Singapore- From First World to Third

1) The deterioration of SMRT and transportation in general.
When SMRT trains started running in 1987, I remember the buzz and excitement it generated. There was alot to be proud of. Metro train travels became part of our daily lives and travelling time was reduced. Happy days.
But ever since its listing in 2000, company execs (and technically PAP since Temasek Holdings own a majority stake in the entity) indiscriminately focused on cost cutting, revenue generation and keeping shareholders happy.
Today, train breakdowns are as commonplace as tissue paper packets used to "reserve" seats in eateries all across our business district. SMRT has become a national shame.

Whilst performance have gone down, fares have headed the other way. The regulatory body Public Transport Council has sanctioned nearly every adjustment request from buses, trains and taxi operators. These companies are majority-owned by the Singapore government.

The roads are no better. Toll gantries known as ERP are erected all over the island, expanding from town and business districts to heartland areas, in the name of traffic flow management. Yet the expressways and even in-roads are still jammed. Once I overhead an Australian remarking that if they did this ERP thing down under, the public would have the mayor lynched.

COE or the piece of paper that allows you to purchase a car now costs as much as a brand new Mercedes C Class in Australia!


2) The unspoken wage decline.

The real earnings, the most accurate measure of wage growth as it takes into account inflation, have been on a steady decline for as long as one can remember. UBS's latest prices and earnings studies reaffirms this. Singaporean's wage levels are in the league of Brazil, Slovakia and Malaysia. Nowhere near Swiss standards for sure. That's shocking considering how highly paid our leaders are.



An International Labour Organisation report also documents that Singaporeans put in the longest work hours globally!

3) Corruption in public service

-Golden tap, first class travels, undeclared directorships and a "peanut" salary package of just $550,000 per year. The man TT Durai was the head of the National Kidney Foundation. Instead of focusing efforts to help dialysis patients, his corporate extravagance and misdeeds were just small symptoms of the wider elitist network that the government has created.

-A senior civil servant at the Singapore Land Authority defrauded the government and bought luxury cars with the dirty money.

-Most recently, the former heads of the Singapore Civil Defence Force and Central Narcotics Bureau were arrested for alleged misconduct. Both were high flying government scholars chosen by the PAP establishment. Looks like there's going to be alot more fire fighting for PM Lee's party if the regime's foot soldiers can't start kicking the bad habits.

Corruption exists in nearly every country but Singapore's sycophantic media has always been quick to point out how the nation is one of the least corrupt in the world.

Unfortunately for them, the irksome social media has all but erased decades of cover up for ruling party.

Watch this space for more revelations of breaches of trust.

4) Ballooning public debt

President Tony Tan claimed in his recent Lunar New Year speech that owing to PAP's fiscal prudence, Singapore does not have high sovereign debt. But that's not true.

CIA and Eurostat estimate that Singapore's public debt is 105% of GDP or ninth highest in the world!

Most of the obligation is probably to the Central Provident Fund (CPF). When the PAP liberalised CPF for housing, they had the opportunity to "borrow" money cheap (the interest rate that CPF pays account holders) to fund their activities. Over the years, misguided policies and investments (mostly kept from Singaporeans) created losses that the government increasingly can't keep up with. See Temasek Holdings, GIC and other stat boards and GLCs.

This is why the PAP keeps raising the minimum sum and withdrawal age because they just can't afford to return the money to retiring Singaporeans.

More puzzling, none of the extraordinarily high debt is due to citizen welfare schemes for the state provides almost none, which is the case for most developed state with significant government obligations.

Singaporeans have a right to know where and how government borrowing is really spent all these years.

5) Love affair with foreign talent (or trash)

60% of registered doctors in 2010 are foreigners.

50% of expats earned more than 200k a year.

38% of the population are foreigners/PRs attracted by pro foreign employment policies, lax banking rules and good physical infrastructure.

30% of our private homes were bought by foreigners in 2011.

20% of A&E patients in our hospitals are foreigners... and enjoying subsidies.

Singaporeans aren't xenophobic. Many of us have grown suspicious of foreigners who are perceived to take away many PMET jobs that Singaporeans want to do. Most of these foreigners are here for the quick buck and simply use the country as a stepping stone (and Visa-less travel) to their dreams elsewhere.

Further, you just have to question the true ability and qualifications of some foreigners. There are reports of foreigners paying for fake certs to get into Singapore.

A prestigious club in Singapore had to sack its CEO for not producing a Masters cert which he claimed to have obtained.

The country's football association removed its French deputy CEO for not disclosing his bankruptcy before taking up the job.

We're not exactly sure how foreign CEOs like Jackson Tai, John Olds and Philip Paillart (combined total tenure of 4 years), added value to Singapore's biggest bank DBS before departing with very golden handshakes.

We're not sure how three expats who started a brawl and two of them subsequently fled the country before facing court, got jobs with leading banks here. It's outrageous how they let foreign trespassers post bail and retain their passports when they refused to allow bankrupt Opposition leader Chee Soon Juan permission to travel to attend an innocuous award ceremony.



Vote on PAP's track record please

Since the PAP's message is clear, vote based on track record, I'm summarising their track record in terms of Economy, Cost of living, Eudcation, Safety and Accountability since the last GE.

