The Anti Neo-Democracy Theorist

Is it Election Time with this annoucement of massive upgrading all over the Island?

Will Tampines, a GRC which traditionally return more non-PAP votes as compared to other GRCS in recent elections, be contested again?

Will the NSP, WP or SDP contest Tampines? NSP/SDA has contested Tampines North Ward in every elections under different GRCs, will they do so again?

Should opposition wards, whose residents also pay taxes, be excluded from the upgrading programme?

When are elections?

HDB upgrading programme speeds up with 64 precincts chosen for 2006
By Farah Abdul Rahim, Channel NewsAsia

The HDB upgrading programme will be on the fast track islandwide with the government pumping in some S$600 million to upgrade 64 precincts next year.

On top of that, town councils will also spend S$14 million to renovate 100 blocks as part of the Town Council-Lift Upgrading programme.

3,800 old blocks islandwide needed to be rejuvenated so there would be no let up in the upgrading programme, said National Development Minister Mah Bow Tan.

Two years ago, 24 precincts were upgraded.

This year, 46 precincts got a new look.

Next year, it will be increased by some 50 per cent to 64 precincts - 6 will undergo the Main Upgrading programme, 15, the Interim Upgrading programme and 43 precincts will enjoy the Lift Upgrading programme.

The opposition wards of Potong Pasir and Hougang are not included nor have they applied to use their town councils’ sinking funds for lift upgrading.

Lift upgrading is heavily subsidised, and residents and the town councils also co-share the costs with owners paying no more than $3,000 per flat.

So. the announcement was music to the ears of the senior citizens at Tampines North Community Club.

And when asked if this was a pre-election sweetener, Mr Mah said: “The upgrading programme is a major platform, a promise of the government. We made this promise every election, not just this election, the coming election but every election - and the important thing is that we have to fulfil this commitment.”

Tampines GRC also unveiled a S$332 million 5-year plan which includes fitness corners, covered linkways, cycling tracks and lift upgrading.

Tampines is representative of a middle-aged housing estate in Singapore, with an increasing number of elderly residents, where many blocks don’t have lifts that stop on every floor.

To address this, the Lift Upgrading Programme will ensure that residents islandwide get lift access on every floor within the next 10 years so that elderly residents will enjoy easy access to their own homes.

The lift upgrading programme is expected to cost some S$5 billion over the next decade.

So does Mr Mah expect a contest in Tampines in the general election, due by June 2007?

He said: “It’s a contest of ideas, contest of plans and programmes - let the residents choose and the ultimate winner will be the residents - so I hope yes, there will be some form of contest.”

But exactly when the elections will be is still anybody’s guess. - CNA /ch

I agree with this statement:

“We’ve been very formulaic in our approach to success, both as individuals and as a nation; and I think we’ve got to break out of all this, and think wildly …”

Making some headway in

the remaking of republic

Star, Malaysia

November 20, 2005

Insight Down South By Seah Chiang Nee

THREE years ago, there was hardly a newspaper in Singapore without the word “restructure” in the headlines.

The press was taking the cue from the government’s launch of a two-year exercise to thrash out, with views from a cross-section of citizens, a plan to remake the country – and the economy – to face the 21st century.

Of their 74 proposals, 60 were accepted last year. So how much of Singapore has been restructured?

On hindsight, some commentators now believe that the word “restructure” was an over-statement and this had resulted in public over-expectation.

It is a matter of perception. During the overzealous reporting, Singaporeans had taken it to mean a dramatic transformation of society – or the economy – and are somewhat disappointed with what has emerged.

“No cows are too sacred to be slaughtered” was the pledge. People had come to expect a brand new Singapore.

So far, few – if any – of the sacred cows – outside education – have been killed.

The changes are, they say, merely cosmetic, a tinkling with the system rather than restructuring.

But realists who had believed that the People’s Action Party would never tear down what it had built for a completely new one (especially when Lee Kuan Yew is around), thought the changes were significant.

At any rate, it is a worthwhile operation because the public had participated in mapping the state’s future. Singapore today is better and more relaxed for it.

Impact there has been, including the following:

Education: Impressive. The biggest restructuring lies in this area. The Ministry of Education has worked feverishly to move away from an exam-oriented, rote-learning system to one that produces thinking students with diverse skills.

Many schools have changed beyond recognition. Whether Singapore can evolve into a creative, high-skill services economy will depend on the exercise succeeding.

Economy: The exercise produced new ideas but with mixed outcome so far.

There was strong progress in developing a higher-skilled economy like hub activities in education, healthcare and business headquarters, especially in attracting biotech firms. Big plans for a tourism leap in coming years, including two casino resorts.

Poor: One centrepiece, getting Singaporeans to become entrepreneurs (less than 5%) has failed. Stifling government hold on business in Singapore remains, despite an announced intention to reduce domestic to concentrate on foreign investment. In a few places, it had even increased.

