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Project 2016: Vote out Lee Hsien Loong (SBF)
- Thread starter chonburifc
- Start date
Propaganda shit from Dick Lee.
NDP 2015 Theme Song: Our Singapore (Live Performance by Dick Lee)
[video=youtube;8Q6xnw-ovbA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Q6xnw-ovbA[/video]
Excerpt from the lyrics:
Has the Singapore Dream turn into a nightmare?
Yes, like what Dick Lee says "look around us" and what do we see.
For those with short memories, the following "maid story" went viral prior to GE 2011.
No thanks to the 60%, PAP was voted back to power again.
Despite PM's election sorry, has PAP changed? Did we learn from the maid's story?
Look around us since GE2011, PAP's policies are self-serving and all the good works done by our fore fathers is now undone right before us.
Issues from CPF, AIMGate, MRT breakdowns, social ills brought about by the unabated import of foreigners, etc are not resolved.
Among the many issues, one of them is the government's deafening silence on IDA's defend of the foreigner's fake degree.
This is government's tacit agreement that our sons' and daughters' education is not good enough as compared to those fake degrees and third world country degrees.
A vote for PAP in the coming GE is a vote destroying our sons' and daugthers' future.
So vote wisely in the coming GE.
NDP 2015 Theme Song: Our Singapore (Live Performance by Dick Lee)
[video=youtube;8Q6xnw-ovbA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Q6xnw-ovbA[/video]
Excerpt from the lyrics:
So, now we look around us and we see
A nation built with love by you and me
A land to treasure right down to the core
Our home, Our heart, Our Singapore
Oh, Ho, Ho, Ho, Oh, Ho, Ho, Ho
And amazing as it seems,
It all started with a dream
And our dreaming isn't done
'Cause the best is yet to come.
So now we look around us and we see
A nation built with love by you and me
A land to treasure right down to the core
Our home, our heart, our Singapore
Oh, Ho, Ho, Ho, Oh, Ho, Ho, Ho
Our home, Our heart, Our Dream, Our Singapore
A nation built with love by you and me
A land to treasure right down to the core
Our home, Our heart, Our Singapore
Oh, Ho, Ho, Ho, Oh, Ho, Ho, Ho
And amazing as it seems,
It all started with a dream
And our dreaming isn't done
'Cause the best is yet to come.
So now we look around us and we see
A nation built with love by you and me
A land to treasure right down to the core
Our home, our heart, our Singapore
Oh, Ho, Ho, Ho, Oh, Ho, Ho, Ho
Our home, Our heart, Our Dream, Our Singapore
Has the Singapore Dream turn into a nightmare?
Yes, like what Dick Lee says "look around us" and what do we see.
For those with short memories, the following "maid story" went viral prior to GE 2011.
I need your urgent advice about employing a maid. As a busy mother, I need someone reliable to help out at home.
My maid is from Profits Agency Pte (PAP) and she has worked for me for a long time. Her mother worked for my parents and did an excellent job, so I had faith in her. For several years her performance has been very good, but recently she has become arrogant and insensitive, and is making lots of mistakes.
For example:
1) She flooded my kitchen – she told me that the drain pipe has blocked (she was supposed to clear it once a month but didn’t). Then she assured me that it is very rare and won’t happen again in the near future. Guess what? It flooded again within a year!
2) She didn’t close a window and my terrier dog escaped. I was so worried cos he is dangerous and could bite lots of people. After the incident, she didn’t apologise and just shrugged her shoulders saying “What to do, it has happened.” Fortunately my neighbor found the dog and we locked it up again.
3) Without consulting me, she has been bringing in strangers for my house’s maintenance work. She says they charge low wages and keep costs down, but they eat my food, make a lot of noise and rest on my bed. I think they even tried to seduce my husband. It stopped feeling like my home, more like a cheap hotel, and I don’t always want to come back at the end of the day.
4) When she first came to work for me, I instructed her to clean thedifferent parts of the house at least once a week. But for some time she has stopped taking care of the bedrooms of PP and H; they are now dirty and messy. I asked why and she told me that the kids had been disobedient, so she was neglecting their bedrooms as a punishment (she has forgotten that she is paid to clean all the rooms).
