By Fang Zhi Yuan
As a true bred Singaporean who was born and educated here, I have never seen Singapore in a worse shape for the last 30 years. Even during the 1985 and 2003 recessions, there were glimpses of hope that things will soon turn around.
Our economy is now in dire straits. It is expected to contract between - 2.8 and - 5% this year. Fresh graduates have difficulties finding a job and earn a decent living to start their own families. Middle-aged professionals, managers and technicians face the threat of retrenchment. A rising portion of our silver-haired population have little money for retirement and has to continue working for as long their physical health permits.
The regime has conveniently attributed the cause of the economic duress entirely to external circumstances beyond their control including losing $58 billion dollars of public monies and possibly more in ill-timed investments.
Singaporeans are told to buckled up and stay united for the tough times ahead, but there is a lot of angst, frustration and uncertainty on the ground whether we will survive this downturn. Where are we heading ? Have we learnt from our mistakes ? And more importantly, will we continue to stick to old and tested methods of governing the nation which has led us to near financial ruins ?
Iceland, the epicenter of the banking crisis, saw huge debts toppling its banks last autumn. Its fragile economy is expected to contract by 10 percent this year. Faced with rocketing unemployment and rising inflation, Icelanders have increasingly taken to the streets to voice their anger.
Icelandic Prime Minister Geir Haarde, rattled by the financial crisis and widespread anti-government protests, called early national elections for May 9 on Friday and announced he was stepping down.
In Singapore, there is no opposition in Parliament to take the regime to task for the mismanagement of our economy and reserves. Draconian laws curbing civil rights of citizens are in place to prevent Singaporeans from marching in the streets to protest. The state media tries to concoct a fairy tale to exonerate the regime from its gross negligence and lapse of judgement which is becoming increasingly difficult and embarrassing for them to cover up.
The politicians pretend nothing has happened and the citizens continue life as before, but a palpable undercurrent of discontent and disgruntlement is growing.
In spite of the regime’s insistence that we have lost less money than others and the amount lost is only on paper, many Singaporeans remain unconvinced going by the whispers circulating around in the internet chatrooms and coffeeshops in the HDB heartlands.
Singaporeans are not naive, ignorant and stupid people. Though they may not express it explicity, they know deep down inside their hearts that they have been short changed by the regime. They have lost trust and confidence in the regime, yet they have little choice but to continue to lend support to it because there is no alternative to replace them as of yet.
We are talking about S$58 billion dollars and possibly more of our reserves being wiped out in less than a year, never mind if it is a real loss or a loss on paper only. We cannot simply brush the matter aside without getting to the bottom of things: what went wrong exactly ?
I sincerely call on worthy members of the PAP and the opposition who truly feel for the suffering and hardship of ordinary Singaporeans to set aside their partisan differences to form a Parliamentary Select Committee to probe the loss.
We must get to the bottom of how much of our reserves built up painstakingly over the years have been lost overnight in these disastrous investments. Who made the decision to invest and who is responsible for the appointment of these decision-makers ? Has due diligence been exercised in the execution of these decisions ? What mistakes have been made ? And how are we going to prevent a repeat of this fiasco again ? Are our children and grandchildren going to pay for the mistakes made by the current administration in the future ?
An independent Commission of Inquiry (COI) must be convened immediately to investigate the matter and an external accounting firm should be engaged to audit the accounts of GIC and Temasek. Singaporeans have the right to demand for complete honesty, accountability and transparency from the elected government of the day. It has to be made answerable to the voters.
Since the Prime Minister’s father and wife are key personnel involved, he has to relinquish his position as Prime Minister as is the standard practice in developed countries temporarily till the investigations are complete. The Commission of Inquiry should conduct a thorough review of GIC and Temasek’s set up, modus operandi and investment strategies and give Singaporeans an answer.
Can we trust a system which is based only on trust without any checks and balances ? In other first world democracies, the close relatives of the Prime Minister will not even be allowed to hold such important positions in the government in the first place !
To the PAP MPs out there, do you serve the people of Singapore or the PAP ? To the opposition MPs, ask yourselves if you are fulfilling your duties as an opposition in Parliament to be the government’s “watchdog”. $58 billion dollars of our monies are lost and not a single question is asked in Parliament.
Where is the accountability to the people who voted for you in the last election ? To the President of Singapore who is the highest paid leader in the world, will you justified even a single cent of taxpayers’ monies if you continue to ignore wishes of the public to request both Temasek and GIC to make a full disclosure of their losses ?
It is better that the government come clean with the people now rather than to allow rumors to fester and spread uncontrollably at the grassroots level which will eventually erode the confidence and faith the people have in their governance. Evading and giving half-baked non-answers to pull a wool over our eyes will only create more doubts, mistrust and angst.