Singapore 2025

1.  I got whiff of some seriously disgruntled Indian Singaporeans even before the Thaipusam festivities last week. The unhappiness was apparently down to a “comprehensive guide” released by the government this year disallowing music from boomboxes, drums and gongs.

2.  A video was released a couple of days ago showing a group of participants openly defying the rules during the Thaipusam festivities proper. The PAP would do well not to underestimate the public perception of its laws on the Indian community and how these very rules could contribute to unnecessary racial tension. The public around the participants (when questioned by the police) remarked that the police would not stop a Chinese lion dance troupe (or a Chingay festival), and next time, the participants should perform a Chinese lion dance during Thaipusam instead.

3.  In the meantime, Law Minister K Shanmugam says the laws have been liberalised (see Straits Times report below) and they have been in existence since 1973 – an explanation, if true, doesn’t inform why the ban against drums and bongos was not enforced previously, and why it is being enforced from this year. I reckon former Law Minister S Jayakumar might have done a better job explaining things to the public.

4.  Separately, the drum/bongo players have just put a series of 10 videos titled “Singapore Thaipusam 2011 – Revived!”, and describe each video like this:

“This video is in no way a move to disregard the government and its laws. However, due to the “comprehensive guide” made public for this year’s Thaipusam festival, many questioned its rigidity. One of the rules was “not allowing music from boomboxes, drums and gongs”. The reason that was explained for this rule is due to the concerns raised that “participants use the event as an excuse to be rowdy”. But what we say is, the music and the instruments bring out the spirit of Thaipusam. Devotees, especially the kavadi bearers, depend on the music to motivate them. By not allowing the use of cymbals and drums, the festival will not be what it is. Imagine trudging along bearing the weight of the kavadi on your shoulders, without the lively beat of the drums and the singing helping you along. That’s what was sadly seen during this year’s Thaipusam. Hence, our videos. We brought along our instruments that night at the risk of getting caught as we wanted to prove something. People love the music. A festival such as Thaisupam needs such music to come alive. We decided that night, that we wanted to play for everyone and anyone. Even people we didn’t know. We wanted to show that the music is essential and we were proven right by the joy displayed by kavadi bearers and spectators. We went up to each bearer we saw and asked them if they wanted to dance. And each one said yes. The music started and the kavadis twirled and spun round and round in the true Thaipusam spirit. Spectators started clapping and dancing and people were enjoying themselves. Finally! A Caucasian lady even came up to us and said, “Thank you, you play wonderfully. I love it!”. Our point we want to make with all this is that, Thaipusam only comes around once a year. With all the strict rules and bans, we won’t be surprised if soon, the festival will see it’s last days if the mood is continually dampened and people lose interest. So with all that has been said, we hope the government would consider letting loose a little and lift the ban on musical instruments. Let’s show that Singaporeans can be AND can have fun. If only we are given the chance to. As an end it this, we would sadly like to state that in a true Singapore law enforcing move, our musical entourage that night was disbanded when the police swooped in on us and confiscated our instruments. Bummer.”

This first the 10 can be accessed from this hyperlink: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wt3wmDvO6Y

5.  A friend put it quite aptly on Facebook (by virtue of the number of ‘likes’ it garnered) – “Next time I want to celebrate Thaipusam, Chinese New Year, or Hari Raya, I will go to Malaysia instead.” There is a good video of the event as celebrated last year in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

6.  TheOnlineCitizen carried a good report on the event in Singapore as well: http://theonlinecitizen.com/2011/01/the-uproar-over-thaipusam/

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Thaipusam rules not new: Shanmugam
Tessa Wong
688 words
15 January 2011
STIMES
English
(c) 2011 Singapore Press Holdings Limited
He was responding to public outcry that they were too harsh

HOME Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam reassured Hindus yesterday that public order guidelines issued on next week’s Thaipusam procession are not new, and apply equally to all religious processions.

Speaking to reporters in the wake of the varied reactions after the Hindu Endowments Board (HEB) publicised the rules last week, he pointed out that such rules have been in existence for 38 years.

Thaipusam, a Hindu festival, is traditionally celebrated here with an overnight procession from the Sri Srinivasa Perumal temple in Serangoon Road to the Sri Thendayuthapani temple in Tank Road.

The procession this year will start on Wednesday and last through Thursday.

The Straits Times reported on Jan 7 that the guidelines mirrored those previously set by the police for Thaipusam.

The report quoted procession organisers from the two temples saying that these had been put together for the public for the first time this year, to address issues of crowd and noise control.

A subsequent report quoted the HEB saying the guidelines were set by the police and were not new. But it confirmed that it was the first time these had been compiled and made public.

The guidelines state, among other things, that shouting, playing of music, and the sounding of gongs and drums are not allowed. But the singing of hymns would be permitted.

Yesterday, Mr Shanmugam said the guidelines had been around since 1973. The only new element this year was to allow the singing of hymns. ‘That represents a relaxation of the rules, contrary to the perception that has been put forward. And these rules apply not just to Thaipusam but to all religious processions.’

Mr Shanmugam, at his press conference yesterday, cited The Straits Times Jan 7 article as the report which he said was incorrect about the guidelines on religious processions being new.

Reports on the HEB’s announcement prompted reaction from the public. Some wrote to The Straits Times Forum saying that the guidelines were too harsh.

Addressing these yesterday, Mr Shanmugam said: ‘I think the concerns have been expressed by a very small number of people, based on inaccurate reports.’

The HEB has told the ministry that the temple organisers who applied for the police permit understood the need for rules.

Mr Shanmugam said the police were not behind the move by the HEB to publicise the guidelines this year.

The HEB representative did not respond to calls to explain why they did so.

Mr Shanmugam said yesterday there would be no need for a larger-than-usual police presence at this year’s procession.

He said organisers had done ‘a good job’ over the years managing crowds, and traditionally both temples relied on auxiliary police officers, and off-duty officers who volunteer with the temples.

‘Of course, some people breach the rules and so on. They will be dealt with as they have been dealt with in the past.’

The police have, in the past, acted on breaches of rules whether by organisers or participants of religious processions.

There were also a small number of cases where no further action had been taken, said Mr Shanmugam.

Mr Shanmugam also dismissed the view that guidelines were issued because foreigners living along the procession route had complained about noise.

On Wednesday, a blog post by a Singapore Democratic Party youth wing member noted on the party’s website that the route did not affect people in the heartland and asked who the real complainants were, and if they were Singaporeans.

Asked about this, Mr Shanmugam did not cite the party but said: ‘I know one or two parties have tried saying that for political advantage. And it is sad from a couple of perspectives. It’s irresponsible and also a little amusing.

‘First the fundamental underlying point is factually wrong, that these rules are new. And politicians are willing to jump on the bandwagon and blame foreigners for everything. I guess that reflects on the people who make these statements.’

Ends.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

Straits Times

(c) 2011 Singapore Press Holdings Limited

EVERY Thaipusam, local Hindus give thanks to Lord Murugan for his blessings by mounting a colourful procession down Little India.

Devotees carry milk pots and kavadis – metal or wooden structures fixed to the body – to express their devotion to the deity.

But this year’s festivities were dampened by a kerfuffle over what many thought were new rules for the celebrations.

Looking back on the incident, Ms Indranee Rajah feels that better explanation and early engagement with the community could have pre-empted the issue.

In early January, the media reported that the Hindu Endowment Board (HEB) would no longer allow the playing of music during the processions, to address issues of crowd and noise control.

Music is usually played at a deafening volume to encourage those who pierce their bodies as an act of faith.

It was also reported that no shouting was allowed, and no paint or makeup could be used on the devotees’ faces and bodies. Only the singing of hymns would be permitted.

Coming only two weeks before Thaipusam, the reports sparked an outcry from the community. In letters to The Straits Times Forum Page and on blog posts, some Indians charged that the Government was prioritising the complaints of Westerners who lived in the area over the traditions of the long-standing procession.

Responding to the chorus of complaints, Law and Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam maintained that the rules were not new and had been set by the police for all religious processions since 1973.

In fact, he pointed out, the permission for hymns to be sung represented a relaxation of the rules.

What happened was that this was the first year that the HEB had decided to compile the rules and make them public to Thaipusam participants.

‘I think what was needed was more lead time in letting people know about the formalisation of the rules,’ reflects Ms Indranee. ‘And before the formal announcement, a bit more explaining and discussion would have been helpful.’

She believes that the reaction from the Hindu community was due more to the ‘suddenness’ of the announcements, rather than to the rules per se.

The latter, after all, ‘are not so different from what has always been in place’.

She notes that the HEB had the difficult task of striking a balance between two types of feedback: complaints about the noise and revelry, and the significance devotees attached to the procession.

‘In striking the balance, the key was in the communication of how it was to be struck, and the engagement of the community in how it was to be implemented,’ she says.

‘Just like in the integration of foreigners, we need explanation, dialogue, communication,’ she stresses. ‘Then I think there would have been more of a positive response.’

Ends.

31 January 1990

The Straits Times

(c) 1990 Singapore Press Holdings Limited

The first programme of SBC’s discussion series Points of View was broadcast last week. The panel comprised Mr K. Shanmugam, MP for Sembawang GRC, Mr Leslie Fong, Editor of The Straits Times, Dr Khong Cho Onn, lecturer in the Department of Political Science, National University of Singapore, Mr Ken Lou, an architect, and Dr Hong Hai, MP for Bedok GRC. We publish below excerpts from the transcript of the discussion “Fashioning the Next 25 years”.

MR K. SHANMUGAM: It is quite easy to paint the picture of an idealist’s ideal state … economy that’s continuing to grow, greater distribution across the board of national wealth. A more just society.

But I would like to focus on one aspect of the political system which forms or provides the framework within which you try to achieve such a society.

And in my limited experience, what I think is lacking now and what I hope to see in the future is a society that’s more participative.

You can have democracies and democracies. The idea of a larger segment of society being able to operate and use the democratic process which is not, after all, just voting once in every four years. Something more than that.

I would like to see a society that’s able to understand issues, that’s willing to participate.

MR KEN LOU: What’s important now is that central to the idea of the intellect and culture is what we would like to call myth, and I think in this generation young people are beginning to look for a myth about culture.

It’s about expressions and impressions and from this creation of the myth, we would then go on to the next level of desire when we have already fulfilled most of our material ones . . .

An intellectual is a real intellectual probably only in the third generation when he’s not snatching up scraps of culture but growing up surrounded by it.

DR HONG HAI: I would put it a little differently. A human being has a body, a mind and a soul.

I think a nation also has a body, a mind and a soul. In Singapore, the body is in good shape. We have excellent infrastructure. We are quite developed as a city. The nation’s mind, I think, is doing quite well.

We are a disciplined society. We are numerate. We are literate. Our children are quite well educated.

MR LESLIE FONG: Can I jump in to say that I agree with Dr Hong Hai on broad principles, but I’m not as optimistic as he is, because I’m by nature a pessimist, and I think before we can even go to that stage, I can see quite some dangers ahead of us.

It is in this context that I give my wish list, which is my hope that in the next 25 years, we stay together as a nation because I think the chances of us staying together as a nation are by no means to be taken for granted.

I worry, in particular, about how we, as a people, would react with each other. In particular, I’m talking about relations between races and communities.

I’m beginning to see fissures opening up in our society which, if we are not careful, will lead us to grief.

In particular, I can see, for example, Malay Singaporeans going through a stage where I think, they have to decide for themselves whether they want to be more Malay or more Singaporean.

I think the rest of Singapore, in reacting with them and in trying to respond to their anxiety, must collectively, together with them, help them come to terms with themselves.

Basically, we are all Singaporeans, regardless of whatever our ethnic and religious pull.