Even though my maid has worked for me for many years and I value what she has done in the past, I think she is now getting complacent. Her attitude is imperious and dismissive. She ignores my comments and basically treats my feedback as “noise”. I wrote to the agency about her behavior; they assured me that they are the best agency around and all their maids are “Commited to Serve” – but I think it is just rhetoric and I don’t see that in her actions. Her salary is much higher than maids in other countries, but the agency say this is to keep her honest and stop her moving to another employer. They say there is a limited supply of maids, and Singapore isn’t big enough for more than one good maid agency, so I should not trust their competitors.
I have to decide whether to renew my maid’s 5-year employment contract. When we discussed this she said that she is now part of a team, and if I want her I must also accept her friends doing part-time work for me. One friend is very inexperienced, can’t do basic tasks or explain what she intends to do. I suspect that she is actually underage. When interviewed, she only seemed interested in her days-off and visiting Universal Studios. When she couldn’t answer my questions she stomped her foot and exclaimed, “I don’t know what to say!” But I am still expected to pay her a high salary.
Now there happen to be a few other maid agencies – Workhard Pte (WP), New Solutions Pte (NSP), Super Personnel Pte (SPP) and Star Domestica Pte (SDP) – that offered me some helpers who seem sincere, genuine and intelligent. They are keen to work, willing to assist me and have a good attitude. I know that they may take a bit of time to learn how everything works, but frankly I am inclined to give them a chance.
People say that the devil you know is better than one you don’t. But I feel that I can’t tahan my current maid anymore. Do you think I should sack my current maid and try out a new one? Appreciate your advice.
Footnote: I live in Tanjong Pagar GRC and it seems like I have no choice about my maid agency afterall – I will have to stick with my current maid. For those of you who are fortunate enough to have a choice, celebrate your blessed privilege and exercise your choice wisely. My best wishes to you.
My maid is from Profits Agency Pte (PAP) and she has worked for me for a long time. Her mother worked for my parents and did an excellent job, so I had faith in her. For several years her performance has been very good, but recently she has become arrogant and insensitive, and is making lots of mistakes.
For example:
1) She flooded my kitchen – she told me that the drain pipe has blocked (she was supposed to clear it once a month but didn’t). Then she assured me that it is very rare and won’t happen again in the near future. Guess what? It flooded again within a year!
2) She didn’t close a window and my terrier dog escaped. I was so worried cos he is dangerous and could bite lots of people. After the incident, she didn’t apologise and just shrugged her shoulders saying “What to do, it has happened.” Fortunately my neighbor found the dog and we locked it up again.
3) Without consulting me, she has been bringing in strangers for my house’s maintenance work. She says they charge low wages and keep costs down, but they eat my food, make a lot of noise and rest on my bed. I think they even tried to seduce my husband. It stopped feeling like my home, more like a cheap hotel, and I don’t always want to come back at the end of the day.
4) When she first came to work for me, I instructed her to clean thedifferent parts of the house at least once a week. But for some time she has stopped taking care of the bedrooms of PP and H; they are now dirty and messy. I asked why and she told me that the kids had been disobedient, so she was neglecting their bedrooms as a punishment (she has forgotten that she is paid to clean all the rooms).
Even though my maid has worked for me for many years and I value what she has done in the past, I think she is now getting complacent. Her attitude is imperious and dismissive. She ignores my comments and basically treats my feedback as “noise”. I wrote to the agency about her behavior; they assured me that they are the best agency around and all their maids are “Commited to Serve” – but I think it is just rhetoric and I don’t see that in her actions. Her salary is much higher than maids in other countries, but the agency say this is to keep her honest and stop her moving to another employer. They say there is a limited supply of maids, and Singapore isn’t big enough for more than one good maid agency, so I should not trust their competitors.
I have to decide whether to renew my maid’s 5-year employment contract. When we discussed this she said that she is now part of a team, and if I want her I must also accept her friends doing part-time work for me. One friend is very inexperienced, can’t do basic tasks or explain what she intends to do. I suspect that she is actually underage. When interviewed, she only seemed interested in her days-off and visiting Universal Studios. When she couldn’t answer my questions she stomped her foot and exclaimed, “I don’t know what to say!” But I am still expected to pay her a high salary.
Now there happen to be a few other maid agencies – Workhard Pte (WP), New Solutions Pte (NSP), Super Personnel Pte (SPP) and Star Domestica Pte (SDP) – that offered me some helpers who seem sincere, genuine and intelligent. They are keen to work, willing to assist me and have a good attitude. I know that they may take a bit of time to learn how everything works, but frankly I am inclined to give them a chance.