Social life: Fair progress, nothing very dramatic. Life is a little less boring.

New measures to free up the lives of its citizens. Homosexuals are now welcome in the public service; busking is encouraged and bar patrons can dance on table tops; some nightclubs can open 24 hours and censorship relaxed for the performing arts and movies. There’s less crackdown on brothels, especially in Geylang.

Politics: Virtually unchanged. It has not led to a freer political environment involving elections, or a freer press or permitted political gatherings that liberals are demanding.

The government rejected a suggestion to define the so-called “out of bounds markers” in politics that inhibit public discussion of “sensitive subjects”, saying they can shift with circumstances.

Changing mindsets

Is it enough to free the Singaporean mind for the 21st century? After 40 years of top-down rule, Singaporeans have remained a hardworking, disciplined lot – but this is insufficient for the New World.

“The problem is: we’ve been for too long stuck in a box. For too long we’ve not been able to develop a degree of mental exploration,” said Dr Tan Chi Chiu, who runs the official Singapore International Foundation.

“We’ve been very formulaic in our approach to success, both as individuals and as a nation; and I think we’ve got to break out of all this, and think wildly …”

American media personality Christopher Lydon describes “Remaking Singapore” as “a very strange and marvellous preoccupation”.

He says: “It struck me as brave, intelligent, obsessive, inspiring, perhaps neurotic.”

For it to work, this little city-state must leap free from robotic efficiency to defiant outside-the-box creativity, requiring a full new rulebook for the information age.

But that dream of self-liberation never gets clear of Singaporeans’ dependence on their micro-managing state.

It could have been better. “Remaking Singapore is a project dominated not by civil society or a free press but by the government, as if an entrenched power network could free itself from itself,” Lydon adds.

The chief executive of the Banyan Tree hotel chain Ho Kwon Ping, said: “We have to totally rethink the strategy to take vis-à-vis China and our opportunities in the world.”

For 20 years, he said, the economic strategy of Singapore and South-East Asia was to strive to be a competitive production platform for multinationals around the world.

“China now has devastated that model, because China is going to be the lowest-cost highest-efficiency producer not only of low-technology products but even middle to high-technology products,” Ho said.

“Formerly the factors of production are land, labour and capital. But this time we have got knowledge as one of the factors of production. And this is where the Remaking of Singapore comes in,” said Chiam See Tong, opposition Member of Parliament.

Setting a new direction is easier than producing a creative, thinking Singaporean or a domestic entrepreneur under existing circumstances.

“Where do you produce your entrepreneurs from?” asks Mentor Minister Lee Kuan Yew.

“Out of a top hat? The root problem is ‘an East Asian reverence for scholarship’.”

The battle is far from over. It may well take another 40 years.

o Seah Chiang Nee is a veteran journalist and editor of the information website littlespeck.com

With compliments from my friend Rachel English

Fact Sheet

Mortality:

380,000 excess deaths have occurred in the Darfur region between February 2003 and March 2005 – at least 200,000 from violence and 180,000 from malnutrition and disease.

The current mortality rate in Darfur is around 15,000 people per month; that is approximately 500 deaths per day or 20 deaths every hour.

From Conflict to Ethnic Cleansing:

The Darfur conflict began in early 2003 when the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (SLA) and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) attacked government forces and installations. These two non-Arab rebel groups took up arms against the Arab-dominated government to win more political and economic rights for the region’s African tribes. The government’s response was to mount a campaign of aerial bombardment supporting ground attacks by an Arab militia, the Janjaweed, recruited from local tribes and armed by the government.

Although the conflict has a political basis, it has also acquired an ethnic dimension, in which civilians are deliberately targeted on the basis of their ethnicity, as well as an economic dimension related to the competition for land and water between pastoralists (herders) who are generally Arab and farmers who are generally non-Arab.

As the followed quote from rape victims illustrates, the Darfur crisis has spawned racial violence between Arab and non-Arab ethnic groups such as the Fur: “It happened last August when we were in our farms outside the village. We saw five Arab men who came to us and asked where our husbands were. Then they told us that we should have sex with them. We said no. So they beat and raped us. After they abused us, they told us that now we would have Arab babies; and if they would find any Fur woman, they would rape them again to change the color of their children.” Three women, 25, 30 & 40, October 2004, West Darfur.

Displacement and the Situation of the Displaced:

Before the beginning of the crisis around 6 million people lived in Darfur. An estimated 3 million people have been displaced by the conflict between the Janjaweed and opposition groups. These millions have been driven from their homes and forced into internally displaced persons camps within Sudan or in refugee camps in neighboring Chad.