I, for one, wish that Singapore would take pains to come to terms with these realities, and hope we can stay as a nation and build a more tolerant society because I think at the bottom of it all, must be tolerance, the ability to accept each other for what he really is, not what we want him to be.

DR KHONG CHO ONN: I would like to say I agree wholeheartedly with Leslie – that there is a need for greater tolerance in this society, a need for a greater sense of unity, a greater sense of one community in this society.

I think if we want to talk about being more Singaporean, I think all of us should talk about being more Singaporean and less Chinese, less Malay, less Indian as well.

I don’t think it’s a question of the minority races. I think it’s a question we should all address ourselves to. And perhaps this doesn’t quite find reflection in some of the Government’s policies.

DR HONG HAI: I think the way to have racial harmony is not to pretend that differences are not there.

I think it’s perfectly consistent with racial harmony for the Chinese to feel very Chinese, the Malays to feel very Malay and the Indians to feel very Indian, but at the same time, also feel Singaporean.

I think it is totally consistent with a multi-racial society that the Chinese promote the speaking of Mandarin and the Tamils the speaking of Tamil.

I don’t think we ought to pretend the differences are not there. It would only lead to more problems.

MR SHANMUGAM: That’s one perspective, I agree. But quite a different perspective could be that well, when you emphasise the individual cultural identity, you cannot pretend that they don’t exist.

But when you start emphasising it, then what? It would inevitably be at the expense of a common culture or development of a common culture even if we don’t have one now.

It’s all a question of emphasis, and I think the point that might have been made is that – is the emphasis overly on the individual races rather than a balanced approach?

DR VIVIAN BALAKRISHNAN (National University Hospital doctor): I’m of the younger generation. We’ve grown up for the past 20 years with a fairly good propaganda machine which led us to believe that we were all Singaporeans regardless of race, language and religion.

Recently, however, you have government ministers questioning the loyalty of certain segments of our society to this nation.

You can’t expect people to be loyal to you when you question their loyalty outright at the beginning. That’s your first premise.

That is the surest way of creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.

MR SHANMUGAM: The way I perceive it is that for the first 25 years, the focus was on developing that common culture, a strong bond within.

And of late, the emphasis has been maybe slightly shifted. And it’s moved over to emphasising the individual cultural identities, perhaps as a realisation that we were losing what little we had by trying to forge something.

So it may be a difference of perception rather than one of a propaganda machine putting forward a certain line, trying to get to the first level of common unity, and then from there on, trying to develop individual cultural identities and hope that the common cultural identity will evolve slowly.

DR BALAKRISHNAN: How can you get to the first level by questioning someone’s loyalty?

MR SHANMUGAM: Granted, you cannot question loyalty if you want loyalty. But let me put this as a hypothesis, if you feel that a certain factual matrix exists, is it better to face it and say how you can overcome the problem or is it better to avoid it?

DR BALAKRISHNAN: Now that’s precisely the problem. What evidence does the Government have, or what facts does the Government have to make a statement questioning the loyalty of certain segments of our society?

MR SHANMUGAM: I don’t think that statement was ever made. I think that’s the way some people have perceived it.

I think what was said was with the frank attitude of trying to discuss the issue on why we have to try and bring the Malays into the mainstream, and why they are not in.

That sort of question-and-answer session, I think, has been blown out of proportion into one of questioning the loyalty.

MR KENNETH LIANG (Chairman): And if I can move on to another area of what you said, Mr Shanmugam, about wanting to see greater participation in the next 25 years, can you elaborate on that?

MR SHANMUGAM: The large majority have no intention of participating. And I don’t know that you can really proceed with the status of developed country when, a large proportion of your population is in that state.

What was said was that we could ossify. So … we certainly don’t seem to be able to encourage people.

The complaint has always been that the Government is not participative.

My own feeling, having been elected for a year, is that the people are not willing to participate.

DR KHONG: Today there is a sense of stasis, there is a sense of waiting for directives, there is a sense of people being unable to formulate coherent alternatives of their own to put forward to the Government, to the people in power.

And there is therefore a need in encouraging participation to further open up the political process, to further encourage people to come forward with ideas, initiatives and opinions. In other words, to offer alternatives to just one orthodox view of doing things.

MS GERALDINE LOH (Circulation Promotions Manager): I’d like to just elaborat e on the point that you brought up, Mr Shanmugam.

Now you said that you’d like to see more participation from the public. I think I’m from your generation, too. But I think that most people would not want to speak up simply because of the past.

And then the Government has got to ask themselves, why do people not want to speak up?

And I’d like to say something about the civil service. I used to be in the civil service and I resigned for the simple reason that you could not speak up.

If you wanted to write a letter to the Forum Page, you had to get clearance.

You’re willing to identify yourself, and yet you have all that red tape. So when the Government has barriers like this, obviously people are not going to speak up.

And from the public’s viewpoint, I think that if you’re going to open up, the civil service has got to open up first before you can expect the other people to come in.

MR FONG: I think, having watched the flow of letters to The Straits Times’ Forum Page, and having observed a lot of these discussions and participation, before we even talk about participation, I would dearly like to see people taking pains to understand issues first before they jump in with views . . . I think there is this myth about participation, everybody jumps in with a view and then if there are 75 people, there are probably 78 views. Some change their minds half-way.

I think the key to a more tolerant society, the key to a more participative society, lies in the people themselves taking pains to understand the issues . . . while it’s good to say, let a hundred flowers bloom and a thousand schools contend, we had better take pains to make sure that issues are understood in all their complexity before views are fired left, right and centre, because I think a cacophony of false voices would lead to even more confusion rather than enlightenment.

MS LOH: Next question is how.

MR FONG: The question can be answered this way. It can be achieved by first, the people who have the information upon which to make decisions or upon which to at least make contributions.

Now I think a good example would be the car issue. I could remember a time some years ago when the question was very much – why not leave things alone – why do you have to tinker with transport measures and so on?

But I think, because of constant exposure, because of information being made available to the public, Singaporeans have, by and large, moved away from questioning why something needs to be done at all, to what should be done.

And that is a step forward because people are now talking on the basis of some knowledge, that there is a finite number of cars you can allow on the road, that there is just so many kilometres of roads that you can build.

So the first step, to answer your question, is that the people who have in their possession – and let’s not just point the finger at the Government, because it is a problem that spans the whole society – people who have information ought to make available that information if that information is conducive to public discussion and the enlightenment that follows from it.

That I think is the first critical step to take.

DR KHONG: I think you put your finger on the problem. The fact of the matter is that at the end of the day, only a very small minority would be fully conversant with any given issue. There has to be a perception, among the majority though, that there has been a free open debate on that matter at the level of that minority perhaps.

There has to be a perception that there are channels of information flowing down through which people can have access to all the relevant points of view on any particular debate – not just those aspects or just those points of view which the Government wants them to be conversant with.

And I think there is a sense of misperception that this is not taking place, that only certain points of view are put forward to them.

MR FONG: I just added another item to my own wish list, which is that, let’s lay this ghost of the past 25 years to rest because there is always this constant reference a big brother Government over the past 25 years suppressing dissent and whatever.

Now I am not going to debate the rights and wrongs. I think different people have different perceptions.

MR JON ONG (National University of Singapore Society): I think that I have faith in the future. I am bullish about the next 25 years.

I mean, just judging from the things that have occurred over the past decade in Singapore gives me enough confidence that Singapore is one place that the young of today will find a place where they can express themselves more freely than their parents could ever have done.

More opportunities to break out from job moulds and other types of moulds and more opportunities for expression, not only in political matters but also in culture and the arts. I think the Government has done a great job in the past few years to bring about the environment that we have today. I believe this environment will likely prevail in the coming years, thereby giving people the opportunity to mature and, as Mr Shanmugam has said, the participative democracy will come about.

I don’t think we need to force this process. I foresee the Government, a strong Government, taking the lead.

MR SHANMUGAM: I think this was precisely the opposite of what I was suggesting because there is a tendency, I think in Jon’s perception, to equate strong government participating with the people for a more glorious future.

To me, that somehow doesn’t sound right. This total emphasis on what the Government does should no longer be the focus. It’s what the people want and what I hope will happen is that we would have a significant substratum of people who are able to engage in informed discussion and have points of view which need not necessarily tally with the Government’s. It should not be up to the Government. It should be up to the people to decide what they want.

DR BALAKRISHNAN: I like to interject on this point. There’s been a lot of discussion on this issue of leadership transition.

Most of us have thought of it in terms of the old guard passing the baton to the younger leaders but I would like to bring up the flip side of that coin. That an essential element of democracy is the option to have a smooth and peaceful transition of leadership to a group which may not be in power today and I therefore like your opinion, of the politicians here, perhaps as to that impression of the role of a future viable alternative government.

DR HONG HAI: I think it would be naive to expect a ruling government to create its own opposition, to create its own alternative and to ensure that it is competent and will take over.

It’s not done. If the PAP does weaken, if it fails to win the mandate of the people, then it is for Singaporeans to ensure that an alternative party comes up that it attracts good people and good talent and that it provides a viable alternative government.

What we have in Singapore today is what political scientists call a one-party dominant Government. You have an opposition but it’s not strong enough to form an alternative government.

One-party dominant governments are not at all uncommon. Japan has had a one-party dominant government for well over 30 years and nobody doubts that there is political freedom in Japan or that Japan is a very efficient and successful society.

DR BALAKRISHNAN: I’m just suggesting that PAP should perhaps play cricket. And give other players a chance in the field.

MR MARTIN SOONG (Business Times Journalist): I see obstacles now to freer more informed press. There is an inordinate emphasis on face-saving where political figures are concerned and this is sort of tied to deference to authority. Is there anything we can do about it or should we do something about it?

MR FONG: Let me answer it this way. If it is face-saving at the expense of truth, then as an editor I would opt for truth rather than face-saving. But as an Asian, as a Singaporean, I would also subscribe to the motion that face is very important in our society. I don’t think we have reached the level of emotional maturity where people can take . . . a drubbing in public. So where face-saving does not impede truth, I’d say, yes, by all means, let’s try to observe that.

The alternative would be a society in which everybody goes at everybody else and nothing is sacred and you can denigrate and you can mock, and you can caricature. Is that really good for us? Just because somebody else has done it does not mean we have to follow.

I think there is nothing wrong in accepting that there should be a certain degree of deference to authority because the alternative is that you again have a breakdown of social discipline and order. But it should not obsequious deference to authority, to the point where you surrender your mind.

MR LIANG: Can we just round up this discussion now with perhaps some very brief comments from the panel?

MR SHANMUGAM: I think I opened a Pandora’s box with my comments on participatory politics or participatory democracy. I am glad to have received the views. My own wish is that this sort of participation would extend down to a much greater proportion of the population. If that is achieved, I think, we would have achieved a lot.

MR FONG: I wish we could really, collectively, build a more tolerant society , with tolerance at every level, not just the political but the social, religious, community. Then there is plenty to look forward to in the next 25 years.

DR KHONG: I think the discussion has showed how difficult the next 25 years is going to be because in the past 25 years, you could set quantitative targets on what you want to achieve and you could then go ahead and achieve them. In the next 25 years, people want a diverse range of alternatives, most of which are not quantifiable, and which will therefore be harder to identify and to achieve.

MR LOU: Well, I think the basic question really is a sense of identity and a sense of place. If we have a home to call our own, we will stay here. And at the end I believe it has to do with people. We can have technology, we can have computers, we can have high-stress life. But essentially if the government and also the private sector can place more stress on meaning and what people are looking for themselves, I think that’s the society we would want for the next 25 years.

