Skip to main content

Definition of PAP’s populistic politics: Affordable housing, cost of living, jobs, GST, CPF… Opportunistic solutions like CDC vouchers, GST rebates, subsidies for healthcare, child, unemployment… fail to solve social problems.

 


Definition of PAP’s populistic politics:

Affordable housing, cost of living, jobs, GST, CPF…

Opportunistic solutions like CDC vouchers, GST rebates, subsidies for healthcare, child, unemployment… fail to solve social problems.


Lawrence Wong shoots his own foots by bringing up the populist issues. He ends the debate by saying both sides need to be strong for a maturing democracy.  And “ownself check ownself‘ is not enough, not realistic. 


Wong is in a hurry and worries that things can happen very quickly. While Pritam Singh, the leader of the Opposition, stresses a step-by-step approach, taking one-third of parliament seats in the medium term.

One side is so afraid of losing the long-held power of Singapore.  The other side is taking a slow motion approach by just bringing up unpopular solutions or unworkable approaches from the government. 


Never a time, you see the PAP is so worried of being replaced.  They are very worried about the Chinese saying of ‘fortune never lasted more than three generations’.   


The PAP and the 4G leaders know they cannot solve the urgent problems of affordable housing, high cost of living, good jobs, unemployment problems, GST and CPF.   Once the Opposition brings up the issues,  the PAP will define them as populistic or opportunistic ideas. They know too well they will lose public confidence, public trust, and finally votes in coming elections. 


These are very complicated and difficult problems to solve.  Some are due to external factors.  Some are the PAP’s own making.  But Singaporeans know that we will never find a perfect answer. However, it will cause the PAP to fall ‘quickly’.   Is this the real reason that Wong had to voice his concerns in parliament?


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Sub-standard PAP and the Singapore education system

I make a 'policy shift' when I hear the debate of right politics, constructive politics and sub-standard opposition. My original aim is to discuss about “Su Dongbo, Zhang Juzheng and Singapore education system”. The discussion will end with a sub-standard PAP, in particular from the assessment of the quality of PAP potential candidates. Another policy shift is to discuss it like a play, a drama and make it more entertainment rather than a sub-standard political discussion. Act 1 Gangster’s demand Imagine a sense in the Hong Kong's gangster movie (or a godfather movie), the gangsters' master is shouting at his poor opponent and demand him to give a price for his wrong act. The poor guy without any resources can only offer his body or his service to work for the master. Back in his own chamber, the master is still not satisfied and continues to shout 'don't play, play, you think you are hero, you think you are tiger, or superstar or acting ...
275 comments
Read more

EBRC objectives: Stop “Out of Aljunied”, Stop SDP Breakthrough and “Negative-Asset” Ministers.

First of all, we have to congratulate the Electoral Boundaries Review Committee for creating more competitions, especially, multi-cornered competitions in the East. When making changes, EBRC aims to achieve 3 goals: To prevent “Out of Aljunied” for Workers’ Party.  This is the most important objective. To prevent Singapore Democratic Party making any breakthrough in the North and Central.   To look for a solution to retire “negative-asset” ministers or reduce PAP damages. From the reported claims from different political parties, we will expect multi-cornered contests not only in single constituencies but also in group representative constituencies. The PAP hopes to have a repeat of 2011 Presidential Election. Then Tony Tan won the Presidency when he got only 35% of the votes, a narrow win.However, a win is still a win. He did in even in the very last minute, after recounts of votes.    How to achieve multi-cornered contests? By i...
65 comments
Read more

Is Prism Project Another Central Planning of the PAP?

There are 3 scenarios under the Prism Project#1 of Institute of Public Policy.  However, it looks more like the central scenario planning of the People’s Action Party. From the instructional menu of Prism Project Primer #2, participants were guided to a situation in 2022 and they have to imagine, within the Primer framework, to come out with 3 possible scenarios in Jun-Aug 2012.  2022. What a coincidence! Not long ago, PM Lee declared that he would like to hold the prime minister post for another 10 years. The other coincidence is the similarity between the 3 scenarios and the candidates of PE2011. How competitive and sustainable are the 3 scenarios to the people of Singapore and to the PAP?   Will the scenarios produce competitive and sustainable Singapore, Singaporeans or the PAP?  Perhaps, as what the Chinese say: planning cannot always catch up with changes.   And planning sometimes turns out the wrong, bad and unexpected results, espec...
50 comments
Read more