Poverty as Taboo in Singapore

Earlier I wrote a blogpost on poverty and income inequality in Singapore, which rankled some pro-establishment netizens (read their comments). What struck me most was not their eagerness to stick up for the government – which was nothing extraordinary – but their defensiveness towards poverty.

By their reaction, these netizens seemed to have taken my straight talk on poverty as a personal affront. First they tried to deny that poverty exists in Singapore; then in the face of evidence they began to point fingers at the poor, blaming them for their plight.

Why and how did poverty become a taboo in our society, which, just a few decades ago in the 1970s, had a 55% “lower-working class” population teetering on the brink of indigence (Lim Yun Xin, “Voicing Poverty,” p. 19)? How did the poor become stigmatized over a mere few decades?

Who’s Politicizing the Governance of Constituencies?

I was a Potong Pasirian. For more than two decades from my teenage years, my family and I lived in the small housing estate and opposition ward managed by the well-loved Mr Chiam See Tong. A recent visit to the neighborhood brought back fond memories for my family and I, who waxed lyrical about how so little had changed in the charming town.

While we can now look back on our days in Potong Pasir with nostalgia, I remember what I dreaded most about living there: the daily long walks under the scalding sun from block 118 nestled right inside the town to the main road of Upper Serangoon where we then took a bus to school and other destinations.

Potong Pasirians of my time could instantly relate to this inconvenience: in those days there was only one bus service (service 142) that plied the entire neighborhood.

There used to be two, but bus service 147 was rerouted a few months after Mr Chiam was returned in GE 1991 such that it no longer looped into the town.

The Bright Side of Our Electoral System

The Malaysia election results have outraged and disappointed many Pakatan Rakyat’s supporters. A Malaysian working in Singapore, who was a polling agent, gave a first-hand account of what happened at a polling station: “I’m really upset. We tried our best to stop the fake foreign voters from coming in, but when the blackout happened things got totally out of control. There weren’t enough polling and counting agents, and many stations had no agents from the opposition to supervise the process.”

In the meantime, Barisan Nasional (BN) wasted no time in blaming its vote loss on the Chinese. Said Najib of  BN’s worst-ever electoral showing, “The polarisation in this voting trend worries the government. We are afraid that if this is allowed to continue, it will create tensions.” Najib went on to say that “racial politics and extremism” must be rejected. As President of a party that has thrived on racial politics over its 56 year-rule of multi-ethnic Malaysia, Najib was remarkably oblivious to the irony in his statement.

These reactions to the election results illuminate the key differences between the electoral politics of Singapore and Malaysia that strengthen my conviction that the institutions and political culture that will gear Singapore toward a two-party system are, more or less, in place.

Elections without democracy? Shifting political landscapes in Singapore and Malaysia

Singapore and Malaysia, as highly developed countries that have clung on to their authoritarian regimes, have long been seen as “anomalies” by political analysts of democratization.

But now cracks are appearing in these regimes. Malaysia will see its most closely fought election ever on 5 May where there is a real, albeit slim, possibility of the ruling UMNO being replaced. In Singapore, the ruling PAP had lost more seats than ever in the 2011 General Election and two by-elections, while still holding on to an overwhelming majority of 80 out of 87 contested seats in the parliament.

The diminishing popularity of the PAP may be ascribed to the erosion of its political legitimacy in recent years.

What Makes a Great City

“There is a certain something in the air, in the look and in the sound of Paris, that cannot be found anywhere else.” George Sand

I am back from my sojourn in Paris, a place I knew I would miss dearly even before my return to Singapore. My friend tried to console me, “Maybe you’ll bring back a new perspective; a new way of looking at your city.”

During my month-long stay in Paris, my dormant right brain had taken over and I had not been keeping up with what’s going on in Singapore, which explains why my blog was growing cobwebs. On the long flight home I tried to remind myself what I love about the place where I was born and bred: the people dear to me, the luscious greenery, the beautiful shophouses, a good, thick cup of kopi, the safe environment, and my relatively cushy job.

But the more I delved into it, the more I realized what’s missing in Singapore

The Difference Ten Years Makes

What do you remember of your life and life in Singapore ten years ago?

Today, Singaporeans are the unhappiest people in the world. But according to the World Values Survey (sample size 1,500+), Singaporeans were a very happy lot in 2002. When asked about their feeling of happiness, 28.8% reported that they were “very happy” and 66.2% said they were “quite happy.” In total, 95% of the population were generally happy.

No Respite from Rising Medical Costs

Before Budget 2013 was announced, many of us would have learned about the spike in our health insurance premiums either through the media or the letter from CPF.

Come March, Medishield premiums and integrated shield plan premiums will see a hefty increase. Because the Medisave withdrawal limit for each premium is up to $800 per insured person per policy year, any sum above $800 would have to be paid out-of-pocket.

Sigh.

If you are a Singaporean, you would be familiar with the saying that one can die but cannot fall sick in Singapore. Some of us might have said it in jest and our foreign friends might think it was an exaggeration.

Yet increasingly, high medical costs in Singapore is making this more of a painful reality than a joke. According to the Mindshare survey 2012, 72% of Singaporeans believe that “we cannot afford to get sick these days due to high medical costs.”

Has the Budget 2013 addressed this very real concern of Singaporeans?

Rule of Law My Foot

When I spoke with some foreign friends about the current “anti-immigration” sentiment among Singaporeans, they invariably felt uneasy about the nationalistic undertones of this revulsion at immigration, and could not fathom why Singaporeans, themselves the progeny of migrants, have taken such a strong stance against the foreigner influx today.

It took some effort to explain to them that Singapore has always been a cosmopolitan city but the rate of the foreigner influx in the past five or six years has been phenomenal, nothing quite like what Singaporeans had experienced in the previous decades.

The rather indiscriminate admission of foreigners has also impacted on Singaporeans in a big way and laid bare the shortfalls in many of our government policies. The relentless rise in cost of living is unmitigated by our grossly inadequate social welfare system; the lack of a legislated minimum wage has depressed wages, particularly those of the blue-collar workers; the absence of autonomous trade unions has made Singaporean workers vulnerable to exploitation and abuse by unscrupulous, greedy capitalists and so on.

To top it off, it has also exposed the precariousness of Singapore’s rule of law.

Is this a fair statement? Readers you may judge for yourself after reading about this incident below.

A Singaporean Core?: What Defines a Singaporean (II)

About a week ago I was looking through the Population White Paper and was greatly perturbed by the missing definition of a “Singaporean core.”

Like many of us, I am concerned about a “diluted” Singaporean identity with the proposed influx of new migrants each year: according to the projected target, “Singaporeans” — which includes a substantial number of new citizens — only make up half the total population by 2030.

As I was trying to tabulate the number of “true blue” Singaporeans, i.e. those who are born and raised in Singapore, I was stumped.

Lift the Whip

It’s been a few days into the parliamentary debate over the controversial Population White Paper and we have heard how PAP Members of Parliament (MPs) presented their views, ranging from the strong objection of Inderjit Singh to the near total endorsement of Mah Bow Tan, not to mention the usual scaremongering (businesses fold up, Singaporeans lose jobs, no foreign workers to build flats etc etc) of Amy Khor, Jessica Tan and Khaw Boon Wan.

While we give credit to MPs like Inderjit Singh and Seah Kian Peng who dissented from the party position and were critical of the White Paper, many netizens also rightly pointed out that what matters ultimately is how the MPs vote.

Speaking against such a contentious policy as the Population White Paper and then voting for it seriously undermine a PAP MP’s credibility. How is the MP going to answer to his constituents for negating ground sentiments and voting along his party line instead?