The Thunderstorm Today... (Blog post #8)

Today, at around 9:30 am, there was a thundercloud overhead Hwa Chong. The sky grew dimmer by the minute and fat drops of rain started to pelter onto the ground like teardrops, leaving puddles of a transparent liquid collected in the indents on the ground. We threaded to LT3 reluctantly to carry on with our IH lesson.

We arrived at our destination minutes later, at the almost deserted lecture theater. The room was humid and an aura of disappointment hung in the air. After it seemed like eternity, pupils from 2i1 began to flood into the theater. The atmosphere became less intense as noise started to build up, and conversations began popping out.

The lesson lasted an hour, but it seemed to be longer. The fact that it was monotonous contributed to it. As we sauntered back to class, the rain seemed to diminish, as if parallel to our mood. The next lesson was Chinese, and we were all grateful for the change. For a moment, I thought the reign of the terrible rain was over.

When I arrived at home, I stared in shock at the aftermath of the thunderstorm. My windows were wide open, and my pillow was entirely wet. My alarm clock survived narrowly due to the protection given by the gallant tissue box, which was completely drenched itself. My test paper sat solemnly on the desk, the long red marks on it soaked through the paper itself, leaving ugly scars in the process. The weather aptly described how I felt at that time......

GE 2011 Again... (Blog post #7)

Recently, I have been posting a lot about the General Elections 2011, partly because I am very interested in politics and also because this year's election is extremely meaningful. Being the only election in which the PAP met a strong opponent, this is the most significant election since independence. I will now be talking about my feelings towards this year's elections.

In this election, the percentage of votes won by the PAP dropped by a huge amount. One of the reasons is because they have a strong opposition this year, Worker's Party, and another being the two most senior ministers, MM Lee and SM Goh, launched personal attacks on Mr Low Thia Khiang and Mr Tan Jee Say respectively. This earned them the public's displeasure, thus leading to their number of votes dropping.

In this year's elections, some of the fights between PAP and the opposition are narrow, especially the one between Mrs Lina Chiam, representing her husband from SPP, and Mr Sitoh Yih Pin from PAP. Winning only by 114 votes, the residents of Potong Pasir demanded a re-election since the gap was too small. Personally, I feel that PAP should let Mrs Chiam take over Potong Pasir, since Mr Chiam himself has already been running it for 27 years ever since he won it over from the hands of PAP. In fact, he should not have gone to compete for Bishan-Toa Payoh and instead stay and continue his hold on Potong Pasir.

Another of the numerous elections I would like to highlight is the one in Holland-Bukit Timah GRC. One of the members in the SDP team there is Mr Tan Jee Say, who was formerly SM Goh's private secretary. In his speeches, he mentioned his displeasure about the government, which was his main reason for quitting his job and joining the opposing political party. He even revealed the secret that ministers get a yearly bonus of 8-12 months worth of their monthly salary, which amounts up to 2 million or more. If he did not divulge this, we would never have known where the surpluses of our taxes paid went! In this election, however, Mr Tan's team only won 39.9% of the votes, probably because they were not strong enough to compete with the PAP team led by Minister Vivian Balakrishnan and they did not have specifically planned actions.

All in all, this election was a close fight between PAP and the opposition, and the next election would be even more interesting, whether WP will earn the public's vote and continue its hold on Aljunied or do badly in governing them and lose to PAP again. In this case, both parties will do their best in serving the people of Singapore so as to earn the public's consent.

GE 2011 Conclusion... (blog post #6)

The general election this year is the most meaningful one by far, for this is the only one in which the PAP faced a strong opposition, which won one GRC in the end. Ever since the GRC system started, Worker's Party is the first political party to win at least one GRC to their side and a total of six seats in parliament. They finally managed to break through the GRC barrier which was first set up by the 'kiasu' PAP to help them secure more seats in the parliament through lots of hard work and numerous persuasive rallies. The final result was PAP winning a total of 81 seats, WP winning 6 and none for the rest of the political parties.

Personally, I feel that SDP losing Holland-Bukit Timah GRC to PAP was kind of unfortunate. One of the members of the SDP team competing for Holland-Bukit Timah is Mr Tan Jee Say, who was formerly SM Goh Chok Tong's private secretary. In one of SM Goh's speeches, he launched a personal attack on Mr Tan for 'betraying' PAP ad joining the opposition. I have seen Mr Tan's rallies online and his plans were detailed and far-sighted, especially his $60 Billion National Regeneration Plan. He was one of the potential candidates SDP had, but still lost to Mr Vivian Balabalakrishnan, fielded by the PAP.