Sudan is the largest country in Africa and has a population of approximately 39 million. Sudan is also home to the world’s largest Internally Displaced Persons population–by the end of 2004, almost 6 million people have been displaced (from a combination of the current conflict and the North-South war, a separate conflict that was resolved by 2002). Nearly 50% of those displaced are from the Darfur region, although only around 15% of Sudan’s population lives in Darfur.

In the whole of Darfur, an area nearly the size of France, nearly every village of sedentary farming groups has been attacked, looted, burnt and abandoned.

Many of those living in IDP camps in Darfur and Chad lack food, clean water, shelter, security, and the most basic forms of health care. They are at a substantially greater risk of suffering from malnutrition and diseases such as dysentery.

80% of the children under five years old are suffering from severe malnutrition and many are dying each day.

Humanitarian aid organizations have access to only 20% of those living in the IDP camps in Darfur.

Those who manage to reach camps accessible to humanitarian assistance are at physical risk, frequently of rape, when venturing outside to collect food or firewood. Many remain in rural areas inaccessible to aid agencies, including in rebel held zones, and are vulnerable to attacks by the Janjaweed.

Declarations of Genocide:

Although initially reluctant to make any declarations about the Darfur crisis, the US Congress declared on July 22, 2004 that the atrocities occurring in Darfur, Sudan, are genocide.

On September 9, 2004, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell stated before the Committee on Foreign Relations of the Senate, “[w]hen we reviewed the evidence compiled by our team, along with other information available to the State Department, we concluded that genocide has been committed in Darfur and that the Government of Sudan and the [Janjaweed] bear responsibility–and genocide may still be occurring.”

What Needs to be Done:

To end the genocide and the suffering of Darfurians, the Janjaweed must be disarmed and disbanded and its leaders prosecuted. This will end the violence that has claimed the lives of at least 200,000 Darfurians. It will also enable humanitarian aid organizations to have more access to Darfurians suffering from disease and malnutrition as well as enable Darfurians to return to their homes and begin to rebuild their villages and their lives.

Although the UN declared in April 2004 (over a year ago!) that the situation in Darfur was the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, the UN and the international community have done little to address the situation other than to send humanitarian aid. They have not apprehended any Janjaweed leaders nor have they adequately pressured the Sudanese government (which continues to deny any connection to the Janjaweed) to stop the Janjaweed. Also, the international community has failed to support the African Union, a peacekeeping force which is in the best position to pacify the conflict but which lacks resources. Because countries such as China and Russia have oil and other interests in Sudan, many speculate that the desire to not offend these countries outweighs to desire to stop genocide by intervening in Sudan.

Sources:

http://www.genocideinterventionfund.org/

http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm?id=3060&l=1

http://www.sudanreeves.org/

http://www.hrw.org/doc/?t=africa_pub&c=darfur

http://www.darfurpeaceanddevelopment.org/

http://www.lakareutangranser.se/files/ReportSexualViolenceDarfur03_2005.pdf

http://www.theorator.com/bills109/hr1424.html

I am very glad the Education Minister agrees with me/or I agree with him on this issue over the recent reforms of the education system:

“To this, Mr Shanmugaratnam admitted that perhaps there was not enough research into policy issues in economics and social sciences. “

See my articles on the above mentioned.
http://waynesoon.blogspot.com/2005/11/we-must-study-how-we-study.html

Before passing Bill, MPs raise many questions over change from statutory to not-for-profit status

Tor Ching Lichingli@newstoday.com.sg

THE evolution of Singapore’s two public universities into the corporate domain was greeted with a healthy dose of constructive scepticism as the corporatisation bills were passed in Parliament yesterday.

Several MPs raised questions regarding the restructuring of the National University of Singapore (NUS) and Nanyang Technological University (NTU) from statutory bodies into not-for-profit organisations as of next year.

Dr Lily Neo (Jalan Besar GRC) cited NTU’s recent tender for 300 ergonomic chairs costing up to $2,200 each when querying how the Education Ministry would ensure the accountability of university resources.

In response, Education Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam said that his ministry was aware of the need to balance autonomy with accountability.

But he added: “It is for the university to decide on the merits of expensive chairs with long warranty periods or cheaper chairs with shorter warranty periods.”

However, the new framework for autonomy will include a comprehensive accountability framework to ensure that the universities are delivering what is expected of them.

Nominated MP Dr Geh Min asked if the ministry’s appointment of the universities’ board of trustees would stifle any notion of independence, but Mr Tharman said this was necessary to ensure the publicly-funded entities retained public trust.

“The ministry has to appoint the board of trustees to ensure the right people are in place,” said Mr Tharman.

Moving forward, however, it may be possible for the universities to appoint their own External Review Panel.

The minister added that apart from the ministry setting policy parameters according to national objectives which the universities must meet to obtain funding, they were free to manage their academic affairs.

NTU, NUS and the Singapore Management University (SMU) — forerunner of the corporatised model — will continue to receive 75 per cent state funding.

