• IP addresses are NOT logged in this forum so there's no point asking. Please note that this forum is full of homophobes, racists, lunatics, schizophrenics & absolute nut jobs with a smattering of geniuses, Chinese chauvinists, Moderate Muslims and last but not least a couple of "know-it-alls" constantly sprouting their dubious wisdom. If you believe that content generated by unsavory characters might cause you offense PLEASE LEAVE NOW! Sammyboy Admin and Staff are not responsible for your hurt feelings should you choose to read any of the content here.

    The OTHER forum is HERE so please stop asking.

In Parliament, To Err Is Human

xingguy

Alfrescian (Inf)
Asset
Source: TR EMERITUS

In Parliament, to err is human
February 18th, 2015 | Author: Contributions

towncouncilMArates1.jpg


To err is human unless you are an immortal. Law Minister, K Shanmugam, had very strong words for the WP-run town council for all the lapses AHPETC made. It was like unforgiveable sin to make those mistakes even if the value concerned was not in the hundreds of millions or billions, so echoed many of the immortals. Hahaha, AHPETC got caught with their pants down. And the barrage of attacks was continuous for several days in the main media, like the bull dog that would not release its bite. I must say that the WP looked quite bad even though the public looked at it more sympathetically from the perspective of politicking, nothing else but politicking.

Now the social media is on fire. They could not bear the ruthless attacks against the WP and were finding an excuse to strike back. Thankfully they discovered that the numbers given by Shamugam were mischievously wrong. And the netizens are biting this piece of grave error fearlessly and refusing to let go, like the bite of, yes, a bull dog. It is not sure if the errors were intended or due to human error, or worse, immortal error. Below are some quotes from an article in TRE titled, ‘Problems with Shanmugam’s chart shown in Parliament’, credited to TOC.

….’He (Shanmugam) said “that WP took money from the man in the street and gave it to FMSS, to their friends” and described the town council’s finances as a “sorry state of affairs”.

He also took particular issue with the fees which FM Solutions and Services (FMSS) charges AHPETC. They are higher than in other town councils, Mr Shanmugam claimed.

From July 2013 to July 2014, FMSS charged $7.43 for each residential unit and $14.92 for each commercial unit, compared to $4.80 to $6.65 for units of each type, charged by the managing agents of the PAP town councils …. he claimed that FMSS charges the highest rate among all the managing agents. He handed out charts showing a table of the MA rates for the different town councils to the Members of Parliament to illustrate his point.’

There was an apparent anomaly in the residential and commercial unit rates in Shanmugam’s chart. They were suspiciously the same. Sylvia Lim picked it up and asked Shanmugam about it.

“From what I know, MA rates are usually different from residential units and commercial units… But in your chart, they are all the same. So I would like minister to clarify that there have been no mistake in this chart and it is really the fact that all this MA is charging the same rates for commercial and residential units ….So I think minister may want to check his chart.

Mr Shanmugam got up and replied to Ms Lim immediately, “I can answer your answer straight away. You should look at annex 3 and you will see in the first page that the MA rates once they are done on a weighted average basis, these figures are accurate, [I’m] told by MND.”

The netizens were delirious with this golden opportunity to take it out on the flawless Law Minister to prove that karmic retribution is real and can be immediate. Do not do to others what you do not want do to you.

When Boon Wan was faced with the columbarium fiasco, he took the excuse of assuming the info given by HDB was correct and had to admit that it was not. Here, Shanmugam was cock sure his data was right. Now it is proven that the data was wrong and the netizen and WP are going to make him eat his own words. His template on the lapses in AHPETC is going to be thrown back at him.

WP is likely to go to Parliament and demand that Shanmugam gets to the bottom of this error. Who did it, why did he do it, who is going to benefit from it? Is there a conflict of interest? The misleading numbers, would they affect the fiduciary duty of the town councils to the people? What were actually paid and collected and reported? The WP camp is going to demand that Shanmugam comes clean, be transparent, do not hide any information, answers the questions put to him. Was the wrong data in the chart intentional, calculated to cause maximum damage to the WP?

What was the intent? Is this the only mistake, a fabrication? Is there a rot somewhere? Were the data presented to mislead the people as the WP was attacked and embarrassed in Parliament because of it? It is not like in the courts where the judge can tell the jury to ignore what was said. The issues were reported boldly in the main media and seen all over the world. And if Sylvia Lim did not notice and brought it up, the WP would be hung for it.

There are many questions that the WP would put them back to the PAP. Would there be a consistent pattern of denial and deflection, and protecting whoever? Or, to quote Hri Kumar, ‘Why should the WP be let off easy just because it is the opposition?’ with ‘WP’ substituted by ‘PAP’ and ‘opposition’ by ‘ruling party’. The people must not be forced to accept less but full accountability. ‘This cannot be the way to go forward.’ This must be the war cry of the WP.

There are many things that the WP would be saying after the bullocking in Parliament and reported in the media. And now they are presented with the same opportunity to ask for their pound of the flesh. The big question, while the anti-PAP netizens are having a ball of a time, what would the WP finally do in Parliament? Would they demand an apology for being put in a bad light or would they meekly say, ‘A mistake has been made, let’s move on?’

Chua Chin Leng aka redbean

* The writer blogs at mysingaporenews.blogspot.com.