DR HONG HAI: We are worried about this problem of immigration from Singapore. I think the solution to our emigration problem is not just in making life more easy, making the growth rate, economic growth rate, higher here or better housing and so forth. These factors will help.

What is going to stop Singaporeans from emigrating is the sense that this is home, this is the place where they can identify with the sights, the smell, the sounds. This is the place where their friends are. This is what will keep Singaporeans here.

And I hope that in the next 25 years, we will develop this spirit of belonging, we will develop the culture, the arts, the unity of purpose that will make us a nation and that will keep us together here in Singapore.

Ends.

This article was first published in The Online Citizen on 8 Nov 2010: http://theonlinecitizen.com/2010/11/clutching-at-straws-shanmugam’s-hollow-defence-of-pap-media-myths

In a talk entitled “The Role of the Media: Singapore’s Perspective” delivered at Columbia University on 4 Nov 2010, Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam perpetuated the same well-rehearsed myths that justify the PAP’s ironclad grip on the mainstream media in Singapore. The Minister was spot-on about one thing though – the arguments he raised were a function of PAP paranoia.

Myth Number 1: It is in the interests of Singapore (or the PAP?)

The Singapore media scene is dominated by two government-linked publishers, Singapore Press Holdings and Mediacorp. In the years after independence in 1965, Singapore hosted a vibrant media scene comprising various English and vernacular presses that ran a wide range of views on issues of national interest. Shanmugam argued that today’s PAP was not going to be an irresponsible government and gamble with the lives of Singaporeans by hosting a free media. Going by Shanmugam’s argument, was the PAP of the late 1960s and early 1970s “gambling with the lives” of Singaporeans in allowing numerous independent and privately controlled newspapers to operate? Was it an irresponsible government? Surely not. With men like Goh Keng Swee, Hon Sui Sen and S. Rajaratnam helming the fort, such a suggestion is ludicrous.

Until the Newspapers and Printing Presses Act 1974, the first-generation PAP leaders not only survived and lifted an entire generation of Singaporeans out of poverty, they also set the foundations for extraordinary growth in the face of a flourishing media environment immediately after independence. The logic follows that the current crop of PAP leaders, unlike their predecessors, are incapable of handling the real-world realities of the competitive media environment. This is in spite of the million-dollar annual salaries that Goh Keng Swee would have been loathe to pay today’s PAP ministers.

Myth Number 2: The media will exploit race and religion

The history of mankind has shown that race and religion can be exploited for political purposes – in fact, Singapore’s experience with the 1964 riots makes this point out. Never mind for a moment that the predominant catalyst of those riots resided in the political tension between the PAP and UMNO, and not with the media.

What Shanmugam conveniently left out is the positive role the media can play, and has played, in bridging and bringing differences between different racial communities together.  Sometime in 1992, in an extremely sad episode in modern India’s recent history, a country that gained independence slightly more than 15 years before Singapore, Hindu zealots destroyed the Babri mosque in the town of Ayodhya in Uttar Pradesh. The rabid act of Hindu religious violence was rooted in contested claims to the land on which the mosque was built. In late September 2010, the High Court of Uttar Pradesh delivered its judgment with an order to divide the disputed land three ways.

The role of the media in the run-up to the judgment was noteworthy. In response to the government’s request to the hyper-competitive Indian media to exercise restraint in reporting the Ayodhya verdict, the country’s media responded by coalescing opinion from faith, business, industry and political leaders, amongst others, restating India’s commitment to secularism, diversity, tolerance and respect for religious minorities. Even though India hosts a very significant minority of 150 million Muslims, the verdict was dissected and argued over vigorously. Yet, no violence ensued and the media’s positive influence had equally positive knock-on effects on Indian society and economy.

In his tiresome justification on the dangers of racial and religious strife, Shanmugam seems to have conveniently ignored the giant strides made by Singaporeans in building a multiracial society. National Service for one, has been an incredible adhesive.

While one can portend the possible existence of a radical and lunatic fringe that is racially chauvinistic – there simply isn’t a multiracial utopia anywhere in the world. Yet, larger and far more complex multiracial polities in the developed and developing world have accommodated a free media in the name of an informed citizenry. In fact, in appealing to paranoia as the foundation of the PAP’s media policy, Shanmugam effectively put the brakes on the organic development of a tolerant Singaporean society.

Myth Number 3: Singapore is a small country with a small population and short common shared history

Shanmugam’s points about Singapore’s population size, physical size and short common history were curious defences that were left intellectually unsubstantiated.  What the new Minister of Home Affairs must acknowledge is that size is paradoxically one of Singapore’s greatest strengths in dealing with racial and religious disharmony. Possible racial tension is nipped in the bud and the support of grassroots leaders can be quickly canvassed to return a potentially fractious situation to a state of normalcy. In fact, when the tudung issue of 2003 blew up, causing some consternation within some elements in the Malay community, the government was quickly able to bring Malay leaders to dialogue and diffuse the situation.

It appears that as far as Singapore’s short common history is concerned, this was yet another red herring that Shanmugam is quickly earning a reputation for invoking. If true, it must mean that other multiracial countries that secured independence in the two decades after World War 2 – not very much older than Singapore – would equally have too short a common history to accommodate a free media. The absurdity of this argument speaks for itself.

In keeping the media under the purview of the government so as to determine the boundaries of any public discourse in the media, the PAP has shrewdly ensured that Singaporeans end up looking to the government for answers to even the most fundamental aspects of their existence. This is the same PAP government that ironically insists Singaporeans cannot expect the PAP to have all the answers to public grievances!

As for Singapore’s small population, this writer certainly does not hope the Minister was alluding to the cerebral incapacity of Singaporeans to decide on what type of Singapore Singaporeans want for themselves and their children.  Although given the elitist and eugenically inspired mindset of not a small number of PAP leaders, it would be surprising if the Minister was indeed of the opinion that only the elite in Singapore can deal with a free media. If true however, the arrogance and conceit of this position is very much in line with the PAP’s elitist belief system.

Myth Number 4: Journalists are biased and subject to vices, media companies sacrifice journalistic values at the alter of profit, both journalists and media companies can be bought, and the advertising dollar compromises ethics

In casting doubts about the professional integrity of journalists, Shanmugam seemed to be suffering from an irrational fear of the media. But his fears were misplaced and unreasonable. He ought to know better that rotten apples are found in any profession, not just journalism.

Only two years ago, the fat cats in a number of Wall Street banks proved equally, if not more susceptible, to vice, greed and ethical compromise as compared to journalists. As a reputable lawyer himself, the Minister must be acutely aware of the not insignificant number of Singaporean lawyers running away with clients’ monies over the last decade. In fact, in 2005 a lawyer and member of his own party was found guilty of “grossly improper” unprofessional conduct.

In singling out journalists while overlooking their vitally important mission of educating the mass public of the ongoings in society, Shanmugam gratuitously cast journalism in bad light. This unusual fear of journalism is perhaps a classic symptom of a paranoia complex. This is why mature and rational politicians in many developed countries speak of codes of conduct for the media, in addition to the prospect of legal penalties in cases of egregious violations. Even light regulation for any profession can go a long way to reduce the temptation of unethical conduct.

Myth Number 5: Singapore does not want to be like the US

Shanmugam shrewdly predicated his defence of the PAP’s media policy by claiming Singapore did not want to mirror the US media. When Singaporeans cajole the government for greater press freedoms, no one is specifically identifying one media model for the country to follow. Most Singaporeans would be rather proud if Singapore Press Holdings could report and detail issues of national interest with the same vigour and relative objectivity as the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) or even Malaysiakini, an online Malaysian news publisher that has even been complimented by Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew, no less.

In fact, Singapore is in a great position to select best practices from media the world over and adapt a system that works best for Singapore’s needs. The current editor of the Straits Times, Han Fook Kwang, was once quoted as saying, “We’re aware people say we’re a government mouthpiece or that we are biased.” It is publicly known that the SPH’s group president from 1995-2002 was a former director of the Internal Security Department under the auspices of the Ministry of Home Affairs. The current political editor of The Straits Times is a former Internal Security Department officer. Rather than claim that Singaporeans reject a US-style media scene (yet another red herring reeled in to obfuscate the substantive issue), Shanmugam should focus on removing the wanton perception in Singapore of a mainstream media that is manipulated behind the scenes by the PAP.

Whichever way any Singaporean looks at things, a government-managed media scene will only provide one shade of the truth for its people. Alternate sources of news and information that are factually unimpeachable and evince a very high quality of journalism play an incredibly important educative role in any society. There is no reason to posit that Singapore society will descend into chaos should Singapore choose to amend the Newspapers and Printing Presses Act and open up its media scene to private publishers that are subject to the rule of law.

Conclusion

In concluding his speech to his American audience, Shanmugam compared Singapore with US cities like San Francisco where the incumbent political party has remained in power for a long time. Even though his speech was about the media, Shanmugam seemed to conveniently forget that San Francisco hosts a free media where the political opposition is not politically hamstrung by obstacles put in place by the incumbents. More pertinently, in San Francisco, politicians do not live in glass houses but can cope with and shake off personal attacks with comprehensive political proposals, and critically, without resort to defamation suits.

In the final analysis, Shanmugam’s ill-advised remarks – like the attempts of many politicians throughout history to justify press-control and manipulation in favour of the incumbent leadership, authoritarian regimes and to minify alternative views – confirmed an unhealthy PAP paranoia that is effectively retarding the evolution of a tolerant and socially attuned Singapore society. Taken to its logical end, this paranoia and irrational fear of the media can cloud good judgment and may end up irreversibly inhibiting the intellectual development of the very society the PAP claims to protect.

_________________

Comment posted by Pritam Singh to this article on 9 Nov 2010 at: http://theonlinecitizen.com/2010/11/clutching-at-straws-shanmugam’s-hollow-defence-of-pap-media-myths

Dear Traveller,

Thank you for your inputs and my apologies for this late reply. There is a political dimension that you do not account for in your defence of the PAP media policy. Please bear with me and allow me to explain.

I would advise you to visit the Internal Security Department (ISD) Heritage Museum at Onraet Rd. You have to write in for permission, and I understand you have to go as a group. You could potentially arrange for a visit with your Community Centre, town council, RC, CCC, school, or with a registered Singapore society of which you are a member etc. From the briefing given by retired ISD officers, I was informed that about 40,000 Singaporeans have visited the ISD Heritage Museum since it opened in 2002.

http://www.learningjourneys.edu.sg/displayorg.aspx?oid=ISD&title=lj

Once there you will realise that racial incidents DO occur in Singapore, in fact, more often than you think. George Yeo himself alluded to this some years ago when he recounted an episode where a hawker carrying bak kut teh (or some pork dish, maybe it was wanton mee, can’t remember) accidentally spilt the dish on a Muslim and a couple of people got involved leading to a rather ugly incident. Fortunately, the matter was resolved (go to the National Library [or any of its branches] and search the online archives for a fuller narration of this incident). There have also been other episodes best left for you to find out more about with a visit to the ISD museum.

Many Singaporeans think Singapore is heaven on earth and nothing actually goes wrong here because of the sterling work of the PAP. This is not wholly correct. Things DO go wrong, and the state-managed media almost always does not report many of these issues, except when they become very public (I don’t think the mainstream media mean ill when they don’t report the issues – but their decision making calculus/mandate is rather curious – they cannot understand that reportage actually goes a long way to educate Singaporeans, heals rifts and builds bridges).

One copy of any police report that reports on or details a racial or religious incident in Singapore, I understand goes to the ISD for their follow up. This simple procedure informs us that there is a mechanism in place to deal with race and religious problems should they take on an endemic, organized or externally manipulated (foreigner) dimension. I am quite sure there are other macro and micro measures in place that we the public are not privy to.