Several MPs had raised the concern that market forces would press universities into culling less commercially popular options.

To this, Mr Shanmugaratnam admitted that perhaps there was not enough research into policy issues in economics and social sciences.

The minister reassured the House that there was no correlation between corporatisation and a hike in tuition fees.

“Let’s not fear this corporatised animal too much,” urged Mr Tharman, who reiterated his confidence that the local varsities were moving in the right direction.

I am finally Done. 45 pages in two weeks. Written everything and anything from Asian Values to Reunification of Taiwan to Terrorism issues to the Haitian Revolution.

So Tired but is all over.

One nice article to share.

Singapore learns hard lesson

Asia Times
November 16, 2005
SINGAPORE

By Jaya Prakash

AUTHORITIES have learned a hard lesson after Britain’s prestigious Warwick University snubbed the city-state with its decision not to accept an invitation to establish a campus.

The decision was a blow to Singapore’s strategy to attract more foreign students and academics. It perhaps also is a temporary setback to efforts to transform the island into a knowledge-based economy.

State planners have dreamed since the early 1990s of Singapore as a knowledge-based state where everything from arts to culture and science and technology would flourish. The government plans to double the number of international students to 150,000 by 2015 as part of a strategy to reduce its economic reliance on manufacturing.

Warwick and the Australian University of New South Wales were the only two foreign universities selected by Singapore’s Economic Development Board (EDB)to set up full-scale campuses, which would be able to grant undergraduate degrees.

Other foreign universities, mostly American, have satellite campuses offering specialized, usually vocational, programs, or maintain affiliations with universities in Singapore but do not award degrees locally. The University of New South Wales, which will be the first foreign university opening in Singapore, will welcome 500 students in 2007.

Meanwhile, many people are asking what went wrong with Warwick? That may be best answered by how Warwick’s supreme governing body - the senate - expressed its displeasure through its 48 members. It would appear the snub was all about the school’s lifestyle and reputation - in essence the “Warwick way of life”.

The bottom line was that Warwick’s senate was concerned about academic freedom, Reuters news agency reported. “In the absence of a positive commitment from the academic community, [the council] resolves not to proceed with the plan for a second comprehensive campus of the University of Warwick, in Singapore,” the university said in a statement.

Thio Li-ann, a Singapore law professor who drew up an advisory report for Warwick University, warned the school that “the government will intervene if academic reports cast a negative light on their policies”, Reuters reported. Singapore requires foreign educational institutions to abstain from interfering in its domestic affairs.

Thus, it clearly came down to a clash of values.

Where freedom flows

According to reports carried in Britain’s Financial Times, the university had sought guarantees from Singapore on the protection of its students in such areas such as freedom of assembly, speech and media, as well as in religious practices. (Currently, Jehovah Witness adherents are kept on a short leash in Singapore, because of their opposition to compulsory national service.)

That a university known for its research prowess had to seek such a guarantee as a first step meant it had fears that needed placating. Warwick was evidently not willing to risk setting up a campus without getting guarantees on academic freedom.

As opposed to some other universities, Warwick’s expertise and reputation lie mainly in its social science programs, where a great deal of analysis and probing is required for its academics to present their papers. Endangering or taking that avenue away - ie curtailing aspects of the research process so as to cause its academics to fall into disfavor with authorities - may have been what worked against Singapore’s bid to attract the university.

Warwick also would have drawn lessons from the experiences and disillusionment of noted Singapore novelist and academic, Catherine Lim, whose 1994 essay The Great Affective Divide in the Straits Times newspaper invited sharp rebukes from the authorities. In the essay, she writes of “an emotional estrangement between the government and the people”. It was only this year that she was able to get one of her essays published in the paper.

Yet another academic, Cherian George, was also similarly rebuked for remarks that did not endear him to the authorities. And a disparaging article for the International Herald Tribune on the containment of political opposition in Singapore also landed American academic, Christopher Lingle, in trouble with the authorities.

Meeting Singapore’s standards would have meant enormous trade-offs for Warwick, which probably led the university’s decision-makers to conclude it was not worth the exercise. Using that as a gauge, Warwick’s fears may not seem unreasonable. That was further reinforced by the refusal of many academics in Singapore to comment on the Warwick situation.

Warwick, ranked eighth among British universities in The Times Good University Guide, has a reputation for diversity - its students come from all parts of the political spectrum.

For example, the university did not shy away from controversy when it recently invited author Salman Rushdie, whose book - The Satanic Verses - so inflamed Muslim sensibilities in 1989 that he lives to this day under a pall of death arising out of the issuance of a fatwa (Islamic edict).

Because such gung-ho activism cannot be duplicated in Singapore, it led one observer, Rejini Raman, to say that the country is not “ready” for Warwick.

