I mentioned earlier that the McKinsey study also mentioned the term perfect competition as one of the key to improve productivity. The fundamental idea is also simple. Under a perfect competition environment, companies are forced to outdo one another to survive. Inefficient and ineffective companies are naturally displaced by stronger opponents who could generate more output at the same or even lower input. A stronger company would also most likely mean a more productive company. More importantly, consumers get to enjoy a better quality and/or lower cost product. In essence, a competitive environment is important for productivity to thrive.

Singapore has been a great place to do business. There are many rules and regulations that build a strong system that allows businesses to compete freely. Yet, we see that such regulations are selectively applied. One industry stands out in terms of controversy and complexity when we tried to apply the word competition–None other than the transportation sector.

Many Singaporeans, including myself, were peeved when we were told that the government is co-funding $1.1 billion to help so called privatized bus companies procure buses. Many questioned the reason for the government to use public funds to assist private companies. While the intention is good, to improve the current crunch on public transport, it is not unreasonable to question whether such direct assistance is appropriate.

By co-funding, it is akin to a direct transfer of $1.1 billion worth of assets (to be depreciated over many years) to SBS/ SMRT. These are valuable resources that can generate a lot more income for ComfortDelgro and SMRT. For people who are unaware, SBS is mostly owned by ComfortDelgro, and the majority shareholder of both ComfortDelgro and SMRT happens to be Temasek Holdings. If the government insists that it is best to let the companies go private and operate in a free market, why did the government decided to interfere?

Public funds go into private companies to generate more income for shareholders. The balance sheet of the transport companies got a boost and in time to come, the assets will generate more income to the profit and loss statements. Shareholders (including the government) of the transportation companies rejoiced. In the meantime, the commoners down the street did not reap any benefit from this capital injection. One can argue that the people benefit from lower waiting time for buses. However, there is also the possibility of slower traveling buses since the roads are already so congested. Simply adding more buses onto the road do not seem like the wisest move I would expect from the legion of scholars within the Civil Service.  The opportunity cost of such a huge amount of money is almost limitless.

In my opinion, the government should loan out the $1.1 billion instead of simply giving it away. After all, we are talking about healthy privatized transportation companies. From the media release by ComfortDelgro, full year revenue in 2011 increased by 6.4% to reach $3.41 billion, and net profit increased by 3.1% to $235.6 million. The Singapore taxi operations increased 7.6% to $748.7 million due to higher rental income from a larger fleet and increase in new replacement taxis. Bus revenue also increased 3.1% to $566.1 million as average daily ridership grew by 6%.

All these figures are respectable numbers. As such, I don’t see the rational to give these privatized companies such a huge amount of money for free. With more bus comes greater operating cost. Will the transport companies then again cite operating cost increase to justify their fee hike? If the money is to be loaned to the companies with interest, the returns from the loan can be put to better use that benefit the general public.

It seems that a government backed monopolistic position of SBS and SMRT has left the companies inefficient, inflexible and ineffective. Many people quoted Hong Kong and Taiwan, where the public transportation system seems to function better and smoother than Singapore even though the fares are lower despite the fact that the companies are nationalized (and they survive). With the government supporting these companies as the largest shareholder and even allow capital transfer easily from the country’s treasury, it is not difficult to see why our transportation companies had ballooned into a rigid, lurid semi-government agency that only serves the interest of the selected few. While the Worker’s Party Yaw Shin Leong incident was shamelessly trumpeted on local media in recent times, the media seems to be pretty quiet on this blatant transfer of public funds from one pocket to another, which to me is a more serious issue.

Government-linked companies like Singapore Airlines, Changi Airport and Keppel Corporations continue to do well amid intense competition from foreign companies, suggesting that free competition is good and government intervention is not required. The issue is straightforward. If the government wants to intervene with public funds, SBS and SMRT should be nationalized. If the companies remain as private entities, public funds should not be used.

The government raved about the country’s phenomenal economic growth. But why are Singaporeans not satisfied? Many point to the ever increasing Gini coefficient and the seemingly absence of increase in economic well being (real income growth). While Singapore could boost to have the most number of millionaires per capita, the sad fact is, while the rich becomes richer (and faster), the rest of the society is not. Why is that so?