According to The Straits Times, there will always be four scenarios in an election.

1: Opposition wipe-out.

In this scenario, PAP will continue to think that its policies are correct and perfect and there will be disagreeing voice in the parliament, which means PAP will continue on whatever policies it has, even the wrong and detrimental ones. In this case, the next election will be extremely dangerous as the people of Singapore will be extremely unhappy about PAP's dominance.

2: Only SMCs to opposition.

In this scenario, there will be an opposing voice in parliament but not strong enough to effectively resist PAP's wrong decisions. If this happens, PAP might continue with its wrong policies despite the opposing voice and might earn the public's unhappiness too.

3: One GRC to opposition.

This scenario is the optimal one, as one team from the opposition has already broken through the GRC barrier. This would mean a voice in the parliament strong enough to resist the government's decisions. This will also mean both political parties in the parliament will strive to do their best to improve the lives of the people in Singapore in order to secure their places in the next election so it benefits everyone.

4: Large portion to opposition.

In this scenario, there might be cabinet change, which is extremely undesired by everybody as it would mean a great loss of talented ministers already in the parliament, which will be extremely detrimental to Singapore in the long run.

In this election, the result came out as the optimal one, with six seats in total to Worker's Party. This will ensure that there is enough opposition in the government to resist or stop any wrong decisions by the PAP which would result in detrimental effects.

Worker's Party Rally @ Kallang... (Blog post #5)

Yesterday, my family and I went to the Worker's Party's Rally to have a new experience, entirely different from the one at PAP's rally. Apparently, many more people are interested in what WP has to say rather than just listening to PAP droning on and on about their past achievements and the benefits of voting for them. When we reached Kallang Sports Stadium at 7 pm, we found that the whole stadium was already packed with people and with many more standing outside, trying to take a peek of what was going on in front. As for my family, we were forced to spread a groundsheet and sit on it for the entire duration, without a hint of what was going on in front. We were only able to hear the speakers share their thoughts and opinions and the benefits of voting for them. One distinct difference was that the people viewing the WP's rally cheered and supported WP without any prompt while the PAP supporters only cheered and whistled upon a shout from one of the PAP members. This just goes to show how unpopular PAP is right now.

In the past, PAP was in WP's position, and they had about the same number of supporters, according to my father. However, they had much better policies and insights for future Singapore, especially Mr Lee Kuan Yew, also heading the party back then. Now that WP is in PAP's position in the past, they will have to work harder to win the public's hearts.

According to my parents, Worker's Party has several potential candidates with high education standards to match some of PAP's. In fact, I think that they will win Aljunied GRC and perhaps Kallang too. However, MM Lee Kuan Yew mentioned that if the peopel of these towns voted for WP, he would wish them "good luck" and give them 5 years to ruminate and regret their decisions, which he is confident that they will. I feel that he should not have said this. By saying this, he is insulting the capabilities of the members of WP and also doubting their abilities of governing as well as the PAP themselves. Moreover, this just displays the fact that he has no sportsmanship.

Personally, I respect the PAP for governing Singapore well for the past 50 years, especially MM Lee Kuan Yew who practically devoted his whole life to politics to help improve the living of the people in Singapore as well as upgrading our living conditions.

PAP Rally At Aljunied GRC... (blog post #4)

Just yesterday, I went to Aljunied Sports Stadium at 7pm to view the rally speech given by Mr George Yeo, Minister for Foreign Affairs, and his team. Apparently, the Worker's Party is much more popular at Aljunied as according to my parents, the Worker's Party held their rally the previous day. During their rally, the stadium was full at around 6pm, and at 7, people who still came in had to stand on the football field as the stands were all full. However, when PAP held theirs, my family still managed to grab some seats at 7pm, with our food which we bought. Moreover, the papers even stated that PAP had to use coaches to bring in people who initially did not want to go to the rally to make up the crowd and force them to stay there and support the speakers. This really shows how well the opposition is doing and how unpopular PAP is.

According to my parents, a group of people behind them were complaining that "PAP cheated them". The reason behind this was that in the previous election, Mr Goh Chok Tong stated that he would set aside a total of around 200 million dollars to upgrade the estates in two of the towns in Singapore. However, he did not do so afterwards as one of his conditions was the voting for him by the majority of the people. This only earned him the discontent of those who voted for him.

Personally, I hope that PAP will win. Partially because they have several talented people as well as the experience of governing Singapore for already 45 years. Furthermore, they are the ones who developed Singapore from scratch and should deserve the position of the government of Singapore. Finally, I feel that we should be grateful to PAP for making Singapore what it is today, especially MM Lee Kuan Yew.