It is curious, though, why Singapore’s EDB - one of the bodies responsible for charting the nation’s growth - put out feelers to Warwick, knowing the university’s unique social features.

And it will be interesting to see what the EDB does with lessons it learned from the Warwick incident, so as not to derail its goal of transforming the country to a knowledge-based economy.

The incident has the potential of hurting the republic’s chances of becoming an educational hub, as other universities no doubt have been watching events unfold. Warwick would have been welcomed with open arms had it tried to establish a campus where students would not have had their freedoms curbed.

But Singapore is not Britain or the United States. Regardless of what is published in the academic media, it becomes politically charged when it appears in Singapore’s mainstream media, said Benjamin Detenbeas, an American who teaches media psychology at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University.

That, in a nutshell, summarizes the tenuous link between where academic freedom flows and feeds in Singapore. But as with all other freedoms that are dependent on one another, some links just have to be expediently severed in Singapore.

For its part, Warwick would have been better off had it understood better how to deal with others holding drastically different views. After all, freedom can be interpreted differently depending where you are in the world.

Jaya Prakash lectures in journalism at Beacon School of Technology in Singapore. He can be reached at prakruby@pacific.net

The government’s reply to my letter

Question now is ” “If the observation of the MPS is left to the schools, should the school have done it in the first place?” =)

And how do I make of this?
“Since a pilot school-based YEC was launched in Hwa Chong Institution in July, some students have attended “meet-the-people” sessions in Ulu Pandan district.
However, Mr Goh — also the second vice-chairman of the People’s Association Youth Movement (PAYM) Central Youth Council —”

Meet-the-people sessions not part of YEC scheme

Letter from Jackie Goh
2nd Vice-Chairman,
People’s Association Youth Movement, Central Youth Council

I refer to the article “Meet the people, earn CCA points” (Nov 11) by Tor Ching Li and the letter “Broaden perspectives of youth” (Nov 12) by Wayne Soon.

I would like to clarify that attendance at Meet-the-People sessions (MPS) held by Members of Parliament is not part of the programme of the People’s Association Youth Movement’s school-based Youth Executive Committee (YEC) scheme.

I understand that one school on its own routinely arranges for some of its students to observe the MPS in the vicinity.

This, however, is unconnected with the YEC scheme.

The school-based YEC programme offers students a platform to broaden their perspectives beyond the classroom and be engaged in the community.

Students will have the opportunity to organise community activities.

This, and other experiential learning opportunities, will help develop their leadership and character and imbue civic-consciousness in them.

My letter

Broaden perspectives of youth
Allow them to attend meet-the-people sessions of different political parties

Letter from Wayne Soon

I refer to Tor Ching Li’s report, “Meet the people, earn CCA points” (Nov 11).

I commend the Youth Executive Committee’s efforts to increase youth awareness in grassroots activities as well as promote efforts to reach out to different segments of the Singapore community through grassroots collaboration with the Ministry of Education and the People’s Association.

My only concern is whether activities related to meet-the-people sessions would be viewed unconsciously as partisan, in light of the introduction of Co-Curricular Activity (CCA) points to the committee?

When CCA points are given to the YEC, the state presents institutionalised incentives to students to participate in the sessions and other relevant grassroots projects.

This in itself is positive as it allows students to understand an important aspect of Singapore’s political process, which are the meet-the-people sessions.

The sessions are held by elected MPs to meet their constituents, address their concerns and ultimately play an important role in the representative aspect of our democracy. It allows students to see a wide range of issues and people and might inspire them to one day join the political process.

However, if institutionalised incentives are fused with an apparent lack of choice; that is, students would only attend the sessions and participate in grassroots activities from one party’s constituencies, would that give rise to criticism of unfairness and partisan political indoctrination?

Or would it be better if students are given the choice by the committee to attend different meet-the-people sessions and help out in grassroots activities in different constituencies held by different parties, so as to understand more fully our political process?

Students from 20 schools to take part in new grassroots programme
Tor Ching Li
chingli@newstoday.com.sg

http://www.todayonline.com/articles/83580.asp>

STARTING next year, students from some 20 secondary schools can earn CCA points for meeting the people in various constituencies and organising community projects.
According to Mr Jackie Goh — who initiated the school-based Youth Executive Committee (YEC) earlier this year — the Ministry of Education’s Co-Curricular Activities (CCA) branch has granted in-principle approval for the club as a points-earning activity.

Since a pilot school-based YEC was launched in Hwa Chong Institution in July, some students have attended “meet-the-people” sessions in Ulu Pandan district.

However, Mr Goh — also the second vice-chairman of the People’s Association Youth Movement (PAYM) Central Youth Council — stressed that such activities were not core to the club, which will focus on two modular tracks: Training and development and community projects.
“We are in the process of tailoring the programme for various schools. They can choose to focus on various modules or outdoor activities, tapping on the People’s Association infrastructure of the Sea Sports Club, National Community Leadership Institute or Outward Bound School,” he told Today.