The key ingredient to drive improvement to quality of life

Not surprisingly, the key reason why many people don’t feel better off even with economic growth is simply the P word – productivity. A study by McKinsey Global Institute concluded that productivity coupled with free competition drives higher real wages and improves quality of life even among developing countries with incomplete infrastructure. While Singapore’s economic growth had been impressive for the past few decades, the ranking of Singapore workers’ productivity level has been dismal. For those without basic economics background, let me explain using an over-simplified illustration:

Let’s say Company A hires 10 workers and pays each worker $1 a month. Each worker can produce 2 goods maximum monthly that can sell for $1.50 each. For simplicity, assume no capital cost or any other cost. So input is $1 x 10 workers = $10 and output is $1.50 x 10 workers  x 2 goods = $30. The owner of Company A earns $20 as gross profit per month.

Now the economy is booming and there are more demand for Company A’s products. Demand for the goods increase from 20 to 40 per month (100% increment). The owner expanded production and hires 20 workers. As each worker continues to produce 2 goods monthly, the marginal increase in input is the same as the marginal increase in output. Company now pays $1 x 20 workers = $20 as input in order to earn $1.50 x 20 workers x 2 goods = $60. Input increased by 100% and output increased by 100% because demand increased by 100%. The owner of Company A thus now earns 100% more at $40 as gross profit per month.

We see that just because demand increase does not mean the company will pay more to each worker. The ones most proficient in using resources and capital (ie the ower of Company A/ business owners/ capitalists) are the ones that stand to benefit the most from economic growth. On the other hand, the typical workers are not paid a much higher wage since the owner of the company can simply hire more workers to increase output.

When we factor in labor mobility and demand-led inflation, we can see how the picture starts to get real ugly. Higher inflation erodes real wage (or purchasing power) of the workers. The influx of cheaper labor supply from another region adds downward pressure on real wages and contributes to higher displacement rate of local workers. In fact, cheaper labor supply would only benefit Company A more. Business owners and companies don’t discriminate workers. If they can only pay $0.50 per worker to get the same amount of output, they will only get to gain more.

In order to be better off, each worker must produce more than 2 goods a month. Let’s say each worker can now produce 4 goods a month, Company A can continue to hire just 10 workers and can also afford to pay each worker more. In fact, the company can now pay up to $2 per worker each month. Input would be the same as hiring 20 workers whose productivity is only 2 goods a month and output will still increase from 20 goods to 40 goods. The owner will still enjoy an increase in gross profit. The only difference is workers now also enjoy a higher wage. Even if the owner is to increase the wage from $1 to $1.50 instead of $2, output would be the same and the workers will still be better off. The rise in real wages will also increase new demand for goods, giving rise to consumption led demand increment rather than population led demand increment.

One might argue that there are many other complex factors but it is not difficult to see how productivity is the key agent behind a higher quality of life. The fundamental idea is very simple. With more output at a given level of input, there is more to go around. One produce more means one can now consume more.

The current economic model in Singapore that still prioritizes labor input rather than improving productivity will only create a country that distorts social harmony. Having attracted so many MNCs to set up operations in the island with low tax and political stability, the government is compelled to let in foreign labor to anchor those good companies in Singapore. But without a corresponding increase in productivity, it creates a cycle of self-feeding system of labor demand.

More companies mean more demand for labor. The authorities are unwilling to see a tight labor market for fear of companies deciding to uproot to other cheaper countries. So they yield to the request of increasing labor directly through allowing more foreign workers into the country. Having allowed a large population of foreign labor to the local population creates more demand for other companies’ products and country resources. Capital and resource owners enjoyed a windfall and wanted to hire more because productivity did not improve. So they demand the government to let in even more foreign workers. End result? More inflation, more stress on country infrastructure and resources, more social divide, stagnating of real wages among the lower and middle income, increasing disparity between the rich and the poor, and ultimately, unhappy citizens who do not feel that they are not better off even with all that hyped up media announcements of a fantastic economic growth in the country. It is no wonder Singaporeans are an angry lot in recent years.