End Of Article​

Reader's Comment
Armadillo:
February 18, 2015 at 12:24 pm (Quote)
He authoritatively captive the whole house in attention of his supposedly hard works at faulting WP and that the whole credits must belongs to only him and him alone, judging from his rather stern and fierce expression.

But when he was faulted himself, he eluded by saying that the data was from MND, as if he should be free from all blames, quietly tucking himself onto the seat as stealthily invisible as possible with his voice lowered down to a muffle. And because he is one of the 12 central executive committee of the PAP, therefore such mistake especially a matter in Parliamentary debate cannot be accepted to had happened from him, entitling many to doubt and think otherwise of the party.

I do not support denigrating, unconstructive and gutter politics. You deserve your own medicine.​

[video=youtube;cioF-C9CQhM]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cioF-C9CQhM[/video]
 

xingguy

Alfrescian (Inf)
Asset
For those who are not experts in Town Councils Management.

Huat the Fish is a MA Rate?

MA rates are based on what the Managing Agent charge the town council to manage the estate based on the number of residential units and commercial units.
 

vtran2684

Alfrescian
Loyal
Of all the topics, AHPE is the main focus. Not Singapore's foreign policy, immigration, education, health, high defence expenditure etc.
 

xpo2015

Alfrescian
Loyal
From: maimeechai Feb-17 8:27 AM
To: All (1 of 6)
83281.1
THE SHAM GOING ON IN PARLIAMENT


Post date:
17 Feb 2015 - 8:22pm
towncouncilMArates1.jpg


When you bring a knife to a fight, you have to make sure it is sharp. When you bring a gun, make sure there's a round in the chamber. And if you pass a chart around for ammunition - this has to be most embarrassing for trained lawyer - the data had better be checked and double checked.

The lady was trying to be helpful, and provide an opportunity to correct the boo-boo. “From what I know, MA rates are usually different from residential units and commercial units,” Ms Sylvia Lim volunteered. “But in your chart, they are all the same."

If his face flushed red, it was difficult to tell. It has nothing to do with his skin pigmentation, he was plain black as coal with self righteous indignation that day in parliament. Without hesitation, Shanmugam growled his immediate response, “I can answer your answer straight away. You should look at annex 3 and you will see in the first page that the MA rates once they are done on a weighted average basis, these figures are accurate, [I’m] told by MND.” Notice that last tai-ji bit, when all else is lost, he can still blame it on another ministry. Same way Alvin Yeo threw his clerk under the bus for over-invoicing.

No wonder Pritam Singh prefers to talk to his residents. Residents which could produce the smoking gun to the lying lawyer's duplicity about accuracy. No matter what weightage is used in averaging, the two sets of rates for residential and commercial property can't possibly be identical. It would appear that only the numbers for Aljunied-Hougang-Punggol East Town Council are non-bogus.

Error-1.jpg



The infuriating part is that not a single one of the minister's colleagues bothered to whisper to his ears and save him from committing credibility suicide. Including the minister for education who took up a full page of the now 153rd ranked newspaper to wax lyrical about betraying residents' trust, and boasting "the real check in this instance came from the Government." If this is the kind of fact check Heng Swee Keat is proud about, we might as well dismiss the upcoming budget tables altogether, and skip straight to the comics section.

The real comic in the house has to be Khaw Boon Wan, who put on his best poker face to declare, "I am also a very religious man. So, where possible, I try to help. Whoever. Doesn't matter. ...If you are honest, you are clean, I would do my best to help you." By not helping Shanmugam in his moment of need - the flawed tabulation was attributed to his MND ministry - the logical inference is that one of them is definitely dishonest.



Tattler

*The writer blogs at http://singaporedesk.blogspot.sg/
 

xpo2015

Alfrescian
Loyal
Finance analyst Lim Yun Lu, also a Hougang resident, questioned the timing of the government's exposé of the AHPETC.

"A lot of things are not transparent; we just don't know of them," she said. "I feel the PAP is using this as ammunition against the WP. How sure are they that the PAP is all clean? Isn't it too much of a coincidence that all these are suddenly getting exposed just because elections are coming?" she asked.



https://sg.news.yahoo.com/residents-mostly-shrug-off-ahpetc-debate-104123065.html

Residents mostly shrug off AHPETC debate



Residents living in Aljunied, Hougang and Punggol East mostly appear little affected by the fierce debate in Parliament last week on the financial statements of their opposition-run town council.

Yahoo Singapore spoke to residents from these constituencies over the weekend and found that a few have since had a sharp negative change in their views of the Workers' Party or the Aljunied-Hougang-Punggol East Town Council (AHPETC), although many were unconcerned.
 

ionzu

Alfrescian
Loyal
I rather have some fools rather than a bunch of opposition idiots and their crass supporters :rolleyes:

having one party dominate parliament is running a country without a plan B. Who can guarantee the dominant party will remain above board for the next 50 years? it is unheard of in history CMIIW

unless plan B involves the suspension of democracy.
 

winnipegjets

Alfrescian (Inf)
Asset
having one party dominate parliament is running a country without a plan B. Who can guarantee the dominant party will remain above board for the next 50 years? it is unheard of in history CMIIW

unless plan B involves the suspension of democracy.

Sedition Act will be used alot in the coming months to thwart critics.
 
Top