The 20 secondary schools that will roll out the CCA next year are mainly neighbourhood schools from various districts throughout the island.

Each school-based YEC will be attached to a Community Club YEC, but the working youth will play a mentoring role while students get to play a more hands-on role for their projects.

Said Mr Goh: “This is an opportunity for youth to organise activities outside of school. Even the school council only organises events within the school.”

Already, the Hwa Chong YEC is planning a community project for the year end with the Ulu Pandan Community Club YEC, which it is attached to.

Explained Mr Goh: “The attraction to students will be the chance to organise community events and also to interact with students from other schools in future through various activities. The CCA points are just an additional incentive.

“For schools, we can add value to their CCA programme. Our aim is to link youths up with grassroots at an early stage in life, to be more aware of the community at large.”
Mr Saminathan Gopal, principal of Yio Chu Kang Secondary School, said the presence of good role models in the new Yio Chu Kang Community Club YECs will be a good influence on his students.

Said Mr Gopal: “We plan to have our school councillors participate in the school-based YEC so that they can eventually organise community events for our students to participate in as well. The resources the PA can provide for our students will also be most helpful for their development.”

The idea for such a club was initiated by the PAYM in response to Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s rallying call in August last year for Singapore’s youth to step-up and be engaged in society.

Kurry Kebab near our school early this term…celebrating my bday apparently lah

My Really Good Friends in Carleton: =)

Me and Professor Burt Levin (Former Ambassodor/Consul General to Burma, Taiwan and Hong Kong) in Mandrain Kitchen in Minneapolis. He and Prof Grow treated us to delicious Chinese meal after our class on America’s China Policy. Most intelligent, great sense of humor and wonderful teacher.

ITs Snowing alreadY! From my room!

Good friend Ruoyang packing some food after our delicious dinner

Patrick Bigabo, Rwandan Journalist, being interviewed by us on various issues

It’s not that bad

I wrote an article few months back about “Think Pills for Generation Lax” for TODAY. One of the paragraphs I wrote is as below:

“When asked if there would be more political pluralism in the next generation, a speaker replied that the next generation simply would not care enough to make a difference. This generated much laughter — probably of affirmation.”

Seems that Little Speck has also picked up on that. She is a very perceptive writer although sometimes too pessimistic. I believe that many Singapore youths might be apolitical and apathetic but many are also able to think critically about how, why, whom they are living in and for. Young Singaporeans were underestimated in 1965. It is certainly easy again to underestimate them again in 2005 =)

So tech-savvy and smart,
yet so dependent

Star, Malaysia
November 13, 2005

Insight Down South By Seah Chiang Nee

THE Singapore teenager can send messages via SMS with lightning speed, solve a Math problem faster than kids in most other countries – but is helpless without his maid.

He (or she) is well educated, computer and gadget savvy, travels more widely than his peers in other countries, but is naive about Internet predators or corruption or real poverty.

This MTV generation is also self-centred, materialistic, and probably knows the price of everything but the value of none, having grown up in an era of stability.

That means he will probably think nothing about spending S$4 on a latte, while his father, who supports him, spends only 70 cents on his teh tarik (tea) at the corner coffee shop.

The Singapore kid may know the name of the latest Japanese pop star but not his own Member of Parliament.

These instant-noodle children will likely change their mobile phone every two years or celebrate their high school graduation ceremony in a five-star hotel.

If the teenager here can be put in a stereotype box, these few paragraphs could best help do it.

In these youths, grandchildren of Singapore’s baby-boomers, lie the country’s future.

In the eyes of respected former civil servant Ngiam Tong Dow, the new generation has another flaw. “Many lack ‘cultural DNA’ due to educational neglect to teach history and literature,” he said.

As a result, they’re becoming too Westernised. “Without a sense of history, we will become a people lost in limbo.”

Youth here are frequently placed under the social microscope in numerous studies to see what is wrong and how they can be improved.

Every society worries about whether its youths have the capabilities to build a better future. In the case of Singapore with no natural resources, the dependency on its youths is even greater.

The leaders and older citizens often fret that they may not have what it takes to achieve it.

After 40 years of independence, Singapore has raised youngsters who have powerful strengths and fundamental weaknesses.

In a New World in which countries compete on ideas as much as skills, Singaporean youths have a major shortcoming.

Some 40,000 youths were emerging annually from a school system that – until very recently – was based on grades, hard work and rote learning, rather than initiative and inventiveness.

The result is a workforce good in data knowledge but not very suitable for an economy that competes on entrepreneurship and ideas.

For years youths have shared a single objective: To acquire a degree that offers them the best job prospect, preferably a high-paying one in the government.