Productivity can be improved in many ways. Technology is one. Education or training is another. Let’s not forget about creativity as well. But productivity may also be expensive and time consuming to generate and it can be easily replaced by additional inputs of labor and/or capital. Allowing more labor does not give the companies any incentive to improve productivity. In my opinion, it is better to swallow the bitter pill while the country is still relatively rich and stable. Restricting the option of labor would force companies to improve productivity in order to make business sense in such an environment.

Of course, this is an opinion of someone with limited economic training and I am not expecting many business owners to welcome such an idea. I would actually expect business owners to haul vulgarities into my face and reasoned that operating a business is a much more complex process. I am no business guru but I do believe having to do with less labor and improve productivity is quite possible. Productivity does not have to be high-tech. Good training and hiring the right people often pays much more dividend. How many times have you seen workers dilly-dallying away in shops waiting for business to come in instead of actively approaching customers or create more compelling marketing tactic? A perfect example of productivity as witnessed from my previous travel in France is a single waiter serving a café of 10 tables while it would usually require 3-4 workers in a café of similar size in Singapore. In the United States, you won’t see a legion of workers working on the construction sites, unlike Singapore where we compensate productivity with thousands of foreign labor workers.

While the government can continue to assert their rights, they are unable to stop people from taking among themselves. Simply taking on defamation suit without a corresponding transparency might stop the rumors (online at least) for a while but it’s the after math of doing so that is more damaging. Those people who might have forgotten about the issue might take a renew interest into the matter.

Take for example the issue of nepotism. One blogger accused the reason Ho Ching was CEO of Temasek Holdings is simply because she is the Prime Minister’s wife. Of course, that accusation was refuted and it was stated (quote from ChannelNewsAsia):

“This is a false and baseless allegation. As is publicly known, Mdm Ho Ching was appointed on merit and through proper process.”

Publicly known?? Like how? I never knew the process of selecting a CEO for Temasek Holdings was ever disclosed. Is it even possible to prove whether nepotism took or never took place especially when Temasek Holdings is such a secretive organization (the financial statements don’t tell much)? While I think anyone with any background can take on a job in finance, it is not unreasonable to expect raised eyebrows when someone who had been an engineer for more than 2 decades could take on the complex job of leading and managing a company dealing with investing hundreds of billions of dollars within a couple of years. The fact that she was appointed CEO in the same year Lee Hsien Long was appointed Prime Minister also does not help in quelling more rumors of nepotism.

For the link, click here.

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It was a memorable and bold moment in Singapore journalism. Earlier this week, a dogged reporter’s patience and persistence combined with a brave editor’s decision to throw caution to the wind ended in an exclusive that brought back memories of the good old days of old-fashioned reporting — and put the government in an embarrassing spot.

The Chinese evening newspaper, Lianhe Wanbao, went ahead with a report on the corruption investigations into the activities of two top public service officers — Singapore Civil Defence Force chief Peter Lim Sin Pang and Central Narcotics Bureau chief Ng Boon Gay — without a government confirmation. It named names and gave details, like the involvement of a woman in the scandal, knowing fully well that there was a chance — a very small chance, maybe — that it could get some important details wrong.

When the government statement came — on the same day but after the paper had published the report — the news had already caught fire with the on-line world hammering out posts and reports and raising pointed issues that ranged from transparency to arrogance.

The most damaging statement, unintended though it was, came from the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau. In response to media queries, it said that the narcotics man was arrested on Dec 19 and the civil defence boss on Jan 4, many days before the government put out its statement on Jan 24.

It was too long a lapse and was made worse by the rapid-fire news cycle punishing even those who take a couple of  hours to come out with its side of the story.

Why this long delay?

In response to a query by The Straits Times, the government said the investigations are continuing and “it is only  fair that we accord the officers assisting with investigations a fair hearing in accordance with the civil service disciplinary process and the law.”

It is understandable that you want to give those involved, especially when the investigations are still on-going, a good shot at fair play. That occasion passed when the two were arrested. That was the moment when officialdom should have bitten the bullet and said: The tipping point has been reached.  And we have to go public with the story.

But it remained silent until the unlikeliest of sources — the traditional media, fed by a regular diet of press releases and official speeches — put the story in the public domain.