Shanmugam’s paternalism viz. the local media denies Singaporeans a look into the reality of Singapore society, and more pertinently, to learn and appreciate what we must do collectively to improve race relations in Singapore. Wong Kan Seng not inaccurately observed today that Singaporeans are complacent about security.

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/1092260/1/.html

But has he asked himself why and how it has come to this? Perhaps it could be because Singaporeans have been fed on a diet of omissions, no thanks to the government-managed media, from which we hear only good things about the PAP and everyone who supports them.

It is important to realise that a freer press environment doesnt mean the rule book is thrown out of the window. On the contrary, the rules remain and the government or an independent body (preferred) can censure publishers who engage in inaccurate or irresponsible reportage. Foreigners who play with religious fire can have their views firmly rebutted not just by the government, but ordinary Singaporeans as well (who ultimately count more than any government of the day).

Even so, the “market” will decide. Any newspaper whose content is suspect, simply cannot survive, especially in a market that hosts a well-educated population. You probably have a fear that the damage to Singapore will already be done before the “market” makes a decision. Traveller, this is not a concern I want to wish away for it is a relevant concern – but it is my belief is that Singapore is better served by a media that educates our population about the realities of Singapore – that means having a more investigative media that seeks out the truth, and indeed its various shades, only for the purpose of better policy responses, in addition to providing a check on the quality of the government of the day.

More pertinently, I am convinced we have the structures and systems in place to tackle racial and religious problems. I cannot promise you that there will no racial or religious incidents if the government loosens up on our media policy. But as my visit to the ISD Heritage Museum informed me, even a controlled media environment cannot guarantee a Singapore without racial or religious incidents.

There is much more Singapore and Singaporeans stand to gain from a free media. We have got to have faith in our people, and if 45 odd years of nation-building have not done it, then I fear we already have the “divided” society you speak of.

I believe that the liberal elements in the PAP also want a substantively free media. However, I would opine that the conservative elements of the PAP are more interested in retaining a firm grip on the public discourse so as to determine its exact contours for the foreseeable future. Allowing the media a free rein would fundamentally take power (evinced through information dissemination and providing solutions) out of the PAP’s hands and into the hands of Singaporeans. This position politically benefits the PAP of course, as it has for the last 30-over years.

But it does Singapore and Singaporeans a huge disservice with regard to our growth as a people, and evolution as a society.

Ends.

1. As some of you may know, I have a personal interest in the mandatory death penalty regime, having written about it before, a link I probably shared with a small number of you.

http://theonlinecitizen.com/2010/05/prejudicing-a-fair-trial-the-yong-vui-kong-case/

Something even the Young PAP had a view about it seems!

http://www.youngpap.org.sg/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=164%3Aminister-shanmugams-comments-on-the-death-penalty&catid=41%3Apolitics&Itemid=34

2. I have been a little surprised this past week reading about the unusually forceful cries for clemency from Malaysia for a convicted Malaysian drug trafficker, Yong Vui Kong (aged 19 when he committed the offence of smuggling 47-odd grams of a Class A drug into Singapore). According to a citizen website, a total of 31 Malaysian MPs and 11 Senators have put their names to a petition seeking a reprieve for Vui Kong.

http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/fmt-english/news/general/8893-save-vui-kong-mps-senators-ink-support

3. In my living memory, I cannot recall a more strident and co-ordinated campaign from the people sector in Malaysia seeking clemency for a Malaysian convict in Singapore. Even Anifah Aman, the Malaysian Foreign Minister has chipped in, no doubt because of the growing groundswell of public opinion in Malaysia.

http://theonlinecitizen.com/2010/08/malaysian-mps-and-senators-call-for-yong-to-be-spared/

4. But curiously, albeit unexpectedly, there is no real coverage of this issue in the government-managed Straits Times newspaper in Singapore. In fact, what appears to be developing is a clever campaign from the mainstream media in Singapore to disinform the public of the larger issues surrounding the mandatory death penalty, through omission and selective reportage. Some would argue this has always been a strategy of mainstream media, but I think the wiser among you would be better placed to confirm this.

5. Now let me be clear about it, there is enough anecdotal information to suggest that many Singaporeans are not against the death penalty, especially in regard to heinous crimes and even drug-smuggling. Considering that countries such as China, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand not to mention the US retain the death penalty, it is virtually impossible to make a strong argument that can support doing away with the death penalty in this neck of the woods, especially considering the narrow scope of public discourse in a one-party dominated state such as Singapore.

6. The unique problem in the Singapore case (and Malaysia and Indonesia. I know India does not have a mandatory death penalty regime. I understand China does not as well, although someone mentioned to me that it applies if more than 50g of heroin is involved. In Singapore it is 15g. Would appreciate some clarification here on China and whether there is a mandatory death penalty regime for drugs) is that Singapore’s parliament, many years ago, passed the Misuse of Drugs (MDA) Act which invokes the mandatory death penalty. As I have stated elsewhere, in mandatory death sentence cases, mitigation is irrelevant and the judicial process concludes upon a finding of guilt. I disagree with this simply because it gives a judge no power to deviate from the MDA, even if there are extenuating circumstances relevant to an accused. Even if there are potentially reasonable grounds – low IQ, unique circumstances etc. to justify a sentence other than a death sentence, the judge is powerless to rule outside the ambit of the law. The process of imposing the mandatory death penalty is largely administrative, not judicial as popularly thought of.

7. The other problem with the mandatory death sentence regime is that it puts too much discretion in the hands of the Public Prosecutor (PP), the PAP state’s lawyer. While the PP must have discretion in general, because of the way the mandatory death sentence regime works, he/she effectively becomes the all powerful arbiter, as he/she holds has all the evidence and police investigation reports in hand. Ever so often, cases come to court where the accused has allegedly trafficked 14.99g of heroin. This boggles the mind. Needless to say, the PP has determined, often through the ubiquitous “laboratory test” that the pure heroin content had come up to 14.99 grams. What a lucky accused! Thank you PP! Who needs the separation of powers schema between the Executive and Judiciary anymore? The Chief Justice might as well appoint the Fairy-God mother to the bench!

8. Alex Au, one of Singapore’s finest bloggers has written about this in the context of Alan Shadrake’s book with superb cogency.

http://yawningbread.wordpress.com/2010/07/10/new-book-puts-death-penalty-on-trial/

9. In light of the societal barometer, what ought to be called for is a move away from the mandatory death penalty regime. A similar case to Yong Vui Kong may well come up in a no-mandatory death penalty jurisdiction, and a judge may well sentence the accused to death, if the circumstances dictate so. The fear has been, and Lee Kuan Yew has verbalised this, is that judges will not dare to hang anyone if there were no mandatory death penalty regime. I am not going to get into this argument. I would think if that is the case, then a judge is mentally not fit to sit on the bench, and the Chief Justice made a rather poor choice (by the way, no one really knows about the procedure whereby High Court judges are selected in Singapore).

10. Now what the mainstream media (by extension PAP government) strategy appears to be is to suggest that people speaking out against the mandatory death penalty regime are actually speaking out against the death penalty regime. It is critical that civil society draw a distinction upon these two separate issues, because the government will lump them together, and if goes to a referendum (which it will not), I am very sure the pro-death penalty camp will come out tops because across race and religion, Asians, given our social attitudes and mores, are comfortable with murderers and drug traffickers being (not mules I would argue, masterminds) sent to the gallows. In the interests of justice and due process, it is vital that our eyes be firmly fixed on the abolishment of the mandatory death penalty regime in Singapore. That is the real Rubicon to cross in the immediate term. Why? Because of the case of Vignes Mourthi as covered by Alan Shadrake in his book, Once a Jolly Hangman, a case that weighs very heavily in my mind.

Excerpted from Alex Au’s aforementioned hyperlinked article:

“Chapter 18 recounts how Vignes Mourthi, a Malaysian who commuted to Singapore for work, was found guilty of trafficking 27.65 grams of heroin in 2002. Vignes claimed at his trial that he did not know he had heroin on him; he thought that what he had been given to hand over to a contact was a pack of precious incense stones used in Hindu worship, a claim of innocence he maintained throughout.

The prosecution’s case and the verdict rested mainly on a handwritten note by the arresting officer recording the alleged conversation that took place between the officer Rajkumar and Vignes just before the arrest on 20 September 2001. Rajkumar was posing as the buyer and in his undated note said that Vignes’ replies during the short conversation indicated the latter knew that what he had handed over were drugs. There was no corroboration of the account contained in this handwritten note, nor even any indication it was not written up far later, yet it was what the judge relied on to convict Vignes.

Vignes was hanged on 26 September 2003.

The day after Rajkumar arrested Vignes, a woman accused Rajkumar of raping and sodomising her. Two days later, on 23 September 2001, Rajkumar himself was arrested on these complaints. He was apparently not suspended from duty and continued to be part of the prosecution’s case against Vignes.

Eventually, the woman withdrew her accusations, but by then, police investigations had begun of Rajkumar and fellow officer Balbir Singh for offering large amounts of money to the woman to persuade her to do so. The men were later found guilty of corruption and sentenced to fifteen and six months’ imprisonment respectively. Page 161:

But it was not until Vignes Mourthi was hanged that Rajkumar’s trial began. When Rajkumar, whose contested testimony had sent Vignes Mourthi to the gallows, was sentenced, Judge Sia Aik Kor described his actions as ‘so obviously corrupt by the ordinary and objective standard that he must know his conduct is corrupt’. The judge also cited a precedent which found actions to be ‘akin to an attempt to subvert the course of justice’. So if he could subvert the course of justice to save himself from a long prison term, was he also capable of inventing those damning words that confirmed, in the eyes of trial judges, that Vignes Mourthi knew what he was doing?

First of all, isn’t it interesting that a case of rape, sodomy and corruption from an arrest of 23 September 2001 languishes for years while a capital case arising from an arrest of 20 September 2001 is finished and done with more quickly?

Shadrake pointed out that the police and very likely the Attorney-General’s Chambers knew even as Vignes was on trial, that their chief prosecution witness Rajkumar was himself under investigation for corruption and subverting justice. Surely this must be pertinent to Vignes’ case? Would knowledge of this not have been grounds for impeaching Rajkumar’s credibility and for reasonable doubt in Vignes’ case?

Shadrake asks why there was silence throughout; why Rajkumar’s trial didn’t commence until Vignes had been hanged.

I would ask: Was the silence judged necessary to avoid an embarrassing collapse of the case against Vignes? Was it felt that it was more important not to have it collapse, more important to protect the idea of the death penalty from disrepute, the image of police and prosecutorial infallibility, than the question of true justice to a man?”

Ends.

1. The Singapore government has banned this video (online since late last year), with the ban set to take effect from 14 July 2010 (see article appended below – Film ‘Dr Lim Hock Siew’ prohibited from July 14). How the government plans to police this ban is beyond me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqhr4wxUFws

2. The decision to ban this clip, more than 8 months after it was first released is strikingly odd, especially if you consider how the government-managed mainstream media covered Dr Lim Hock Siew early this year (see article appended below – Still dreaming of a socialist Singapore dated 19 Feb 2010). In fact, one writer wrote in to the Straits Times (see article appended below – An example for aspiring politicians dated 24 Feb 2010) after reading the article in absolute praise of Dr Lim, “…politicians of Dr Lim’s calibre are rare, and it behooves us to seek them out to help move the nation forward.”

3. In Janadas Devan’s (current op-ed / review editor of the government-managed Straits Times) commentary (see article appended below – Let others voices add to Singapore Story dated 28 Jul 2007), the son of former President Devan Nair ends his piece asking readers to “….tell stories, for it is the only way we can take possession of ourselves.”