Singapore’s brand of pragmatism doesn’t always serve its people well. No want wants to venture out into the risky world of business when they can nestle securely in a secure job.

That puts them behind rivals like Hong Kong and Taiwan where becoming their own bosses is an ambition of many youths.

During the industrial era, Singapore prospered by producing obedient students and obedient workers. Today, in the skills services that Singapore wants to develop, these qualities are far less crucial.

But the institutions are still producing risk-averse youths who shun taking the initiative.

Chief operating officers of foreign companies often complain that Singaporeans may have good grades but lack in enterprise and ideas. “They need hand-holding” is a frequent complaint, many content to wait for instructions rather than “make things happen”.

A decade ago, the education system was intensively restructured from primary school to university in a rush to produce a new thinking and diverse workforce.

The schools have begun offering non-academic courses that range from music to the performing arts, from languages to sports. Many of them grade students for practical projects.

The polytechnics have also increased new studies to meet the changing economy, the latest being casino operations.

One weakness is harder to correct. Despite national service, the new generation is politically apathetic and has little interest in current affairs.

Critics attribute it to a top-down environment under an authoritarian government that controls many aspects of life. It’s tough to get people to speak up or become creative.

A trait that doesn’t augur well for a stronger future, youth today still prefer to leave things to the authorities for fear of invoking punishment if they make a mistake.

Singaporeans are used to pressures to perform in school, at work or in business. From young, the kids are often reminded that their country is just a dot on the map with limited resources and faced with potential threats from abroad.

This reduces the level of fun among the people and contributes to a high emigration rate.

“It started as a survival philosophy that eventually felt like a siege mentality,” said a lawyer.

But it is the authoritarian government that has turned Singapore’s youths into a compliant, disciplined lot. Most youths simply ignore politics or current affairs to avoid trouble and just get on in search of materialism and a good job.

A minority of youths has become restless, disenchanted and generally sceptical about promises of a more open society.

Will any built-up disenchantment lead to greater political diversity in future?

A speaker at a recent seminar replied: “The next generation simply will not care enough to make a difference.”

Do youth have the wherewithal to succeed? Wean out all the fears, real and imagined, the new generation, like its predecessor, works hard and plays hard and is serious about life.

These are ingredients for success – provided the world doesn’t turn too sour on Singapore.

o Seah Chiang Nee is a veteran journalist and editor of the information website littlespeck.com

Letter to TODAY

Broaden perspectives of youth

Allow them to attend meet-the-people sessions of different political parties

Letter from Wayne Soon

I refer to Tor Ching Li’s report, “Meet the people, earn CCA points” (Nov 11).

I commend the Youth Executive Committee’s efforts to increase youth awareness in grassroots activities as well as promote efforts to reach out to different segments of the Singapore community through grassroots collaboration with the Ministry of Education and the People’s Association.

My only concern is whether activities related to meet-the-people sessions would be viewed unconsciously as partisan, in light of the introduction of Co-Curricular Activity (CCA) points to the committee?

When CCA points are given to the YEC, the state presents institutionalised incentives to students to participate in the sessions and other relevant grassroots projects.

This in itself is positive as it allows students to understand an important aspect of Singapore’s political process, which are the meet-the-people sessions.

The sessions are held by elected MPs to meet their constituents, address their concerns and ultimately play an important role in the representative aspect of our democracy. It allows students to see a wide range of issues and people and might inspire them to one day join the political process.

However, if institutionalised incentives are fused with an apparent lack of choice; that is, students would only attend the sessions and participate in grassroots activities from one party’s constituencies, would that give rise to criticism of unfairness and partisan political indoctrination?

Or would it be better if students are given the choice by the committee to attend different meet-the-people sessions and help out in grassroots activities in different constituencies held by different parties, so as to understand more fully our political process?

I am very happy that British MPs have decided to do the right thing- Not to use terror to fight terror, not to expand detention without trial. British MPs have successfully stop the Slippery Slope down to authoritarianism in Britain for the time being!

Horray to Men and Women of Goodwill, Sensiblity and those who have an acute sense of retaining our own liberty and freedoms. As I have said before, to restrict our freedoms and liberty in the face of terrorism is signifying to them that we have lost the battle for the moral high ground.

Daily Telegraph, UK
90-day terror detention rejected
(Filed: 09/11/2005)

The Government has suffered its first Commons defeat after MPs voted to reject a proposal to allow police to detain terror suspects for up to 90 days without charge.

Despite desperate last-minute lobbying by ministers and an impassioned plea from Mr Blair himself, MPs rejected the proposal by a margin of 31 votes.

They later approved an amendment to the Terrorism Bill extending the current 14-day limit to 28 days.

This afternoon’s 322-291 vote on the Bill’s report stage will be seen as a massive blow to the authority of the Prime Minister, who left no doubt of his commitment to the 90-day period requested by police in the wake of the July 7 bombings in London.