The end result: A government caught with its back against the wall and in a reactive mode.

High pay and low corruption

When the Parliamentary debate on political salaries took place from Jan 16 to 18, the one critical point that never came up was that of a clean Cabinet and civil service. The silence on this issue was understandable because corruption in high places in government is extremely rare. But this new development, where two very senior public service officials were under investigation for “serious personal misconduct”, could have been brought up and could have added a new dimension to the debate.

The salary-corruption link is important. High pay was one way to discourage officials from wanting to have their palms greased. Lee Kuan Yew highlighted that point when he pushed vigorously for top salaries. No reasonable-minded Singaporean would have expected a corrupt-free public service, even with high pay; those who want to get round the laws will always find loopholes to exploit.

But you can make sure that corruption cases are as rare as possible. And that corrupt officials, once exposed, will face the full brunt of the law.

Even ministers have not been spared. Former National Development Minister Teh Cheang Wan, who was praised by Lee Kuan Yew a number of times, chose to end his life when he faced the heat of an unyielding group of anti-corruption officers way back in the 1980s.

Making the CPIB report directly to the PMO gives them the latitude and freedom to investigate even the high and mighty without too many encumbrances.

All these could have made the Parliamentary debate more meaningful and relevant. But an opportunity to explain the historical backdrop and context to Singapore’s war on corruption was lost.

The ruling party kept silent; so did the Opposition. I am more inclined to sympathise with the members of the Opposition because there was no way for them to have information on the latest investigations.

Lessons not learnt

Since GE 2011, the government seems to be on its backfoot with communication blunders becoming a regular occurrence. From the Mas Selamat case (official statement was issued four hours after the terrorist escaped from the Internal Security Department’s detention centre) to the wrong signatures on YOG appreciation certificates (Minister Vivian Balakrishnan said that it was an embarrassment but not a disaster) to the PAP’s electoral defeat in Aljunied (Lee Kuan Yew warned residents that they will repent if Opposition won), it is clear  that the government has yet to get a handle on how to communicate effectively in a new world.

That is really strange. This is not a stupid government, it has done a lot of good things for its people, it is respected overseas and its model of governance is highly sought after.

Yet, one of the basic attributes of a smart government — squaring with its citizens and carrying them along — seems to be missing.

P N Balji has more than 35 years experience as a journalist. He is now a media consultant.

The PM had already said that the government (or rather, himself) decided to accept the wage proposal created by a committee formed by himself and that the ‘whip’ will not be removed, meaning the majority PAP controlled parliament can only approve the proposal as well.  It’s akin to a school headmaster asking his fellow teachers to grade him for his performance but he can choose to approve whether that grade is acceptable. In other words, the PM grades himself. What I am really concern about is the capability and logic thinking skills of the various ‘talents’ the PAP government had ushered into the highest decision body in Singapore.

There is this unknown MP who calculates that an estimated 3.5 million Singaporeans pay only $1 each for the Prime Minister, and the PM is ‘kind enough’ to ‘sacrifice’ a hefty discount to take ‘only’ $2.2 million a year. I laughed. Going by that logic, the US President should be paid $300 million, the Indian PM should be paid $1.2 billion, and the Chinese Premier should expect $1.3 billion. That would mean every single head of state in the developed world is seriously underpaid. I smell a wisp of chao-tar curry in the air. Too much curry powder was added and the flame was overwhelming.

Another unknown MP re-paraphrase what the Deputy PM Teo Chee Heng had mentioned, about ‘not being fair’ to compare the salaries of other countries as other head of states enjoy hidden perks like housing, free air ticket, and (he emphasized the words) “et cetera, et cetera, et cetera”. If there are so many et ceteras, why couldn’t the MP simply list the figures down clearly? The emphasizes of et cetra without a concrete figure is vague and ambiguous. If you have the figures, back it up. If not, it’s empty speech.

One female MP talks about being unfair to measure politician salaries base on civil service salaries given the larger responsibilities and more important decision making politicians face. If salary is a measurement of responsibility, it would mean managing a $220 billion economy with a population of 5 million is more complicated and difficult than managing a $15 trillion economy with a population of 300 million, never mind the other factors such as natural disasters and strong labor unions when we compare Singapore and USA.

