SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Police in strictly controlled Singapore on Sunday refused to allow a protest march by a veteran opposition politician who is challenging the government's plans for a one percentage point hike in its goods and services tax.
J.B. Jeyaretnam, who has been repeatedly sued for libel over the years by the city-state's ruling party officials, wanted to lead a march through an inner city residential area on January 5 -- the day he turns 77.
Protests are rare in Singapore, which maintains stringent laws on public speaking. A police spokesman said the planned march would have disturbed law and order.
"Police, having considered the application, have decided not to grant the applicant a permit for the event as it may pose law and order problems," police spokesman Stanley Norbert said.
Jeyaratnam had said his planned march would be peaceful, like that of India's Mahatma Gandhi's against the British government's salt tax in 1930.
After losing a series of defamation suits brought against him by ruling party officials, Jeyaretnam was declared bankrupt last year and gave up his parliamentary seat. As a result, he has been barred from running in elections.
In 1981, he became the first politician to break the People's Action Party's parliamentary monopoly, and was famed for his verbal jousting with the then prime minister Lee Kuan Yew.
The government decided to stagger the rise in its goods and services tax because of prolonged weakness in the economy. The tax was to have risen from three percent to five percent on January 1.
Instead, it will go up to four percent from three percent in January 2003, and then to five percent in 2004.
The police said Jeyaretnam could speak at the city-state's Speakers' Corner, which is loosely based on its namesake in London's Hyde Park. Speakers must register with police beforehand.
But microphones are banned despite traffic noise, all speeches must cease by 7 p.m. and strict rules prohibit speeches that are religious in nature or that could foment hostility among the nation's Chinese, Malay and Indian communities.
Your opinion?? I don't think singapore is very strictly controlled, but I think Singapore SHOULD allow JBJ to proceed with this march. . .
NOTE: This thread is about whether you agree or disagree with the protest march, NOT whether you agree or disagree with the GST hike.