People say that the devil you know is better than one you don’t. But I feel that I can’t tahan my current maid anymore. Do you think I should sack my current maid and try out a new one? Appreciate your advice.
Footnote: I live in Tanjong Pagar GRC and it seems like I have no choice about my maid agency afterall – I will have to stick with my current maid. For those of you who are fortunate enough to have a choice, celebrate your blessed privilege and exercise your choice wisely. My best wishes to you.
No thanks to the 60%, PAP was voted back to power again.
Despite PM's election sorry, has PAP changed? Did we learn from the maid's story?
Look around us since GE2011, PAP's policies are self-serving and all the good works done by our fore fathers is now undone right before us.
Issues from CPF, AIMGate, MRT breakdowns, social ills brought about by the unabated import of foreigners, etc are not resolved.
Among the many issues, one of them is the government's deafening silence on IDA's defend of the foreigner's fake degree.
This is government's tacit agreement that our sons' and daughters' education is not good enough as compared to those fake degrees and third world country degrees.
A vote for PAP in the coming GE is a vote destroying our sons' and daugthers' future.
So vote wisely in the coming GE.
Upzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!
Source: Terra Incognita
I had written this old script in October 2013 with some slight editing.
Quote: Sometimes I ask myself why am I so vicious against this ruling party, having had good values passed down from my parents to always forgive, repair and overwhelm the hurt from within with love.
Unfortunately, this regime has induced so much hurt; that the love from within is unable to override the pain.
To cite my reasons on why I have become so anti towards the ruling party.
In mid 2008, I had taken the late love of my life to SGH; unbeknown at the time, one of her lungs had fluid to the brim.
She was in the emergency ward waiting for over 18 hours in a crowded corridor overflowing with patients on trolleys like lambs in a slaughterhouse owing to the lack of doctors and ward space et al.
In June of 2008, she was diagnosed with stage 4 thymic carcinoma cancer. She passed away that same year in November.
This is now (altered to 2015); A Ms Helen Lee Gek Suan, who posted her story on TRE in October of 2013, shared the same predicament of my experience.
I have had to live with this pain and vowed never to trust their empty promises, fake smiles and cold handshakes. EVER!
In this pressure cooker city state with only Khoo Teck Puat Hospital added, the valve needed to release the impending blowout is missing.
We are on an irrevocable setback of greater proportions even though newer hospitals are planned for 2020. However, it defeats the purpose as more and more unwanted FT humanoids are brought in to replace us.
We must make it our urgent mission to REPLACE this government. Lock, stock and barrel. Unquote
“Nothing has changed”
Source: AsiaOne
Hospital staff too busy to provide urgent care
Sunday, Nov 10, 2013
The Straits Times
SINGAPORE - On Oct 9, my siblings and I took our 83-year-old mother to the Singapore General Hospital's accident and emergency department at about 4.30pm, because she had fluid in her lungs.
The triage nurse examined her and told us she would be sent straight to critical care as her blood pressure was very high.
Despite her high blood pressure, my mother was not attended to until about 10pm. Throughout this time, she was not given any medicine to lower her blood pressure.
The medical staff were too busy to provide urgent care to the patients waiting in critical care.
There were rows and rows of patients on trolleys, and it became so crowded that the staff had to push away trolleys that were in the way when they had to attend to a particular patient.
While awaiting admission, my mother was taken to the observation ward at about 11pm.
The nurse-in-charge noticed her blood pressure had risen very high and notified the doctor, who told her he was ordering medicine for my mother.
We realised the situation was critical and told the nurse that my mother had her blood pressure medicine with her.
The nurse then called the doctor again, and told my mother to take her own medicine.
It is a sad state of affairs at a hospital that is well-known internationally for being an excellent medical centre.
Helen Lee Gek Suan (Ms)
I had written this old script in October 2013 with some slight editing.
Quote: Sometimes I ask myself why am I so vicious against this ruling party, having had good values passed down from my parents to always forgive, repair and overwhelm the hurt from within with love.
Unfortunately, this regime has induced so much hurt; that the love from within is unable to override the pain.
To cite my reasons on why I have become so anti towards the ruling party.
In mid 2008, I had taken the late love of my life to SGH; unbeknown at the time, one of her lungs had fluid to the brim.
She was in the emergency ward waiting for over 18 hours in a crowded corridor overflowing with patients on trolleys like lambs in a slaughterhouse owing to the lack of doctors and ward space et al.