The fact that only 1 PAP MP Ms Denis Phua raised concerns about the revised salary structure reeks of Group Think and reluctance to challenge the decisions made by the PM within the PAP–the very idea of nonexistence of impartiality in a dominating PAP parliament. The PM said that it is still possible to have healthy debates in a PAP dominated parliament during the last General Election. Obviously, it’s not true. All in all, it sent a shiver down my spine to think that these are the so called ‘talents’ that the PAP is pursuing to lead the country.

The PM mentioned that Singapore is extraordinary. Yes, we are extraordinarily open to foreigners. We are extraordinarily friendly to various corporations. And we pay our political leaders extraordinarily well. While self-praising themselves as extraordinary elites and insinuating that without the PAP, Singapore will deteriorate, the deterioration process has already started proven from the recent problems haunting the country. The many years of self-serving elitism had eschewed on whatever remaining moral the old PAP had build up. The new PAP is an obsessed financier that place a price tag on everything, mix with his own people, benchmark his performance on growing the bank account even if it means structuring products that would cause harm to his clients as long as his own profits increase, and measure his capability in dollars and zeros. In the logic of PAP, a high pay equates to talent and vice versa.

If the logic is true, is it not only fair for Singaporeans to have extraordinary expectations? So why aren’t Singaporeans enjoying an extraordinary life? In fact, I don’t think that Singaporeans have an extraordinary expectation of their government. I remembered a time when most Singaporeans are contented about the PAP government until the foreigners, transportation, housing and cost of living issues started brewing in the beginning of the new millennium.

Despite all that explanation, the PM and Deputy PM’s reasoning are flawed. Singapore is a larger entity than the PAP. The PM’s reasoning simply means that the PAP is unable to find talents without paying top dollar. It does not mean that Singapore is unable to find talents without paying top dollar. It is important that we are conscious that the PAP might not govern Singapore forever. The fact that we have Chen Show Mao, a Harvard grad and Rhodes Scholar to give up a top paying job as a partner of a top lawyer firm renowned world-wide to take up a MP position in the opposition camp, is the perfect example of what a real sacrifice should be. Not those calculative ‘sacrifices’ espoused by unproven, mostly ex-civil servants or ex-top management of government-linked companies that only managed to hop on the coat tails of PAP into parliament.

I view the discussion of the ministerial salary as a valuable chance for the PAP government to regain whatever credibility they have lost over the last few years. What I witnessed is reluctance to go for bold changes and speeches that makes me question the capabilities and real reason for joining politics of the various ‘elected’ MPs and ministers of the ruling party. It seems that the PAP is not only extraordinarily generous in rewarding themselves, they are also extraordinary in one aspect: the lack of moral authority.

Once upon a time, Mr Lee Kuan Yew said ministerial pay needs to be increased in order to curb corruption and also attract talents. So what he means is pay is an important factor. Fine, that sounds like an acceptable reason given the political landscape among the ASEAN countries in the 1960s. Mr Goh Chok Tong followed up by saying that if we pay peanuts, we’ll get monkeys. Reaffirmation of the importance of the pay factor but not very convincing nowadays given the negative issues of foreigners, housing and transportation even after paying top dollar to the so-called talents for so many decades.

In recent times Ms Not-so-Graceful said money is not her primary concern when she decided to enter politics and yet paradoxically mention about the ‘possible deterioration’ of her standard of living. If you are not concern, why even mention it? I can never understand why would someone talk about an issue that they said they are not concern about. And now, we have this ex-general propagating that pay is not a factor at all for his fellow colleagues and himself. Going by the logic of Mr Lee and Mr Goh, Ms Grace Fu and Mr Chan Chun Sing must be offered top dollar in order to attract them to join politics. Yet going by Ms Grace Fu and Mr Chan’s defense, it seems that pay is not an important factor after all. So the question is, do we still need to pay top dollar to attract talents to serve the country?

If pay is an important factor to attract talents, then there is nothing altruistic about the reason Ms Grace and Mr Chan joined politics. But if pay is not an important factor, why do we even need to offer such a high salary? You can’t say pay is not an important factor for yourself to join politics and yet said that pay is important to attract talents to join politics. It is such an oxymoron.

