http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/08/14/new-pap-candidate-ive-the-poorest-impression-of/
[h=2]New PAP candidate I’ve the poorest impression of[/h]
August 14th, 2015 |
Author: Contributions
The New PAP Candidate Whom I Have The Poorest Impression
Of
Yesterday, the PAP announced that there will be three new candidates in the
Bishan-Toa Payoh team – Chee Hong Tat, Chong Kee Hiong and Saktiandi Supaat.
The new team would be replacing Wong Kan Seng, Zainudin Nordin and Hri Kumar
Nair.
Chee Hong Tat
Among which, I have the worst impression of Chee Hong Tat. He joined the
Civil Service in 1998 and worked in the Ministry of Home Affairs, Finance,
Transport and Education, before being appointed as Principal Private Secretary
to Mr Lee Kuan Yew in 2008. You can read his career history here.
Earlier this month, he left his most recent role as the Second Permanent
Secretary at the Ministry of Trade and Industry to join politics.
I got to know of his existence when I was running a campaign
to reintroduce dialects two years ago. During my campaign, I was not calling
for active promotion of dialects but rather a very simple decision – reverse
policy of banning dialects on free-to-air television and radio.
This is because of his
letter to The Straits Times where he declared, “It would be
stupid for any Singapore agency or NTU to advocate the learning
of dialects.”
I don’t dislike Chee Hong Tat because he disagrees with my point of view that
dialects should be reintroduced on local television.
Rather, due to the following reasons:
1) Chee seems to lack critical thinking skills and comes across as a
“yes man”
Chee claims that the supports the intentional suppression of the government
on dialects because it “interferes with the learning of Mandarin and English”.
However, the only evidence he has to support this claim is because his dear
Master Lee Kuan Yew said so.
There is absolutely no
linguistic evidence that learning of other Chinese languages such as
Teochew; Hokkien and Cantonese will affect one’s command of English and
Mandarin.
Many children throughout the world grow up with more than two
languages from infancy without showing any signs of language delays or
disorders. In fact, neurologists have proven that young children are
remarkably good at learning multiple languages simultaneously and can even
develop native-sounding accents in each tongue. In adulthood, all reinforced
languages can even hold their own in the brain without interfering with the
others.
Contrary to impeding one’s learning of Mandarin, having a dialect
foundation at home when one is young would actually be beneficial to the
learning of Mandarin as both dialects and Mandarin belong to the same language
family. According to Newman (1988), a proficient Hokkien speaker,
drawing on analogies between the two languages, would be able to predict the
Mandarin tonal pronunciation of a given word 90 percent of the time.
Furthermore, it doesn’t make sense to me that the government allows dual
sound options on television for Japanese and Korean films but insist on dubbing
all Cantonese and Hokkien movies with Mandarin.
Read: Four
main arguments for the reintroduction of Chinese dialects on Singapore’s
free-to-air television
I don’t know Chee in person but my impression so far is that he is a
typical yes man who just follows orders and resonates the point of view of those
above him without exercising critical thought.
Furthermore the fact that he can believe in a policy decision not supported
by any scientific evidence and so damaging to the elderly here doesn’t give me a
good impression of his intelligence and heart as a person.
2) Chee comes across as fake
What surprised me was that Chee actually introduced himself with dialects.
This was pointed out by The Online Citizen in their coverage
of his debut.
Personally, I find this move hypocritical. PAP candidates often claim
that dialects are no longer widely used in Singapore. Yet, when General Election
comes, everyone starts giving dialect speeches. Okay, so if dialects
are irrelevant and no longer widely used, why are you trying so hard to connect
with this supposedly small group of people?
The fact that they bother to prepare for it shows that dialect speakers still
make up a significant percentage of our Singapore electorate which is true.
Based on the Singapore Department of Statistics 2010, 19.2 percent of ethnic Chinese Singaporeans
speak Chinese dialects at home.
Back to the topic of Chee, if you think dialects are irrelevant, why
speak in it? Suddenly when you are running for elections and need to win old
aunties and uncles in an elderly district over, it becomes okay is
it?