In June of 2008, she was diagnosed with stage 4 thymic carcinoma cancer. She passed away that same year in November.
This is now (altered to 2015); A Ms Helen Lee Gek Suan, who posted her story on TRE in October of 2013, shared the same predicament of my experience.
I have had to live with this pain and vowed never to trust their empty promises, fake smiles and cold handshakes. EVER!
In this pressure cooker city state with only Khoo Teck Puat Hospital added, the valve needed to release the impending blowout is missing.
We are on an irrevocable setback of greater proportions even though newer hospitals are planned for 2020. However, it defeats the purpose as more and more unwanted FT humanoids are brought in to replace us.
We must make it our urgent mission to REPLACE this government. Lock, stock and barrel. Unquote
“Nothing has changed”
End of Article
Source: AsiaOne
Hospital staff too busy to provide urgent care
Sunday, Nov 10, 2013
The Straits Times
SINGAPORE - On Oct 9, my siblings and I took our 83-year-old mother to the Singapore General Hospital's accident and emergency department at about 4.30pm, because she had fluid in her lungs.
The triage nurse examined her and told us she would be sent straight to critical care as her blood pressure was very high.
Despite her high blood pressure, my mother was not attended to until about 10pm. Throughout this time, she was not given any medicine to lower her blood pressure.
The medical staff were too busy to provide urgent care to the patients waiting in critical care.
There were rows and rows of patients on trolleys, and it became so crowded that the staff had to push away trolleys that were in the way when they had to attend to a particular patient.
While awaiting admission, my mother was taken to the observation ward at about 11pm.
The nurse-in-charge noticed her blood pressure had risen very high and notified the doctor, who told her he was ordering medicine for my mother.
We realised the situation was critical and told the nurse that my mother had her blood pressure medicine with her.
The nurse then called the doctor again, and told my mother to take her own medicine.
It is a sad state of affairs at a hospital that is well-known internationally for being an excellent medical centre.
Helen Lee Gek Suan (Ms)
End of Article
Soiurce: likedatosocanmeh
20150518 Five years to repent if Singaporeans don’t demand accountability from PAP for foreigners’ dubious/bogus degrees
May 18, 2015 by phillip ang
I refer to TRE’s “Teo: No need for central authority to screen FT degrees”.
DPM Teo is right because we do not need to waste more tax dollars to set up another agency to oversee the responsibilities of irresponsible government organisations. Teo was replying to MP Png’s question in Parliament on foreigners’ bogus qualifications.
Png should have demanded accountability instead of allowing PAP to wriggle out of repeated screw ups. The repercussions go beyond just a few jobs lost to foreigners. Based on PAP’s support of IDA’s shoddy HR practice, there are likely to be tens of thousands of foreigners with fake degrees. Could it be that PAP isn’t aware of the endemic corruption in India?
PAP’s defence of IDA’s untenable position is likened to equating local graduates to foreign ones from unheard of universities, ie Local grads = Foreign grads from unheard of unis. Is this in our interests?
To a foreigner who has little job prospect in his country, the risk of getting caught for a bogus degree is worth the price for landing a job in Singapore. This is because an accountant in Singapore ($3,854) earns about 10 times more than one in India ($340). (more links in TRE article)
The ‘quality’ of Indian graduates has been revealed by The Wall Street Journal’s “India graduates millions, but too few are fit to hire”, published by TRS on 29 April (below post). The article reveals shocking facts about Indian graduates. An Indian call centre has found it increasingly difficult to find competent Indians and most of its 8,000 employees are based outside of India. Most Indians could not communicate effectively in English and only 3% of applicants could be employed. According to the article, “75% of technical graduates and more than 85% of general graduates are unemployable by India’s high-growth global industries”.
If Indians could not be employed in India, why does the PAP lay out the employment red carpet for Indians at the expense of local graduates? .
(Singaporean graduates had better wake up to the reality that PAP has contractual obligations to provide jobs for Indian nationals under CECA and it has NOTHING to do with creating good jobs for locals. Indian banks set up in Singapore hire mostly their nationals. Singaporean banks like DBS which set up branches in India hire mostly their nationals. Both ways, the Singaporean graduate will be screwed. Even DBS CEO is a new citizen from India.
CECA has enable DBS to set up 12 branches in 12 major Indian cities. Indian salaries are at least 5 times lower than Singapore’s and would DBS sacrifice it profits to employ Singaporeans at local wages in India?