PAP is such a confused group of politicians. Either that, or it’s all wayang.

In addition, there is not much margin left to cut considering that the top management of Government-Linked-Companies are already earning a very high salary. It doesn’t make sense for the CEO of SMRT or Singtel to earn more than a minister (at least in PAP logic, although CEO of Keppel group seemed to be paid more than a minister in a good year when bonus and options are included). In fact, the entire pay structure of top civil servants would prevent a humongous cut from happening since our permanent secretary alone (and I haven’t add in the bonuses) earns more than the U.S. president. In a way, it’s like a domino. If you want a truly significant reduction, it would mean slicing all the way down to the civil servants, which is actually a bad thing if you ask me.

However, I must say that the salary cut is a good step towards a more democratic society, where an increasingly vociferous population is snatching back power monopolized by the government. The only issue I have is the ridiculous bonus scheme. Even if the new proposal is adopted, the maximum bonus is still more than 14 months–a scheme that is so rare in the private sector. In typical oxymoron fashion, the government benchmark their pay to the (top earners of the) private sector but devised a bonus scheme that is out of this world (the current scheme allows bonus up to more than 24 months). The proposed benchmark based on 4 factors sounds valid but there is a deeper sinister meaning:

1. GDP growth—ok, so GDP growth still plays a part
2. Unemployment rate—since S’pore’s unemployment rate is forever so low (since the 80s!), GDP still plays the major part. Why do you think there are so many foreigners? The country’s problem is not enough workers, not not enough jobs. For this, I commended the government for doing such a great job in pulling in companies to set up businesses in Singapore (that policies is almost crafted solely to meet business owners/ MNCs’ needs)
3. Median Income of TOP 1000 Singaporeans income earners—bias policy might be created to favor this elite group. We already see the chairman of the Real Estate Developer Association of Singapore to have the cheek to warn (and threaten) an economic downturn and asset devaluation due to new property cooling measures. And again, it’s about pushing through the GDP express train so that the top earners would benefit. I foresee greater income disparity.
4. Real growth in bottom 20% of income earners—This sounds politically right. But basically, all you need to do is to increase foreign workers levy which makes it more expensive to hire cheaper foreign labor, score some political point for correcting a policy that Singaporeans don’t like, and indirectly force some companies to pay a higher pay to Singaporeans. Or, the government can simply introduce minimum wage policy, score more political points and raise the bottom earners by a few dollars. At such low salary, any increment would be significant. When you are earning $800 a month, a $50 increment would translate to 6.25% jump in income.

If you look closely, the essence of the policy doesn’t change. It is still about the economy. It is still mainly about money. Point 2 is easily achieved going by the current low Singaporean population and the low replacement rate. Point 4 can be easily achieved too. And point 1 and 2 is solely on driving the economic train. In fact, points 1,2 & 3 go hand in hand together. You can’t get one without the other two. While I admit economic growth is important, the idealistic me would rather see benchmarks such as improving health-care (made even more important in an aging society) and public goods such as transportation (yes, I definitely feel that a ‘nationalized’ bus and train service is still the responsibility of LTA. If not, why would we even need a minister of transport?) and housing (a major problem). How about replacing point 2 & 3 with population control (measurable), waiting time of public transportation (measurable), and waiting time to get and affordability of a HDB flat (also measurable) since such factors directly affect most Singaporeans?

In the meantime, we yet see another minister who just could not keep her mouth shut and start spouting stupid comments. Grace Fu, in yet another ungraceful ‘PAP-style-I am misinterpreted’ episode (see here) could do better to keep her opinion to herself. Why would she comment that pay is not a major factor when at the same time insinuate a lower pay scale would mean a lower standard of living? On the other hand, maybe I should commend her on her honesty and bravery for not deleting the post (or maybe she realized netizens would have screen saved it any way).

This is not the first time we have seen how politically ‘unsavvy’ PAP candidates are…maybe they need EQ lessons, provided they have some emotional quotient left in their brain.