Conservative leader Michael Howard said Mr Blair should think about stepping down in the wake of the defeat, which he called a “searing indictment on his judgment”.

“Mr Blair’s authority has been diminished almost to vanishing point,” he said. “This vote shows he is no longer able to carry his own party with him. He must now consider his position.”

But Mr Blair was defiant, telling Sky News that he would not be resigning.

“It is better sometimes to lose doing the right thing than be doing the wrong thing,” he said.

“I think people in the country will find it very odd that MPs, given such a strong and compelling case by the police, decided to ignore their recommendation and to go for a period they thought of themselves without any justification for it.”

Earlier, Chancellor Gordon Brown and Foreign Secretary Jack Straw were ordered to cut short high-profile trips overseas in order to boost numbers going through the Aye lobby.

Party chairman Ian McCartney attended Parliament for the first time since having heart surgery in order to vote.

But their presence was not enough to offset a rebellion by 49 Labour backbenchers, who joined Conservatives and Liberal Democrats to overturn the Government’s 66-strong majority.

BBC NEWS
Blair defeated over terror laws

Tony Blair says his authority is intact despite suffering his first House of Commons defeat as prime minister.

He said he hoped MPs “do not rue the day” they rejected his call to allow police to detain terror suspects for up to 90 days without charging them.

MPs voted against by 322 votes to 291, with 49 Labour MPs rebelling.

Tory leader Michael Howard said Mr Blair should resign. Lib Dem leader Charles Kennedy warned Mr Blair could become a “lame duck” leader.

Following the defeat MPs backed by 323 to 290 votes a Labour backbench MP’s proposal to extend the detention time limit to 28 days, from the current 14 days.

Authority

Mr Blair, who is planning to quit as prime minister before the next election, has said he will serve a full third term.

But Mr Howard said the vote had “so diminished” Mr Blair’s authority that he should quit now.

And Lib Dem leader Charles Kennedy said Mr Blair would be seen as a “lame duck” leader unless he realised he could not behave in a “quasi-dictatorial way”.

“If he doesn’t, then increasingly his premiership is becoming a John Major premiership, at the mercy of events, at the mercy of opposition, not just from other political parties but from within his own,” said Mr Kennedy.

But Mr Blair told the BBC he did not believe the vote would affect his position as prime minister.

‘Wrong decision’

“I don’t think it is a matter of my authority - of course I would have preferred to have won rather than lost,” he said.

COMMONS VOTES
90 days’ detention time limit: Defeated by 322 votes to 291, majority 31
Backbench compromise of 28 days’ detention: Passed by 323 votes to 290, majority 33

He said the police had told him the case for the 90-day detention proposal was “vital” and “compelling”.

It had been his duty to put the plan before MPs and it had been their right to vote against it, he said.

But, he said: “I think it was a wrong decision - I just hope in a longer time we don’t rue it.”

He said people would think it was “very odd” that given the advice of the police and security services, MPs had “decided to ignore their recommendation”.

‘Angry Blair’

Instead they had voted for a 28-day detention limit which “they have thought of themselves” without any particular justification, he said.

Home Secretary Charles Clarke said he had not suspected until half an hour before the crucial vote that the government might lose.

But he said the prime minister had not been “foolhardy” in pressing for the 90-day plan - and the defeat would make him want to go on longer in the job rather than quit.

“He’s feeling angry that this important proposal for the security of the nation was not carried by Parliament and cross at our failure, my failure, to actually get across to all of our parliamentarians the scale of the issues involved,” he said.

And the idea that the defeat had weakened Mr Blair’s position was “quite wrong” because the proposals were not “at the core” of the government’s counter-terrorism plans, he added.

‘No police state’

Shami Chakrabarti, director of the civil rights group Liberty, said she was “heartened” that MPs had defeated the 90-day plan.

In his final plea for MPs to back the plans, Mr Blair urged MPs to take the advice of the police who had foiled two terrorist plots since the 7 July attacks in London.

In heated exchanges at prime minister’s questions, Mr Blair said: “We are not living in a police state but we are living in a country that faces a real and serious threat of terrorism.”

Ministers had tried to reassure wavering Labour MPs by promising that the new laws would expire the Commons renewed them in a year’s time.

Other concessions included promising scrutiny of the detention process by a High Court judge.

In a sign of the importance given to the vote, Chancellor Gordon Brown was called back within minutes of arriving in Israel for a high profile visit.

And Foreign Secretary Jack Straw also flew back early from EU-Russia talks in Moscow.

Later, in a separate vote, the government’s majority was reduced to 25 when MPs backed the inclusion of “glorification of terrorism” in the Terrorism Bill.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/uk_politics/4422086.stm

Published: 2005/11/09 20:52:43 GMT

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