4. My interim assessment is that the current PAP government is in a bind. A fly on the walls of cabinet may well conclude that it is a divided party, a view that has been bandied about for years. The Home Affairs and Law ministries are helmed by individuals who I opine are conservative and close-minded, and in my opinion of course, are not the best individuals to lead Singapore as we traverse the 21st century. Then there are others, who I am sure were convinced they could change the system incrementally from the inside like Community Development Youth and Sports Minister Vivian Balakrishnan who is quoted by Susan Long (see article appended below – What price politics dated 1 Feb 2002) ,

“Reflecting on the politicians he admires for their strength of character and ability to sacrifice for their beliefs, (Vivian) singles out former Barisan Sosialis stalwart Dr Lim Hock Siew, who spent 20 years in detention.”

5. Likewise there are others, bright and of character, like Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam, who allegedly said this of the 22 individuals who were labelled as Marxists and detained without trial under the PAP from 1987 (See The Online Citizen commentary – Was it a Red or White conspiracy? See http://theonlinecitizen.com/2009/05/was-it-a-red-or-white-conspiracy/ )

“Although I had no access to state intelligence, from what I knew of them, most were social activists but not out to subvert the system ”

(P.S. – I have just finished reading the memoirs of one Teo Soh Lung, one of those incarcerated from 1987. This book I understand is not banned in Singapore and is on sale at Books Kinokuniya at Takashimaya.
Please visit, if interested – http://fn8org.wordpress.com/2010/06/21/hello-world/ )

6. A corollary view, one that has also been bandied about, so I lay no claim to originality, is that the old guard (and their anointed flunkies) in the ruling PAP, like the Communist Party in China, are actually tightening up on substantive political and social freedoms. The pressure of genuine and substantive political reform is being thrust upon them and they are increasingly uncomfortable at this prospect – since they have traditionally been the ones in charge. Whatever the explanation may be, I opine that the structural problems that exist within the ruling PAP have begun to stymie Singapore’s growth and development as a nation. I foresee the government (I am rather hesitant at using the word government because that includes the executive (civil service) and judiciary too. We have been blessed with honest public servants although some in the elite Administrative Service do need to be reminded of their political neutrality) will clamp down even harder in future, with honest civil servants called upon to do the old guard’s biding. The more liberal factions of the PAP (and some good friends of mine who are pro-PAP, and in some cases, for good reason) probably think nature, i.e. the death and increasing irrelevance of the old guard, will resolve this structural dilemma. I am not so sanguine. The empire will continue to strike back. With finesse and sophistication? Lim Hock Siew may not think so.

__________________

Film “Dr Lim Hock Siew” prohibited from July 14
204 words
12 July 2010
05:45 PM
Channel NewsAsia
CNEWAS
English
(c) 2010 MediaCorp News Pte Ltd. All Rights Reserved

SINGAPORE : The film “Dr Lim Hock Siew” will be prohibited in Singapore with effect from July 14 under the Films Act.

It was submitted by Martyn See Tong Ming to the Board of Film Censors for classification.

The Ministry of Information, Communications and the Arts said the film is against public interest, and possession and distribution of it is an offence.

The film has also not been granted a certificate for its exhibition.

The ministry said the film gives a distorted and misleading portrayal of Dr Lim’s arrests and detention under the Internal Security Act (ISA) in 1963.

It added that the government “will not allow individuals who have posed a security threat to Singapore’s interests in the past, to use media platforms such as films to make baseless accusations against the authorities, give a false portrayal of their previous activities in order to exculpate their guilt, and undermine public confidence in the government in the process.”

Anyone found in possession of or distributing the film, if convicted, will be liable to a fine not exceeding S$10,000 or a jail term of not more than 2 years, or both.

CNA/al

__________________

Prime News
Ban on video recording of Lim Hock Siew speech
Cassandra Chew
451 words
13 July 2010
Straits Times <javascript:void(0)>
STIMES
English
(c) 2010 Singapore Press Holdings Limited
THE Government has banned a video recording of a speech made by former political detainee Lim Hock Siew, on the grounds that it is against public interest.

The video by filmmaker Martyn See, 41, gives a ‘distorted and misleading portrayal’ of Dr Lim’s detention under the Internal Security Act, said the Ministry of Information, Communications and the Arts (Mica) in a statement yesterday.

Mica added: ‘The Singapore Government will not allow individuals who have posed a security threat to Singapore’s interests in the past to use media platforms such as films to make baseless accusations against the authorities, give a false portrayal of their previous activities in order to exculpate their guilt, and undermine public confidence in the Government in the process.’

The prohibition, which takes effect tomorrow, makes it an offence for anyone to distribute the video, entitled Dr Lim Hock Siew, or possess a copy of it.

Anyone who commits the offence can be fined up to $10,000, or jailed up to two years, or both.

Mr See told The Straits Times yesterday that the Media Development Authority had instructed him, in a letter, to surrender all copies of his video and remove any digital versions that are online.

The 22-minute video is available on video-sharing website YouTube <javascript:void(0);> and on his blog. It shows Dr Lim, 79, giving a speech last November at a book launch where he recounted his experiences as a political detainee.

He was arrested in 1963 under Operation Cold Store, a massive security sweep that put more than 100 communists and suspected communists behind bars, and detained without trial until 1982.

Mr See recorded the speech and uploaded the film to YouTube <javascript:void(0);> the next day.

In February, he submitted it to the Board of Film Censors for classification, ‘because the law says so’, he said.

He said he had not expected the ban as the law on political films was relaxed last year.

‘The amendments to Section 33 of the Films Act now allow for live recordings of an event held according to the law. The film Dr Lim Hock Siew fits that bill, and therefore I was confident it would not be illegal,’ he added.

The recording, however, was classified under Section 35(1) of the Films Act, which allows for the banning of any film that is contrary to public interest.

Only one other film has been prohibited under this category, in 2007. It was also by Mr See.

The film, called Zahari’s 17 Years, was a 50-minute interview with another former political detainee, Said Zahari. Mr See directed, shot and edited it.

_______________________

ST Forum
An example for aspiring politicians
226 words
24 February 2010
Straits Times
STIMES
English
(c) 2010 Singapore Press Holdings Limited

I WAS moved by Dr Lim Hock Siew’s steely resolve to stand by his convictions and ideals, even after his ordeal against his political rivals, as reported in last Friday’s feature, ‘Still dreaming of a socialist Singapore’.

Today’s aspiring politicians can learn much from his story in their bid for public office.

Our young scholarship holders who have dreams of entering Parliament will do well to emulate Dr Lim’s admirable qualities. He is sincere, unflappable, principled and courageous; he provides a human face to the cold facade of political rivalry.

Men and women with such qualities should be accorded due respect by friends and foes alike.

Politicians of Dr Lim’s calibre are rare, and it behooves us to seek them out to help move the nation forward.

Their presence in all parties, and on both benches in Parliament, makes for healthier and more meaningful exchanges and debates, all to the good of Singapore.

Never let it be said that only one party has a monopoly on the best and brightest.

We have come a long way from the volatile 1960s. In future elections, I hope good sense prevails and that politicians of all stripes will set out to win the hearts and minds of the electorate with verve, fairness and respectability.

Lee Seck Kay

______________________

Insight
Still dreaming of a socialist Singapore
Cai Haoxiang
2840 words
19 February 2010
Straits Times <javascript:void(0)>
STIMES
English
(c) 2010 Singapore Press Holdings Limited

From student activist and PAP campaigner to Barisan Sosialis leader and second longest-held political detainee, Dr Lim Hock Siew’s story mirrors Singapore’s tumultuous history. Now 79, he bares his thoughts and feelings about his political past.

IT IS a sweltering day as you walk by the row of repainted shophouses along Balestier Road.

As you push open the glass doors and duck inside for a welcome draught of air-conditioning, you meet a group of elderly patients waiting expectantly to see their family doctor.

The name on the door plate of his office may not ring a bell for the young but to older Singaporeans, it jumps right out of Singapore’s turbulent political history: Dr Lim Hock Siew.

Enter his simply furnished room, and you see him at a desk stacked with books, stationery and newspapers. An eye chart is pasted on a glass cabinet displaying photos of him as a dashing young man.

The 79-year-old doctor, in his white long-sleeved shirt, greets you with a soft, occasionally wheezing, yet otherwise firm voice. He is not in the best of health, having suffered kidney failure last year and taken a six-month break to recuperate.

As he is undergoing dialysis three times a week, he would have preferred to extend his break except that his clinic partner, Dr Mohd Abu Bakar, 76, was overwhelmed by the patient load.

So he returned to half-day work last month, seeing around 30 patients every morning, and plans to do so as long as his health permits. ‘It’s kind of an ethical obligation to look after them, and I can keep myself mentally occupied,’ he says.

The name of his clinic harks back to his socialist days as a political activist, first with the People’s Action Party (PAP) and then with its arch rival, Barisan Sosialis. It is called Rakyat, which means ‘people’ in Malay. It was set up by Dr Lim and fellow Barisan Sosialis leader Dr Poh Soo Kai in 1961.

Its consultation fees are no different from other clinics’ – $20 to $30. But Dr Lim charges a reduced rate for poorer patients and gives free treatment to the neediest. ‘I don’t deny help to those who need it,’ he says.

Dr Lim’s sense of compassion and empathy for the poor is well known. At a time when the unprofessional and unethical practices of some doctors are hogging the headlines, the mere mention of Dr Lim’s name evokes hushed respect among his peers.

Even pro-PAP Singaporeans who would be horrified by the prospect of a Barisan Sosialis government admit to having a grudging admiration for Dr Lim as a man who has the courage of his convictions.

Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports, once singled out Dr Lim as a politician he admired for his strength of character and ability to sacrifice for his beliefs.

Like many of his former leftist colleagues, Dr Lim feels compelled to give his side of the story before time runs out.

In recent years, a cottage industry has sprung up providing alternative histories of Singapore. Books included memoirs by former communist underground leader Fang Chuang Pi, former Barisan Sosialis leader Fong Swee Suan and former Parti Rakyat Singapura leader Said Zahari. Just three months ago, the Fajar Generation, a book on the University Socialist Club (USC) of the then-University of Malaya, was launched.

In a nutshell, Dr Lim’s is a story of how an idealistic student activist joined and campaigned for the PAP in the 1950s and then fought against the ruling party in the 1960s and paid a very heavy price for his beliefs and convictions.

In 1963, he was arrested under Operation Cold Store and detained without trial for nearly 20 years before he was released in 1982.

A Home Affairs Ministry statement on his release had said that he was arrested under the Internal Security Act for his involvement in Communist United Front (CUF) activities.

Dr Lim refused to agree to any conditions that would have granted him early release and ended up in the record book as the second longest-held political prisoner after his leftist colleague Chia Thye Poh, who served 23 years.

Today, 28 years after his release, he still dreams of a socialist Singapore in which there is no exploitation of workers and the oppressed.

Political awakening

BORN in 1931 to a poor family, Dr Lim spent the 1942-45 war years helping his father sell fish in the Kandang Kerbau market. Both his parents were illiterate, but they encouraged their 10 children to study.

He was the only English-educated child in his family. As the top boy in Rangoon Road Primary School, he gained entry to Raffles Institution (RI) in 1946.

It was in RI that he picked up a book by the first prime minister of India Jawaharlal Nehru and became inspired by his socialist ideals.

Going on to study medicine at the then-University of Malaya here, Dr Lim lapped up the works of philosopher Karl Marx and economist Adam Smith, and books on the British Labour Party and Mao Zedong’s communist struggle in China. His political awakening was heightened by the anti-colonial struggles raging around the world.