To date, no minister has provided any statistics of all the good jobs created by our immigration policy because there is hardly any. PAP policies only serve its business interests.)
It is disingenuous of IDA to deny that a higher educational qualification plays no part in employing Nisha. If there were 9 other local graduate applicants without an MBA, wouldn’t IDA have considered Nisha’s MBA?
In TRE’s “Corruption in Indian universities – A way of life”, an Indian student was reported to have told a BBC reporter that “It is our democratic right! Cheating is our birthright”. Another person told the reporter, “India’s university system is in crisis. Cheating happens at every level. Students bribe to get admission and good results. Research students get professors to write their dissertations. And the professors cheat too, publishing articles in bogus journals.”
PAP has always been indifferent to a high level of corruption in foreign countries because its sole objective is to increase the profits of overseas Singaporean businesses, mostly GLCs. So long as PAP remains the dominant political party, there will never be any accountability for its lack of due diligence. PAP’s track record – NO ONE at ICA, MOM and IDA has been held accountable for letting in fake talents, eg Yang Yin.
A Singaporean spends at least 10 times more than an Indian on education. Is it fair for PAP to put us on par with foreigners? Is it not immoral to invent excuses for not conducting due diligence? Aren’t there thousands of foreigners with bogus degrees? Why has PAP not taken any action to weed out those scumbags and sent them packing?
Singaporean graduates had better understand how Singapore Inc works under PAP as it may be too late after falling victim to the system. PAP started with depressing low wages in the 1990s and all low wage workers have experienced real wage stagnation for more than a decade. But low wages can’t go any lower or even Indians and PRCs would not want to work here. PAP then targeted those without a degree, eg poly graduates now have to compete with foreign grads from PAP’s ‘reputable’ unis who are willing to accept a lower salary. Eventually, even Singaporean degree holders were not spared.
In 2013, it was revealed that the number of foreign lawyers grew 42% in the preceding 6 years compared to 27% for local ones. Soon to hit our shores in numbers will be Indian accountants and nurses. Nurses’ wages have already been depressed by foreigners from China and the Philippines in recent years. Who’s next?
PAP will stop at nothing to increase the foreigner population in order to reduce business costs. This is to maintain the high rental cost which benefits the government who is the biggest landowner. Reducing high rental cost will have a cascading effect on its income through lower property prices, GST, income/corporate tax revenues, etc. Our fake economic growth will be exposed.
Under the PAP, it is inevitable that Singaporean graduates will compete with foreign ones from ‘reputable’ unis, many with bogus degrees. If Singaporeans do not demand accountability from the PAP at the polls, we will have 5 years to repent.
For those who miss TRS, below is a saved copy.
WSJ: INDIA HAS MILLIONS OF GRADUATES EACH YEAR, BUT FEW ARE FIT TO HIRE
Post date:
29 Apr 2015 – 7:31pm
Call-center company 24/7 Customer Pvt. Ltd. is desperate to find new recruits who can answer questions by phone and email. It wants to hire 3,000 people this year. Yet in this country of 1.2 billion people, that is beginning to look like an impossible goal.
So few of the high school and college graduates who come through the door can communicate effectively in English, and so many lack a grasp of educational basics such as reading comprehension, that the company can hire just three out of every 100 applicants.
India projects an image of a nation churning out hundreds of thousands of students every year who are well educated, a looming threat to the better-paid middle-class workers of the West. Their abilities in math have been cited by President Barack Obama as a reason why the U.S. is facing competitive challenges.
Yet 24/7 Customer’s experience tells a very different story. Its increasing difficulty finding competent employees in India has forced the company to expand its search to the Philippines and Nicaragua. Most of its 8,000 employees are now based outside of India.
In the nation that made offshoring a household word, 24/7 finds itself so short of talent that it is having to offshore.
“With India’s population size, it should be so much easier to find employees,” says S. Nagarajan, founder of the company. “Instead, we’re scouring every nook and cranny.”
India’s economic expansion was supposed to create opportunities for millions to rise out of poverty, get an education and land good jobs. But as India liberalized its economy starting in 1991 after decades of socialism, it failed to reform its heavily regulated education system.
Business executives say schools are hampered by overbearing bureaucracy and a focus on rote learning rather than critical thinking and comprehension. Government keeps tuition low, which makes schools accessible to more students, but also keeps teacher salaries and budgets low. What’s more, say educators and business leaders, the curriculum in most places is outdated and disconnected from the real world.