Economy:
1) We were to first Asian economy to plunge into recession during the Lehman-led downturn.
2) Our productivity hasn't grown
3) GIC and Temasek conspired to lose billions in our hard earned reserves

Cost of living:
1) We've had record inflation in the past couple of years- housing, food, transport, utilities and practically everything else under the sun
2) Yet wages only grow on average of 2-3% annually
3) GSTincreased 40% from 5 to 7%

Education:
1) More and more locals being rejected for the preferred course of study at our universities
2) By their own admission, the billingual education policy has failed
3) Singaporeans are balloting against PRs and foreigners for places at primary schools

Safety:
1) Mas Selamat
2) They allowed our trains to be victim of graffiti
3) They let a cold blooded Romanian murderer escape

Accountability:
1) From National Safety Council to Singapore Land Authority to NKF, millions were misappropriated
2) YOG budget ran 3-4 times over and there was no explanation
3) Our young soliders die during training but the system remains the same

GE: Lim Hng Kiang rebuts SDP's proposal to shrink manufacturing sector

Another haughty rhetoric from a minister.

Manufacturing no doubt is an important part of the economy. Back in the 70s, first-mover advantage + hardworking work force + geographical location made Singapore's manufacturing sector the pillar of the economy.
Today, the driving force of manufacturing is simply cost.
Japanese companies, of which Toyota pioneered advance manufacturing standards like six sigma, have also realised that they need to compete on cost. Hence the numerous vehicle recalls over the last few years due to manufacturing defaults.

Singapore can no longer compete on cost with the likes of China, Malaysia, Vietnam and even Thailand taking away alot of our manufacturing output.
Seagate closed its Singapore plant in 2010 and shed 2000 jobs.
Motorola shut a plant producing hand sets and 700 jobs were lost.
ST Microelectronics moved some operations to Shenzhen, Chna.

But one can say that hey, many MNCs still have their HQs in Singapore.
And why not? These corporate mammoths get tax free HQ status, enjoy low corporate taxes and get a free hand at hiring and firing anyone they want- it's an employer's dream!
To fund this corporate largesse, our government introduced the regressive GST system, which taxes the poor more than the rich.

In any case, the major components in our manufacturing are electronics output and biomedicals. The two are extremely volatile and leave our economy haplessly exposed during economic down cycles.

So with five decades of interrupted rule, one would think that our government would have moved our economy with the times, not just to achieve growth but to withstand the inevitable downturns.

Given the circumstances in the region, ramping up the services industry might be the way to go. Hong Kong's economy is over 80% services and one can argue that they may be better placed to weather changes to the region's economic order than Singapore.

SINGAPORE: Trade and Industry Minister Lim Hng Kiang rebutted the economic policies proposed by the Singapore Democratic Party's (SDP) Tan Jee Say, one of which is to shrink the manufacturing sector.

Mr Lim said the manufacturing sector is important because it creates many synergies and linkages for other industries to grow such as financing and wholesale.

Mr Lim was speaking to reporters on the sidelines at the official opening of Clementi Public Library on Saturday.

The manufacturing sector contributes about a quarter to Singapore's economy.

But a proposal by the SDP candidate aims to phase out that sector, in favour of ramping up the services industry which he believes is more sustainable.

Mr Tan, who is a former MTI official and former Principal Private Secretary to Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong, was unveiled by the SDP as one of its candidates on Friday.

He believes this proposal will reduce the dependence on cheap foreign labour and reduce the economic volatility faced during downturns.

However, that has been slammed by the government as unrealistic, as it will not drive the same level of growth as the manufacturing sector.

Mr Lim challenged: "How confident are you that the services sector will take up the slack? Yes, there are some prospects for us to grow the sector as we are doing whether its financial services, port, regional services, education, healthcare, creative services.

"But we don't think that collectively or individually, all these services will take up the slack if we give up manufacturing."

Mr Lim added that it is important to have a diversified economy and not be too overly reliant on a single sector.

Mr Lim is urging voters to study the opposition's proposal carefully because a wrong choice could have detrimental consequences for the economy.

He also took issue with Mr Tan's criticism that the casino and gaming sector was "the wrong kind of services" to go into.

Mr Lim said the sector contributed only a small part of GDP.

Still, he added that the ministry understood the potential social consequences and is monitoring the situation closely.

Mr Lim said: "If SDP wins and gets the support of Singaporeans, then investors will say 'hey, this is the strategy and Singaporeans are supporting such a strategy, now what does that mean to our future investments?' This is something very serious.

"If it's a private individual, if he puts up his ideas as a friend, as an individual, we'll debate it over coffee. But now he is a political candidate standing for elections, Singaporeans have to study his ideas carefully, compare it with what we are doing, make a decision which is better for our future, because it's not just our future; it's not just a GRC that's being affected, it's also sending a very strong signal to potential investors and existing investors."

For the General Election, it will be another party that Mr Lim will likely have to worry about in the battle for West Coast GRC.

The Reform Party is expected to contest there, but his team is confident its track record will give them the edge.

"There is a profound difference between walking the ground, and working with the ground or for the ground, and we are in the latter category for sure, and we have been working systematically and we intend to continue to do that all through," said S Iswaran, Singapore Senior Minister of State for Trade & Industry and Education.

West Coast GRC has had a walkover in the previous two elections.

It will also see two newcomers into the PAP team: former CEO of Energy Market Authority Lawrence Wong, and Standard Chartered's Head of Premier Banking Foo Mee Har. They will join incumbents Arthur Fong, S Iswaran and Lim Hng Kiang.

- CNA/fa/ls