As he recalls, most of the university students then were indifferent to politics. They were afraid of being arrested and preferred to pursue degrees and jobs.

As one of the best and brightest of his generation, he says he felt a deep, patriotic obligation to do something for Singapore and its people in the struggle against the British colonialists ruling Singapore.

He plunged into campus activism, becoming a founding member of the anti-colonial USC, which was formed in 1953.

In 1953, Dr Lim met the young Cambridge-educated lawyer Lee Kuan Yew, who was helping to defend eight USC students charged by the British for sedition because of an article in the USC’s journal, Fajar.

They won the case and Mr Lee was acclaimed as their champion. The USC rallied behind him and his associates when they set up the PAP several months after the sedition trial.

Noting that the party’s original Constitution showed every mark of a socialist, anti-colonial party, Dr Lim recalls that the USC members went around persuading various groups to support the PAP. The 1955 elections saw the 24-year-old Dr Lim stumping for PAP at mass rallies.

PAP was then identified with the working class and Chinese-speaking masses. But the facade of unity maintained by the motley crew of English-educated intellectuals, Chinese-educated socialists, professionals and trade unionists could not last.

The ideological differences began to surface. One episode in 1957 that stuck in Dr Lim’s memory was the plot by a group of radical unionists within the party to oust PAP strongman Ong Eng Guan and several others from the PAP leadership. They opposed Mr Ong as they viewed him as anti-left and an opportunist.

He felt then that the move was ‘most unwise’ as it would create party disunity and provoke a crackdown by the colonial government.

As he recollects, he and several USC members tracked down three of the prime movers – Mr Chen Say Jame, Mr Goh Boon Toh and Mr Tan Chong Kin – and sought to dissuade them. They failed. Dr Lim believes that what he did then probably aroused Mr Lee’s suspicions that he was in cahoots with the leftists.

The central executive committee (CEC) elections resulted in a deadlock with six seats going to the Lee group and the other six going to the leftists. Shocked by the humiliating defeat of his associates, Mr Lee refused to take office. Dr Lim says he tried to persuade him to do so – to no avail.

As it turned out, five leftist CEC members were arrested by the Lim Yew Hock government in an anti-communist operation – and Mr Lee and company were able to regain control of the party.

In 1958, they introduced a ‘cadre’ system in which only appointed members could vote for the CEC. This marked the beginning of the leftists’ disillusionment with Mr Lee, says Dr Lim.

Break over merger

WHEN the 1959 elections came around, Dr Lim says he and Dr Poh offered themselves ‘in good faith’ as PAP candidates. The answer was negative. ‘He did not trust us,’ says Dr Lim, referring to Mr Lee.

After the historic elections which swept the PAP to power for the first time, Dr Lim discovered that his party membership was not renewed.

From the sidelines, the government doctor witnessed the increasing acrimony between Mr Lee’s group and the leftists which was to lead to what is called the Big Split of 1961.

The two factions were locked in a monumental struggle over the issues of merger with Malaya, Chinese education and the continuing detention of students and unionists.

Racked by dissension, the PAP was on the brink of collapse after losing two by-elections in Anson and Hong Lim in 1961.

Concerned over the leftist challenge within his party, Mr Lee moved a motion of confidence in the 51-seat legislative assembly. The PAP survived when 27 voted aye but 13 dissident assemblymen abstained.

Expelled from the party, the dissidents formed Barisan Sosialis with other defectors from the PAP in August 1961. The party was led by Mr Lim Chin Siong.

It was at this juncture that Dr Lim joined the new party. He had to give up a scholarship for further study and quit the civil service.

The Barisan Sosialis then, he recalls, was a very formidable organisation filled with thousands of dedicated people and ‘scores upon scores of university graduates’, ready to form an alternative government.

As a CEC member, Dr Lim helped to run a ‘brain trust’ which consulted a group of more than 50 graduates from the then-Nanyang University and University of Malaya and prepared position papers.

‘We didn’t have a lack of talent. We had more talent than we wanted,’ he says.

In his recollection, the biggest issue that divided PAP and Barisan was merger with Malaya to form Malaysia.

Fearing that Singapore would fall to the communists, Malayan Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman had proposed on May 27, 1961 that Singapore, Sabah, Sarawak and Brunei merge with Malaya to form the federation of Malaysia.

Singapore would have 15 seats in the federal house of representatives, less than what it was entitled to on the basis of population ratios, but a debatable trade-off for Singapore’s exclusive autonomy over labour and education.

Although the leftists were committed to the ultimate goal of unification between the peninsula and the island, they argued that these terms for merger would make Singaporeans ‘second-class citizens’.

The main sticking point, as Dr Lim points out, was that there were ‘two sets of citizenship: one for Malaysians and one for Singaporeans. Singaporean citizens could not participate in Malaysian politics, much less be proportionally represented in the federation’.

The battle between both parties reached its culmination during the referendum on Sept 1, 1962, in which the PAP Government cleverly devised three alternatives for merger on varying terms with no option to say no.

PAP won by a large margin, with 71 per cent of votes in favour of its ‘Alternative A’ against just over 25 per cent who cast blank votes, which the Barisan called for to protest against the ‘sham referendum’.

Imprisonment

THEN came the big crackdown. On Feb 2, 1963, more than 100 leftists and unionists were arrested in a massive security exercise known as Operation Cold Store, aimed at putting communists and suspected communists out of circulation.

On the mass arrests which changed the power balance in Singapore irrevocably, Dr Lim reflects: ‘We lost not to Lee but to the British, who crushed the leftists for strategic, not security reasons.’

When he speaks about his nearly 20 years in detention, there is an edge to his otherwise calm voice.

Year after year, he recounts, attempts were made to break the spirit of prisoners through solitary confinement and interrogations, to make them confess their involvement in communist activities.

Dr Lim became a counsellor of sorts to the prisoners, encouraging them to talk about the physical and psychological abuse they faced during their interrogations. Some broke down in tears as they relived their experiences.

In March 1972, Dr Lim released a statement about his detention and his experience in being taken to the Internal Security Department (ISD) headquarters on Robinson Road two months earlier. He had insisted on being released, saying that ‘history had vindicated my stand’ that the 1963 merger would not work.

He says that ISD officers wanted him to issue a public statement that he was prepared to give up politics and devote his time to medical practice, and to express support for parliamentary democracy.

Dr Lim demanded to be released unconditionally, saying that he should not need to give up politics if there was parliamentary democracy.

He says that he was asked to ‘concede something’ so that his long detention could be justified. He replied that he was not interested in ‘saving Mr Lee’s face’, and would not issue any statement to condemn his past political activities, which he said were ‘legitimate and proper’.

When asked for the Government’s response, a Ministry of Home Affairs spokesman says: ‘Contrary to Lim Hock Siew’s claims that he was an opposition politician carrying out ‘legitimate and proper’ activities through the democratic process, Dr Lim was in fact a prominent Communist United Front leader who, along with other CUF leaders, had planned and organised pro-communist activities in support of the Communist Party of Malaya, which employed terror and violence in their attempt to overthrow the elected governments of Singapore and Malaysia.’

In 1978, Dr Lim was released from detention and placed in Pulau Tekong under certain restrictions. A government statement had described him as a CUF member who refused to give a written undertaking that he would not be involved in communist activities and renounce the use of force to change government.

Dr Lim’s view was that since he had never advocated violence, he should not have to renounce it. ‘It’s like making me sign a statement that I would not beat my wife,’ he says.

He spent four years on Pulau Tekong before it became an army training area. There, he read medical books and became the only doctor for the few thousand villagers on the island. In appreciation, grateful villagers would ply him and his wife with durians, prawns and fish.

Release

FINALLY, on Sept 6, 1982, the Government allowed him to live on Singapore island, on the understanding that he would concentrate on his medical practice and abide by various conditions.

Asked how he coped with the long incarceration, he puts it down to an unshakeable conviction that his political stance is right.

‘We were the leaders of the main opposition party, supported by the workers in Singapore, and we cannot betray our supporters. So we stuck to the bitter end. It’s a matter of intellectual integrity.’

Would he shake hands with Mr Lee? His reply: ‘It is for the oppressed to be magnanimous, not the oppressor. I’ll forgive him and shake hands with him if he admits to his error and apologises to me and my wife.’

Dr Lim’s wife Beatrice Chen, who is a nephrologist or kidney specialist, helps to treat her husband. She declines to be interviewed as she shuns publicity.

They met in 1958 when they were working together at the Singapore General Hospital, and married in 1961.

Dr Lim was detained two years later. For the next 15 years, they saw each other for half an hour each week, separated by a glass panel, and spoke by telephone.

‘The fact that we can see each other is a relief,’ he says. ‘Our common struggle was a unifying force. We understood each other. She kept on encouraging me, giving me moral support…it was very hard for her. She’s a great woman.’

The couple have one son, who is now working in the National University of Singapore. ‘He was five months old when I was arrested. When I came out, my wife was in menopause. I missed the joy of bringing up my own son.’

When Dr Lim is not seeing patients, he catches up on current affairs, surfs the Internet, and reads political philosophy – currently, Bertrand Russell’s A History Of Western Philosophy. He also paints as a hobby.

Step into his condominium home off Mountbatten Road, and you will be greeted by a visual feast of paintings – of scenery, flowers and women – all strictly non-political.

But one has a Chinese couplet which reads: Befriend a thousand books, and have the spine to stand by your beliefs.

____________________

Insight
Let other voices add to Singapore Story
Janadas Devan, Senior Writer
1214 words
28 July 2007
Straits Times
STIMES
English
(c) 2007 Singapore Press Holdings Limited
‘FOR God’s sake, let us sit upon the ground / And tell sad stories of the death of kings.’

So says Shakespeare’s Richard II. He gets rather grisly after that. ‘How some have been deposed,’ he goes on to say, ‘some slain in war, / Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed; / Some poisoned by their wives, some sleeping killed.’

So why would Richard II want to hear such tales? Well, in part, because he knows they prophesy his own: ‘For within the hollow crown / That rounds the mortal temples of a king / Keeps Death his court.’

In the final analysis, that is why we tell stories, including histories. ‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it,’ warned George Santayana. Actually, even those who do remember the past, like Richard II, can be condemned to repeat it. But since we cannot be human without memory, even that – the saddest of tales, the inescapability of tragedy, of death – is worth hearing.

We tell stories because we are human. We tell stories because there is no other way to remember ourselves. We tell stories so as to understand ourselves, our societies, our species. We tell stories to piece together past, present and future. We tell stories to stave off death. We tell stories.

THAT was one way of putting it – a rather portentous, though not irrelevant, preliminary to some mundane reflections on the writing and teaching of history in Singapore.

Firstly, the writing of it: Why should it be done? A good place to begin would be that famous Santayana quote. To understand what the philosopher was getting at, one must read his warning in its context. Santayana wrote in The Life Of Reason:

‘Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. When change is absolute there remains no being to improve and no direction is set for possible improvement: and when experience is not retained, as among savages, infancy is perpetual. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. In the first stage of life the mind is frivolous and easily distracted, it misses progress by failing in consecutiveness and persistence. This is the condition of children and barbarians, in which instinct has learnt nothing from experience.’

That applies especially to new countries. Singaporeans must have a history so as to avoid a perpetual infancy. It would be impossible to grasp our progress without memory. We cannot even begin to have a conversation about how we might move forward without knowing how we got here. A people without history are like ‘barbarians’, with instincts uninformed by experience. That is what Santayana meant when he said that ‘those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it’. They live in a perpetual present – now, now, now, ad infinitum – incapable of foresight because without hindsight, and thus condemned to a perpetual infancy. Why must we write and read our history? It is quite simple actually – to grow up!