I can’t help but doubt his sincerity in helping the elderly people in
this GRC. The policy he supports so fervently – intentional suppression
of dialects in our society – has led to the elderly being denied
from economic opportunities and resigned to doing hard manual labour;
isolated from society and even their own families.
Read: Why
are there so many poor elderly people in Singapore?
People who support policies by just following what LKY says and not
exercising critical thought are the very reason that grandchildren in Singapore
today can no longer communicate with their grandparents.
I would encourage all opposition candidates in this region to let the elderly
know about his stance and the negative effects of this policy when doing your
walk about.
Seriously, sometimes when I look at the
way our government treats our elderly here, I begin to worry and have
thoughts like:
“What if I work so hard here all my life and make the country more prosperous
but end up like these pioneer generation – doing manual labour; can’t enjoy
television shows properly (which is my only entertainment since I can’t walk
well) and can’t even communicate with my grand children?”
No amount of wayang can take away the fact that they
are not close to the ground. (Photo: CNA)
3) Doesn’t seem to understand the ground
Chee has spent his entire life in civil service – comfortable pay; good
worklife balance; tons of benefits and lots of bonuses.
His background is similar to many of the ministers who graduate from overseas
college, get parachuted up as a scholar in civil service and quit when they are
‘talent spotted’ to join as a politician.
I really doubt that this is an effective route to groom a political
leader or if this type of career path and training is effective in generating
leaders who can solve the challenges we have today.
If you look at the first or second group of leaders in LKY’s time,
they came from much more humble origins but made so much more progress. In
contrast, the recent batch came from this type of background but have created
quite a few problems and failed to solve challenges which we face
today.
Hope to see much more diversity from PAP candidates than the usual “spend
whole life in civil service or government linked organizations” people.
Look at Baey Yam Keng and Tin Peiling. Both are really popular, progressive
thinkers and come from private sector firms like Hill & Knowlton and Ernst
& Young.
Hope to see more promising candidates from PAP over the upcoming two
weeks.
Jeraldine
Phneah
* Jeraldine blogs at www.jeraldinephneah.me.
[h=2]New PAP candidate I’ve the poorest impression of[/h]
August 14th, 2015 |
Author: Contributions
The New PAP Candidate Whom I Have The Poorest Impression
Of
Yesterday, the PAP announced that there will be three new candidates in the
Bishan-Toa Payoh team – Chee Hong Tat, Chong Kee Hiong and Saktiandi Supaat.
The new team would be replacing Wong Kan Seng, Zainudin Nordin and Hri Kumar
Nair.
Chee Hong Tat
Among which, I have the worst impression of Chee Hong Tat. He joined the
Civil Service in 1998 and worked in the Ministry of Home Affairs, Finance,
Transport and Education, before being appointed as Principal Private Secretary
to Mr Lee Kuan Yew in 2008. You can read his career history here.
Earlier this month, he left his most recent role as the Second Permanent
Secretary at the Ministry of Trade and Industry to join politics.
I got to know of his existence when I was running a campaign
to reintroduce dialects two years ago. During my campaign, I was not calling
for active promotion of dialects but rather a very simple decision – reverse
policy of banning dialects on free-to-air television and radio.
This is because of his
letter to The Straits Times where he declared, “It would be
stupid for any Singapore agency or NTU to advocate the learning
of dialects.”
I don’t dislike Chee Hong Tat because he disagrees with my point of view that
dialects should be reintroduced on local television.
Rather, due to the following reasons:
1) Chee seems to lack critical thinking skills and comes across as a
“yes man”
Chee claims that the supports the intentional suppression of the government
on dialects because it “interferes with the learning of Mandarin and English”.
However, the only evidence he has to support this claim is because his dear
Master Lee Kuan Yew said so.
There is absolutely no
linguistic evidence that learning of other Chinese languages such as
Teochew; Hokkien and Cantonese will affect one’s command of English and
Mandarin.
Many children throughout the world grow up with more than two
languages from infancy without showing any signs of language delays or
disorders. In fact, neurologists have proven that young children are
remarkably good at learning multiple languages simultaneously and can even
develop native-sounding accents in each tongue. In adulthood, all reinforced
languages can even hold their own in the brain without interfering with the
others.