P.S. I wasted a few minutes of my life reading through the recent post by Tin Pei Ling. In a new year, I was hoping for some improvement. Yet, I see another noble-sounding post that didn’t add value to my time spent. And while more than 80% of the essay is about what is already being done and how the ‘Community’ is helping and ‘reaching out’ to the public, the last paragraph talks about not depending on the government. Isn’t it an irony? An MP of the ruling government asking the public not to depend on the government while taking in $190,000 a year.

Looking back 2011, it has been a pretty bad year for the government. Votes going down, loss of a GRC, loss of a popular minister in exchange for a clueless kate spade lover who hopefully stops giving clueless speech either in public or on Facebook, taxi fares raising thanks to monopolistic player ComfortDelgro, unhappiness over the issue of population and foreigners, worst breakdown in history for SMRT, hundreds of millions and possibly billions of losses by Temasek and GIC (and for some reason they are still giving out bonuses in GIC according to my sources), heavy rains that causes flooding that are supposed to happen every 50 years became every few months (the world coming to an end??), a new word called ‘ponding’, inflation persisted throughout the year, prices for public housing remains stubbornly high……

Then again, the government had it lucky the worst part of the events occurred after the General Election and the Presidential Election. Personally, I am happy to sense and see real social changes happening with increasingly importance played by social media and increasingly vocal Singaporeans.

Okok, that’s all for now since I can’t write much comfortably on my tiny phone. Stay safe people!

MP Seng’s recent note to push the blame to TOC is also uncalled for. His own pathetic little speech with poor use of English (and yes, he was telling people that broken english is ok) language sparks a chain of youtube videos and complaints before TOC started publishing an article (sure, it’s bias, but what do you expect from a media that tends to be more bias against government controlled media? I also admit in my first post that my blog tend to be bias against the government for very obvious reasons). Such an article posted on Facebook (rather than coming on bravely on national TV) is not only cowardy but also speaks volume about his sincerity in apologizing for this episode. More importantly, it seems to insinuate utterly poor communication skills of the authorities.

So much for a ‘world class’ government.

Let’s congratulate ourselves for surpassing Hong Kong, where transportation is actually cheaper. Even my Hong Kong colleagues were complaining that Singapore cost of living is getting out of hand. Meanwhile, my other non-local colleagues were commenting how crowded Singapore is compared to just a few years ago. Even the foreigners were feeling the heat.

In the meantime, a little illustration on the historical price trend of crude oil (which affects diesel, the all important factor Comfort gave in increasing the cab fares drastically) I mentioned in my last post:

We see a gradual increase in oil price but it’s nowhere near the range back in 2008 or even the first half of this year. And trying to act all altruistic, ComfortDelgro simply conveniently pass on the responsibility of increasing taxi drivers’ salary to the consumers while contributing no part of their own.

Jump to another topic: while I have no comments on the largely ‘behind-the-scenes’ ex-president, this article makes me laugh:

http://sg.news.yahoo.com/i-don%E2%80%99t-want-to-defend-myself–s-r-nathan.html

I never realize one needs to be a genius to be ‘educated to understand the role of a president in Singapore’.  The funniest sentence reads, “…Nathan said that the role of Singapore’s president cannot be defined easily or clearly, and it would “take another generation at least” to educate Singaporeans about it.”

and,

“A lot of people think the president can do what he likes,” he said. “How to educate them? I don’t think you can.”

Wow. I was flabbergasted. What kind of job is it that cannot be defined easily or clearly? The role of a president cannot be educated to the general public within a generation! At the same time, Nathan is insinuating that he is just a puppet incapable of doing anything politically.

And the next joke is, paradoxically, the article continues to read:

The former president said it is knowledgeable people, rather than Singaporeans in the heartlands, who are questioning his previous role.

“The people in the heartlands, even though many are not very well educated, they see it as a symbol that is distinct from the government. But knowledgeable people seem to think you can do what you like,” he noted.

So basically ‘knowledgeable people’ cannot be ‘educated’ about the role of a president in Singapore. What a total oxymoron. What Nathan actually wanted to say is uneducated people is easier to be brainwashed and controlled compared to a more educated and liberal population. I believe this largely reflects the general view of the ruling party (you don’t need a genius to guess why).

The PAP will change say Lee Hsien Loong? I give them a million years to even start acting on it.