Secondly, there is no such thing as a history without interpretation. Every report of ‘historical facts’ is ‘shot through and through with theoretical interpretation’, as another philosopher, A.N. Whitehead, put it. The notion of a history without interpretation ‘can only occur to minds… unable to divine their own unspoken limitations’.

For this reason, we should welcome varieties of historical accounts. It is good news that former Members of Parliament are writing their autobiographies. An account of Singapore without Mr Lee Kuan Yew would be like a play without a protagonist. An account without all the other players, big and small, who swelled Singapore’s progress, would be like a protagonist without a play.

Nor should we forget the protagonist had opponents. A slew of memoirs by senior leaders of the Malayan Communist Party have appeared recently – among them Mr Chin Peng, Mr Eu Chooi Yip and Mr Fang Chuang Pi (‘the Plen’). Senior figures associated with the Singapore left wing also have either written their memoirs or plan to do so – among others, Mr Samad Ismail, Mr Fong Swee Suan, Mr Said Zahari and Dr Lim Hock Siew. Each has to be a part of the main, a piece of the Singapore story.

Nor should we forget the play had an audience. There was a wonderful letter recently in The Straits Times Online Forum from Mr Tan Lye Huat. He spoke of his experiences growing up in Kampung Melaka and of how Malays and Chinese lived in peace there through some horrendous times. We need more such histories from the ground. ST Forum editor, Mr Kong Soon Wah, plans to start a new online feature – Down Memory Lane – to accommodate such accounts.

Thirdly, the notion that there can be ‘alternative histories’ is ridiculous. Everyone is entitled to his own opinions, as the late US senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan said once, but no one is entitled to his own facts.

Certainly, at any one point, history is bound to be a contested affair. Accounts will contradict, assumptions will differ, interpretations will clash. But to conclude from that that there must be different histories, existing forever in parallel universes that never converge, is absurd.

No historian, even one writing a self-styled ‘alternative history’, can write without a commitment to the truth. That ‘truth’ must necessarily be provisional at any one point, but historians cannot divest themselves of their commitment to it.

‘This is so, isn’t it?’ every historian or memoirist implicitly has to ask, pointing at the facts. A ‘Yes, but…’ has to be the desired response, with each ‘but’ leading to amendations and adjustments. A singular ‘Singapore Story’ may never be achieved, but one cannot not want to achieve it.

Fourthly, we will arrive sooner at a closer approximation to that singular Story if historians can gain ready access to more facts. Singapore should consider some version of the British 30-year rule in releasing official government documents.

Given the neighbourhood, it may not be possible for a Singapore 30-year rule to be applied as capaciously as the British one. The history of Singapore’s relations with its neighbours – even of events 40 years ago – can still be a matter of acute current controversy.

That said, there are vast areas of public policy – finance, economy, housing, labour, health, education – where official documents, including Cabinet papers, can be safely released. The most incredible stories about Singapore – the whys and hows of public policy – cannot be fully told without this material.

Finally, if we want our children to like history, we should get rid of the textbooks. They are worse than useless; they damage the imagination.

There is a reason certain historical accounts are so riveting even decades after their first appearance – the first volume of Mr Lee’s memoirs, say, or Jawaharlal Nehru’s Discovery Of India; Barbara Tuchman’s Guns Of August or H.G. Wells’ Outline Of History. They were written by excellent story-tellers. Get good story-tellers to write for our children.

Let us sit upon the ground and tell stories – of defeat and triumph, of tragedy and glory, of sadness and happiness. Tell stories, for it is the only way we can take possession of ourselves.

janadas@sph.com.sg

_____________________

What price politics?
By Susan Long.
1885 words
1 February 2002
Straits Times <javascript:void(0)>
STIMES
English
(c) 2002 Singapore Press Holdings Limited

Since he joined the Government, questions have continued to rage in Dr Vivian Balakrishnan’s mind. What price will he pay? Will he have to make any compromises? The Minister of State (National Development), who used to champion free speech, egalitarianism, and checks and balances on power, explains why fitting in has been a life-long worry for him.

EVEN when Dr Vivian Balakrishnan smiles, his brow appears furrowed.

He seems perpetually lost in thought and, more often than not, emotionally-overwrought. Every so often he frets over something, such as whether he is a ‘good enough’ father, ‘deserves’ his success in medicine or can ‘pay the price’ of his new political office.

But just when he gets irretrievably bleak and morose, the clouds dissipate just as swiftly and he bursts forth with a megawatt grin or an amusing anecdote. Then all becomes sunny and light again, at least for a while.

Indeed, his body language speaks volumes during the hour-long interview at his Maxwell Road office. Every now and then, the eye specialist-turned-Minister of State (National Development) clutches his knee to his chest and rocks himself back and forth, while dissecting each question like a surgeon.

‘I’m my own harshest critic,’ he expels suddenly, his eyes fixed somewhere in the distance, without addressing anyone in particular.

‘I kept asking myself, why am I doing this? Am I sure it’s for the right reasons? Am I sure I am willing to pay the price? Am I sure I won’t compromise?

‘I had to resolve all these in my mind.’

There is nothing flippant at all about the 40-year-old former chief executive officer of Singapore General Hospital.

As a vocal opponent of the People’s Action Party most of his adult life, he had locked horns with the Government over issues ranging from the social divisiveness of ethnic self-help groups to the use of Housing Board flat upgrading as an election carrot.

Fitting in has been a life-long worry of his, he lets on. It plagued him especially when a ‘very persuasive’ Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong called him up last year to enlist him as a PAP candidate.

Then began an elaborate courtship which also involved Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew and Deputy Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, who, he says, ‘patiently addressed’ all his reservations about entering politics.

‘I was very worried because I’ve had my fair share of public disagreements with the Government. I wasn’t sure if I would fit, ‘ recalls the long-time champion of free speech, egalitarianism, and checks and balances on power.

In the end, he says he was convinced that the party was not looking to make him compromise or lose his integrity.

Still, it took him eight months of ‘intense soul-searching’ and countless ‘sleepless nights’ before he decided to stand under the lightning and circle banner in the last General Election. Most of it was spent, in his characteristic fashion, vexing over whether he was worthy of the calling.

Reflecting on the politicians he admires for their strength of character and ability to sacrifice for their beliefs, he singles out former Barisan Sosialis stalwart Dr Lim Hock Siew, who spent 20 years in detention.

‘So I look at this guy, rightly or wrongly, this is a politician. He has paid the price for it. Am I capable of paying that kind of price?

‘Actually, you’ll never know untilyou are called to pay the price,’ he says, still looking tormented.

So, one month into his new job, has he resolved all his issues yet?

He broods: ‘I’d be lying if I told you I don’t still nurse some anxieties that I’m not the right person for the role. I am leaving a comfort zone, medicine, which I’ve spent more than 20 years in… Trading it in for something uncertain carries its fair share of risks.’

What about all the talk that he bartered for a government position before he agreed to run in the election?

‘If I entered politics to advance my career and compromised myself to achieve that, I wouldn’t be able to look at myself in the mirror,’ he says.

He knows there is talk that he has sold out.

‘If you go on the Internet, people say I’m a turncoat and traitor,’ he says solemnly. ‘My friends are worried that I will compromise or pay a penalty for not being able to compromise… They have warned me this is a difficult road.

‘Like I said, you can’t win them all, let the mainstream judge me on my own merits.’

Then, with a characteristic flash of defiance, he adds fiercely: ‘I refuse to be stereotyped as a rebel or a liberal. I don’t believe in labels and I refuse to be constrained by labels. I will call a spade a spade.

‘If that makes me ultra right-wing or a liberal, so be it. I am not going to take a position for the sake of it. I’m going to say and do what is right.’

But what about the general disappointment that the most critical and independent minds among the new PAP candidates have all been whisked straight into office, where their task will be to defend and explain policy, instead of raising divergent views and enlivening parliamentary debate?

‘You have to ask yourself: Why raise hell at the end of the day? Will it achieve a greater good?’ he says.

‘If, at the end of the day, I’m in a position to say what I believe and make a difference quietly, this may also be a good thing.’

Then, in a smaller voice, he makes this appeal: ‘Rest assured, I’m still the same person, my values have not changed.’

A WHISPER of a smile tugs at his normally terse countenance when he talks about how his parents fell in love while they were both teaching at Bukit Panjang Primary School in the early 1950s.

His Indian father and Chinese mother had to confront the pressures of a multi-racial relationship head-on and wed only years later, in 1960. He was the eldest of their five children, all born in quick succession.

Since his youth, he learnt to exert leadership – from having to organise his siblings to policing their Monopoly games.

For the most part, the Anglo-Chinese School student was a ‘quiet, good kid’. However, he remembers long arguments with his father – not about how late he could stay out, but about the state of the world and government policies.

The champion debater says his father, a man who was ‘not embarrassed to enunciate his views honestly and bluntly’, imbued him with ‘the ability to think, argue and ask why something is not the way it should be’.

As a child of mixed parentage, growing up ‘looking more Indian some of the time and more Chinese at others’, he spent his teen years trying to resolve his ‘Who am I’ identity crisis.

It was the PAP, he says, which finally helped him reconcile his identity through the Singaporean Singapore policy it espoused in the 1960s, which was that all races should consider themselves, first and foremost, Singaporean.

At National Junior College, he mucked around, played hockey, failed at least one subject in his first year, but did well enough at the eleventh hour to clinch the President’s Scholarship in 1980.

He chose to study medicine at the National University of Singapore (NUS) to fulfil his mother’s dream, and grew to like it.

It was, he says, a humbling experience. He encountered many super-achievers who were ‘smarter than you, willing and able to work harder than you’.

Midway through, however, he decided not to predicate his happiness on academic grades and made a conscious decision to just ‘do well enough’.

The result: he had lots of spare time, which he used to run for president of the NUS Students’ Union, and headed it from 1981 to 1983. He even started dating his wife, Joy, about three months before his final medical examinations.

‘It was a happily distracted time,’ he says, his smile drifting back again.

After serving as a medical officer in the Singapore Armed Forces, he progressed on to post-graduate specialist training in ophthalmology and was admitted, in 1991, as a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons in Edinburgh.

He lectured at the NUS ophthalmology department for a few years before leaving to work at Moorfields Eye Hospital in London in 1993. He returned two years later as a senior registrar at the National University Hospital.

In 1999, he was appointed medical director of the Singapore National Eye Centre and, a year later, chief executive officer of Singapore General Hospital (SGH).

To relax, he says he assembles computers. He also runs – but mostly just before his individual physical proficiency test. He and Joy, a former teacher-turned-housewife, have a 13-year-old daughter and two sons, aged 11 and eight.

Ask him what kind of father he is and he confesses with a wince that having inherited a lot of his late mother’s austere and careful outlook on life, he is probably ‘too tight-fisted’. He is also ‘not around enough and too impatient’, he self-castigates.

The only good word he puts in for himself is that, because of his consistent belief that ‘life’s most important lessons are not found in textbooks’, he hardly ever fusses over grades.

WHAT is certain is that it is impossible to remain ambivalent about Dr Balakrishnan.

He has as many detractors who decry his strong-arm tactics and the hard-hitting changes he brought to SGH, as he has fans who applaud the much-needed winds of change and transparency he dared to introduce.

Under his stewardship, SGH saw medical breakthroughs such as the highly publicised operation to separate a pair of Siamese twins from Nepal, and the use of cord-blood transfusion to cure a five-year-old of a fatal blood disorder.

One lesson he has taken away over the years is that it is impossible to get ’100 per cent support’.

He has also learnt that the vocal fringe does not represent the mainstream.