Contrary to impeding one’s learning of Mandarin, having a dialect
foundation at home when one is young would actually be beneficial to the
learning of Mandarin as both dialects and Mandarin belong to the same language
family. According to Newman (1988), a proficient Hokkien speaker,
drawing on analogies between the two languages, would be able to predict the
Mandarin tonal pronunciation of a given word 90 percent of the time.
Furthermore, it doesn’t make sense to me that the government allows dual
sound options on television for Japanese and Korean films but insist on dubbing
all Cantonese and Hokkien movies with Mandarin.
Read: Four
main arguments for the reintroduction of Chinese dialects on Singapore’s
free-to-air television
I don’t know Chee in person but my impression so far is that he is a
typical yes man who just follows orders and resonates the point of view of those
above him without exercising critical thought.
Furthermore the fact that he can believe in a policy decision not supported
by any scientific evidence and so damaging to the elderly here doesn’t give me a
good impression of his intelligence and heart as a person.
2) Chee comes across as fake
What surprised me was that Chee actually introduced himself with dialects.
This was pointed out by The Online Citizen in their coverage
of his debut.
Personally, I find this move hypocritical. PAP candidates often claim
that dialects are no longer widely used in Singapore. Yet, when General Election
comes, everyone starts giving dialect speeches. Okay, so if dialects
are irrelevant and no longer widely used, why are you trying so hard to connect
with this supposedly small group of people?
The fact that they bother to prepare for it shows that dialect speakers still
make up a significant percentage of our Singapore electorate which is true.
Based on the Singapore Department of Statistics 2010, 19.2 percent of ethnic Chinese Singaporeans
speak Chinese dialects at home.
Back to the topic of Chee, if you think dialects are irrelevant, why
speak in it? Suddenly when you are running for elections and need to win old
aunties and uncles in an elderly district over, it becomes okay is
it?
I can’t help but doubt his sincerity in helping the elderly people in
this GRC. The policy he supports so fervently – intentional suppression
of dialects in our society – has led to the elderly being denied
from economic opportunities and resigned to doing hard manual labour;
isolated from society and even their own families.
Read: Why
are there so many poor elderly people in Singapore?
People who support policies by just following what LKY says and not
exercising critical thought are the very reason that grandchildren in Singapore
today can no longer communicate with their grandparents.
I would encourage all opposition candidates in this region to let the elderly
know about his stance and the negative effects of this policy when doing your
walk about.
Seriously, sometimes when I look at the
way our government treats our elderly here, I begin to worry and have
thoughts like:
“What if I work so hard here all my life and make the country more prosperous
but end up like these pioneer generation – doing manual labour; can’t enjoy
television shows properly (which is my only entertainment since I can’t walk
well) and can’t even communicate with my grand children?”
No amount of wayang can take away the fact that they
are not close to the ground. (Photo: CNA)
3) Doesn’t seem to understand the ground
Chee has spent his entire life in civil service – comfortable pay; good
worklife balance; tons of benefits and lots of bonuses.
His background is similar to many of the ministers who graduate from overseas
college, get parachuted up as a scholar in civil service and quit when they are
‘talent spotted’ to join as a politician.
I really doubt that this is an effective route to groom a political
leader or if this type of career path and training is effective in generating
leaders who can solve the challenges we have today.
If you look at the first or second group of leaders in LKY’s time,
they came from much more humble origins but made so much more progress. In
contrast, the recent batch came from this type of background but have created
quite a few problems and failed to solve challenges which we face
today.
Hope to see much more diversity from PAP candidates than the usual “spend
whole life in civil service or government linked organizations” people.
Look at Baey Yam Keng and Tin Peiling. Both are really popular, progressive
thinkers and come from private sector firms like Hill & Knowlton and Ernst
& Young.
Hope to see more promising candidates from PAP over the upcoming two
weeks.
Jeraldine
Phneah
* Jeraldine blogs at www.jeraldinephneah.me.
