He questioned if the ministers understood the impact of their “mindless and hasty” policy, given that they “don’t need public transport, and get VIP treatment in hospital”. There were “too many too soon” due to lack of restrictions, infrastructure was inadequate, and PRs did not have to do National Service, he pointed out. The RP’s solution? To give PR status to only the talented who can add value to Singapore.
RP’s Secretary-General, Mr Kenneth Jeyaretnam, started on a humble note. “I hope I can earn your respect,” he told the crowd, adding that “competition in business leads to innovation and productivity; competition in politics will lead to better, and more intelligent politics.”
He pointed out that RP was the first to talk about the “hollowness of our performance”, that Singapore’s increase in GDP was due to cheap foreign labour even though real wages did not increase. It was only after the RP highlighted this that that the Government started on the Productivity Bill, focusing on raising real income for Singaporeans, he said.
Mr Jeyaretnam also listed some of RP’s plans. They would not bring down housing prices, but would build smaller flats for smaller families; they would also get HDB to release more land, introduce private sector competition to HDB, and give people the right to buy freehold HDB flats (instead of the current 99-year lease), thus allowing them to get the rise in value if a private developer wanted to buy the land.
RP would also push for reform in CPF policy to let people decide what proportion of their income they wanted to save; they would also introduce a universal healthcare scheme, so that Singaporeans would not need to worry about exhausting their savings on healthcare.
The party would ensure minimum wage, reduce GST for essential items, have a more rational immigration policy, and push for Temasek and GIC to become more transparent, and have it put on the stock exchange for Singaporeans to own shares of it. They would also cut down National Service to one year without compromising on its effectiveness.
The PAP had accused the opposition of wanting to “run the reserves into the ground”, but Mr Jeyaretnam pointed out that Singapore had $15 billion reserves – surely enough to fund some investment in education and healthcare. There would be transparent budgetary planning with RP, he added.
Mr Jeyaretnam summed up RP as a liberal party which believes in the market. It wants lower taxes, and foreign investment, and the removal of restrictions on the press to encourage innovation and creativity. He said unions should be democratically run, “with safeguards to prevent strikes without ballot of all union members being taken.”
“We aren’t going to be in government this elections, but we do intend to be the government one day,” he declared. “Singaporeans who want reform and change should join the RP!”
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May 1, 2011 at 3:41 pm
Merely on three counts we the citizens of Singapore would be committing mass suicide if we vote the PAP back into total power:
1) The tremendous influx of foreign ”talent” which plugs our jobs across the whole range of occupations, our transport system, our housing and even our indigenous languages, all within the intensity of a five year maniacal orgy..
2) Paying themselves sums that cannot be supported on sane grounds and increasing the sums exponentially on every excuse. It is impossible that our PM has a more complex job than Obama and yet he is paid a few times more than Obama. What is worse the whole chain gang in the Cabinet receive such largesse that I suspect they laugh themselves to sleep every night when they think of it:: how they have cowed a whole population in order to raid it .
3} How the thuggish use of defamation laws and faceless premier police force (ISD) frighten the life out of the ordinary man in the street, so that mouths are gagged as we go about our daily grind.
I can guarantee you my fellow citizens that five more years of the turn of the screw would leave this island unlivable except for the elites and the foreign talents.
The machinery to ensure that the box is tightly closed is to continue with this one party Government together with defamation laws to keep down the leak. You can talk but only into a feed back tunnel to the Ruling Party ( like the NCMP or other castrated conduits) )and to ensure no leaks the iSD is vigilantly hounding the people. This country is rapidly becoming a rogue police state. Here the ISD do not pull you out of your car to slap you as in Egypt but every bit of your life is monitored and recorded by the ICA’s personal identity electronic system. This system is available to the elites connected to the Government,
( premier and elite law firms ) who are given free access to the surveillance system located in the computer system of the ICA.
My fellow citizens, you have a window of opportunity to stop the tyranny by voting in an opposition. An opposition would scramble somewhat the pure tones of the PAP who sings like the siren to entrap you into servitude.Which means the three points above would be carried out with greater intensity and with total impunity.
Do not be moved by the fact that none of the opposition parties have track records. This is itself the handiwork of the decades of repression by the PAP against the people and the demolition through the Courts of previous opposition candidates. You can never claim to have a track record when you are never allowed into Parliament by a wall of Fire. The chicken or the egg comes first. Today you have to start with the chicken. It will produce eggs in due course. And the State of Singapore may endure with most of its original crew through the generations.
May 1, 2011 at 10:57 pm
It is strange logic. Once Nathan becomes the President, it appears to the PAP that God gave him the post and any other man would not fill his seat as well.Once George becomes Foreign Minister it is as if no one else in Singapore can replace him. Then once Rashid becomes the speaker of the House, God has stamped him with that post on his forehead for life. For it is argued by the PAP that if they lose in any constituency Singapore will suffer for having lost such a God made arrangement of one Indian, one Chines and one Malay. A perfect harmony- music of the spheres.
This is the kind of logic, not even my grandson of 7 will believe in and yet the PAP inhabited by State Scholars produce this argument, perhaps thinking how ingenious it is.
I forgot, PAP members may not all believe in God. Let us replace the God concept by say, the Collective Unconscious. There is a cosmic coincidence that Nathan, George and Rashid form a triangle from which will emerge truth, probity and good governance. Whatever the reason it sounds contrived and unworthy of the great minds inhabiting the Ruling Party.
So my fellow citizens do not be fazed by the seemingly superhuman intelligence embedded in the PAP. Other parties can do as well if given a foot into Parliament. We need commonsensical ideas of the man- in- the- street to do battle in Parliament and this I think the PAP lacks. Why?because it is used to operate for decades by the oppression of ISD, Courts, defamation suits and even upgrading of HDB flats and other governmental services! Which by now I think they think they own.
May 2, 2011 at 1:12 am
My dear fellow Singaporean voters,
As quoted by MMLee saying that if PAP Aljunied GRC has lose for this election, they will try harder for the next election.
Hence, we should give an opportunity to our oppositions especially now, for our younger generation who have stepped out for us with courage and passionate to be our voices, they desrved an equality and encouragement to stand up for the nation to vote for them in the Parliment, I believe all oppositions will be united as one to listen to our nation’s needs and desires, they have avoided three corners flight in order to help each of the party, they have been working very hard and prepared for this coming election, the reason is very simple, they got a fearless heart, they dare to fight for our right.
I also believe we should give them a 5 years contract and let them to prove it to us that they are capable and more importantly, they must have ears for us, they have to work even harder within these 5 years to convince us. If we are not giving them a chance to serve us, how to judge them for the track records.
Hence, I urge you to act now or never…Enough is enough, Vote for a change !
May 3, 2011 at 12:58 am
http://www.straitstimes.com/GeneralElection/News/Story/STIStory_663810.html
Can TOC please report on this? It would be good to hear his explanation from another angle.