‘To deal with this group, there is no need to confront them head-on, just sit down, shut up and stand your ground, don’t bully, be reasonable and the solid mainstream can make their own judgment about who is right and who is wrong,’ he expounds.

Throughout his career, he has often been the youngest member of the management team he has been appointed to lead. His coping strategy, he says, is not to ‘knock someone else’s experience’ and to remind his staff that it is their ‘duty’ to tell him off when he is wrong.

Summing up his management style, the man who became a CEO at 38 says: ‘I am confident enough not to have you affirm my decisions as right.

‘If you’re willing to tell me when I’m wrong, when you agree, it strengthens your affirmation.

‘Just tell me upfront at the beginning. What I don’t want is an ‘I told you so’.

Originally published in The Online Citizen on 15 May 2010.

http://theonlinecitizen.com/2010/05/prejudicing-a-fair-trial-the-yong-vui-kong-case/

“Yong Vui Kong is young. But if we say ‘We let you go’, what is the signal we are sending?”

With these words on 9 May 2010, Law Minister Mr K. Shanmugam tread where no right-minded Singapore politician ought to have gone – commenting and therefore potentially prejudicing an appeal before it had been decided in court. The effect of his remarks has even lead some voices to opine that the Minister could have been cited for contempt of court.

On 14 May 2010, Chief Justice Chan Sek Keong, Justice Andrew Phang and Justice V K Rajah ruled that Yong’s lawyer M. Ravi had failed to prove that the mandatory death penalty for certain drug offences was unconstitutional, and duly dismissed Yong’s appeal.

Yong, a 21 year old Malaysian who was to be hanged last December for trafficking 47.27g of heroin secured a last minute reprieve after his lawyer successfully sought a stay of execution from the Court of Appeal. In allowing the appeal, the Court gave the accused the full measure of legal recourse, even though the stay of execution was rooted in a technicality. The effect of this reprieve on Singaporeans who kept an eye on this case was perceptibly positive. After all, a man’s life was on the line. It mattered that our judicial system was seen to be fair and just, technicality or not. By allowing the appeal in spite of a strong argument made by the prosecution, the Court of Appeal earned the social dividends that it deserved from the Singapore public.

But Shanmugam’s ill-timed remarks a mere week or so before the Court of Appeal’s judgment on 14 May 2010, effectively pulled the rug from under their feet. And thanks to Shanmugam, the Singapore judiciary’s has unfairly come under the spotlight, with doubts cast over whether the Law Minister’s words had any effect on their judgment.

A trite fact about the Singapore judiciary is that it interprets laws that are passed by Parliament. It has no powers to substitute the mandatory death penalty in drug trafficking cases with its own sentence. While many Singaporeans feel that the death penalty should remain on the statute books, many also opine that it is judiciary, and not parliament that ought to pass the death penalty. After all, that is what the judiciary – not parliament – is paid to do: Listen to all sides of a case, including mitigation pleas, and pass judgment fairly without political interference, and with an eye on what is in the best interests of Singapore. Parliament ought to have no business usurping this function, since in mandatory death sentence cases, mitigation is irrelevant and the judicial process concludes upon a finding of guilt.

Shanmugam did not really want to cover this ground in his defence of the death penalty at the Siglap South Community Centre on 9 May 2010. He laid out the largely non-existent dilemma of doing away with the death penalty, positing that letting one drug-trafficker go would invite 10 others to wreck havoc in Singapore. In shrewdly side-stepping the issue at hand, that of doing away with the mandatory death penalty and leaving the decision of sentencing drug traffickers to death to the judiciary, Shanmugam went on to spectacularly undermine his own argument warning that by removing the death penalty, “[w]e (will send) a signal to all the drug barons out there: just make sure you choose a victim who is young, or a mother of a young child, and use them as the people to carry the drugs into Singapore.”

The Minister ought to know that in spite of the People’s Action Party’s (PAP) much-heralded mandatory death penalty regime as the panacea to all drug-related crime, his words represent the precise strategy drug barons pursue. Young, vulnerable and desperate drug mules are the victims of choice in their game of chance. Sending young drug mules to the gallows in Singapore has not had a deterrent effect, since the supply line of drug mules, let alone drugs, is potentially limitless.

Does the evidence reveal a mind that knew exactly what it was doing, or was the mule in question a victim of circumstance? An enquiry into these questions are reason enough to conclude that the courts are in a better position to determine if a young drug mule ought to be sentenced to jail, upto 20 years, or have life taken away from him/her. A complex and difficult problem appears to have presented an excuse for a one-party dominant parliament to throw humanity, compassion and mercy out of the window, that too, at the judiciary’s watch. In ruling on 14 May 2010 that the door was now closed to appeals that cover the constitutionality of the mandatory death penalty, the Court of Appeal has effectively put the issue in parliament’s hands.

But this writer would argue that the rub of the matter goes far beyond the issues discussed so far. The PAP’s raison d’etre requires that the party build up and destroy bogeymen in order to legitimise its own existence and present the government as the protector of Singapore’s interests, culture and sovereignty. The opponents of the death penalty and separately, mandatory death penalty for drug offences are perfect candidates. Giving an inch to either group would only lead to a floodgates argument that can only engender calls for greater democratisation, mainstream media freedom and the like. Preventing this is an all-of-government effort, given that Shanmugam’s 9 May 2010 remarks were strategically rebroadcasted for wider readership through a Ministry of Foreign Affairs press release (http://app.mfa.gov.sg/pr/read_content.asp?View,14940,).

The usual course of action involves obfuscating public interest through the state-managed mainstream media and playing up the allegedly insidious intentions of human rights and civil society activists as liberal idealists far removed from the unique local circumstances at hand and ill-equipped to understand what is required to run Singapore. To be sure, some human rights and civil society activists may well be too cocky and arrogant for their own good. But rather than to address, dissect or discuss arguments on the death penalty and mandatory death penalty, and present the issues for public scrutiny, the PAP-led government resorts to defining the problem in black and white, or fishing out red herrings, as Shanmugam did.

Yong Vui Kong has one more avenue before he is sent to the gallows. Clemency. While it is popularly thought that the Elected President of Singapore decides such appeals, in reality it is Cabinet that makes the decision, “recommending” a result for the President to announce. De facto and de jure power is in Cabinet’s hands. Shanmugam, as a member of the Cabinet, may well have shown Cabinet’s hand and prejudiced Yong’s clemency plea with his ill-timed remarks. Even worse, the disquiet over the Minister’s remarks could cause Cabinet to harden its position by denying clemency so as not be seen as wavering under pressure if and when the clemency comes up for consideration.

When contacted, a Law Ministry spokesman said that Shanmugam was responding to a specific question raised by a resident during the Siglap dialogue, and had only reiterated the policy and philosophy behind the death penalty and why Singapore adopted such a tough stance. The journalist who covered the event reported that the Minister did not want to speculate on the future of the (Yong) sentence. But by referring specifically to Yong Vui Kong by name, that is precisely what Shanmugam did. The Law Minister may well have a duty to his party to set out the government’s stand on the death penalty. But another duty seems to have eluded him – that of ensuring that the legal process in Singapore is not open to charges of political interference. After all, every Singaporean worth his or her salt would agree that justice must not only be done, but be seen to be done.

Ends.

Originally published in The Online Citizen on 29 Oct 2009.

http://theonlinecitizen.com/2009/10/law-minister-defeats-%E2%80%9Creporters-without-borders%E2%80%99%E2%80%9D-straw-man/

In a speech on 26 Oct 2009 to the New York State Bar Association that covered the press situation in Singapore, Law Minister K Shanmugam did little more than to successfully tackle a straw man.

Questioning Reporters without Borders’ (RwB) press ranking of Singapore (133 out of 175 countries), Shanmugam oddly urged for the ranking to take into account the economic success of Singapore since independence.

The Law Minister must know that RwB judges every nation’s press freedom standards by the same measure – so how could he expect special “objective” treatment for Singapore? After all, Singapore was not ranked below Kenya and Congo in press freedoms this year without reason.

Had Shanmugam revealed a more holistic picture of the press scene in Singapore to his visitors from New York, he might not have been so dismissive of the RwB report he sought to discredit. In truth, the Law Minister was probably acutely aware of the state of the press in Singapore – it just did not serve his interests to reveal the other side of the story.

Unfortunately for him, discerning Singaporeans, Americans and foreigners at large, are well acquainted with the other side of the story.

Singapore Press Holdings (SPH), the largest media conglomerate in Singapore maintains a monopoly over the press. It regularly makes profits in excess of $400m dollars a year, recession or not, and its chairman happens to be a former deputy prime minister who is a member of the same political party as Mr Shanmugam.

SPH’s group president from 1995-2002 was a former director of the Internal Security Department. The current political editor of The Straits Times, the most widely read English daily published by SPH, is a former Internal Security Department officer. There is no Freedom of Information Act in Singapore.

Only some months ago, The Straits Times had the gall to remove comments made by the Finance Minister in parliament that covered Singaporeans’ right to information on matters involving the state’s sovereign wealth fund, Temasek Holdings. On assuming responsibilities as chairman of SPH in the early 1980s, the current President of Singapore, Mr S.R. Nathan, was famously told by then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew that he was being handed a porcelain vase that if broken, could never be put back again. By MM Lee Kuan Yew’s own admission, government press control and management have been central to the ruling People’s Action Party’s (PAP) grip on power since independence in 1965.

In shrewdly seeking to conflate Singapore’s economic success against the irrelevance of international press freedom rankings, Law Minister K Shanmugam sought to justify the importance of maintaining the government’s indirect control over the press in Singapore.

In reality, Singapore’s economic success since the 1960s is of little relevance to RwB, as is the economic performance of any other country it ranks. Correspondingly, the Law Minister ought to have respected the objective ranking standards of RwB, in step with his triumphant references to reports from the World Economic Forum, IMD, Moody’s, Mercer and Mori, which rank Singapore favourably in economic, legal and quality of life indices.

In a curious blast from the past, Shanmugam also spoke of an Asian value system of human rights with reference to American perceptions about Singapore. But sadly, what constitutes this value system was not properly explained to his visitors from the New York State Bar Association. If the minister was referring to “Asian values”, he ought to have been reminded that that particular debate is long dead and buried.

In “Human Rights and Asian Values” (first published in 1997 at The New Republic), Amartya Sen comprehensively debunked the Asian Values argument. The simple generalisation of Asian Values does not adequately explain the cultural ethos of a multi-racial state like Singapore. In fact, even MM Lee had long withdrawn himself from this debate he so enthusiastically engendered, when he clarified that what he meant by Asian values were not applicable to Southeast Asia.

The least Shanmugam could have done was to express what he meant by a term that has all but disappeared from the international public lexicon, rather than to frame an argument around it.In justifying his “Asian value system of human rights”, Shanmugam went on to detail the existential threats that confronted Singapore in an era of decolonisation. Perhaps he meant to say that people were locked up without trial in Singapore because that was the price to pay for development and economic prosperity.

In speaking of a past which many Singaporeans have little memory of, the Law Minister was better placed to speak about a Singapore of tomorrow, rather than to justify the political matrix of yesteryear. After all, Shanmugam was selling Singapore as a great place to do business to his American visitors – he might well have sourced more business for Singapore if he gave his support to a PAP government that respected a free and responsible press, in addition to one that drew a line at Singapore’s Cold War era press control regimes.

Rather than propose a standard for RwB that is incongruous with its press freedom index template, the Law Minister should have made a commitment to align Singapore’s press freedom regime with that of other democracies. And if the minister cares to put his mind to it, the choice of one or two independently-owned and operated newspapers at his doorstep at 6am in morning, in addition to The Straits Times, may well serve to put a smile on his face the next time RwB releases its press freedom index.