“If you pay peanuts, you get monkeys,” says Vijay Thadani, chief executive of New Delhi-based NIIT Ltd. India, a recruitment firm that also runs job-training programs for college graduates lacking the skills to land good jobs.
Muddying the picture is that on the surface, India appears to have met the demand for more educated workers with a quantum leap in graduates. Engineering colleges in India now have seats for 1.5 million students, nearly four times the 390,000 available in 2000, according to the National Association of Software and Services Companies, a trade group.
But 75% of technical graduates and more than 85% of general graduates are unemployable by India’s high-growth global industries, including information technology and call centers, according to results from assessment tests administered by the group.
Another survey, conducted annually by Pratham, a nongovernmental organization that aims to improve education for the poor, looked at grade-school performance at 13,000 schools in rural areas in India, where more than 70% of the population resides. It found that about half fifth graders can’t read at a second-grade level in india.
At stake is India’s ability to sustain growth—its economy is projected to expand 9% this year—while maintaining its advantages as a low-cost place to do business.
The challenge is especially pressing given the country’s more youthful population than the U.S., Europe and China. More than half of India’s population is under the age of 25, and one million people a month are expected to seek to join the labor force here over the next decade, the Indian government estimates. The fear is that if these young people aren’t trained well enough to participate in the country’s glittering new economy, they pose a potential threat to India’s stability.
“Economic reforms are not about goofy rich guys buying Mercedes cars,” says Manish Sabharwal, managing director of Teamlease Services Ltd., an employee recruitment and training firm in Bangalore. “Twenty years of reforms are worth nothing if we can’t get our kids into jobs.”
Yet even as the government and business leaders acknowledge the labor shortage, educational reforms are a long way from becoming law. A bill that gives schools more autonomy to design their own curriculum, for example, is expected to be introduced in the cabinet in the next few weeks, and in parliament later this year.
“I was not prepared at all to get a job,” says Pradeep Singh, 23, who graduated last year from RKDF College of Engineering, one of the city of Bhopal’s oldest engineering schools. He has been on five job interviews—none of which led to work. To make himself more attractive to potential employers, he has enrolled in a five-month-long computer programming course run by NIIT.
Mr. Singh and several other engineering graduates said they learned quickly that they needn’t bother to go to some classes. “The faculty take it very casually, and the students take it very casually, like they’ve all agreed not to be bothered too much,” Mr. Singh says. He says he routinely missed a couple of days of classes a week, and it took just three or four days of cramming from the textbook at the end of the semester to pass the exams.
Others said cheating, often in collaboration with test graders, is rampant. Deepak Sharma, 26, failed several exams when he was enrolled at a top engineering college outside of Delhi, until he finally figured out the trick: Writing his mobile number on the exam paper…
*Read the full article at http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748703515504576142092863219826
[video=youtube;9zfC3kbOlQI]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zfC3kbOlQI[/video]
20150518 Five years to repent if Singaporeans don’t demand accountability from PAP for foreigners’ dubious/bogus degrees
May 18, 2015 by phillip ang
I refer to TRE’s “Teo: No need for central authority to screen FT degrees”.
DPM Teo is right because we do not need to waste more tax dollars to set up another agency to oversee the responsibilities of irresponsible government organisations. Teo was replying to MP Png’s question in Parliament on foreigners’ bogus qualifications.
Png should have demanded accountability instead of allowing PAP to wriggle out of repeated screw ups. The repercussions go beyond just a few jobs lost to foreigners. Based on PAP’s support of IDA’s shoddy HR practice, there are likely to be tens of thousands of foreigners with fake degrees. Could it be that PAP isn’t aware of the endemic corruption in India?
PAP’s defence of IDA’s untenable position is likened to equating local graduates to foreign ones from unheard of universities, ie Local grads = Foreign grads from unheard of unis. Is this in our interests?
To a foreigner who has little job prospect in his country, the risk of getting caught for a bogus degree is worth the price for landing a job in Singapore. This is because an accountant in Singapore ($3,854) earns about 10 times more than one in India ($340). (more links in TRE article)
The ‘quality’ of Indian graduates has been revealed by The Wall Street Journal’s “India graduates millions, but too few are fit to hire”, published by TRS on 29 April (below post). The article reveals shocking facts about Indian graduates. An Indian call centre has found it increasingly difficult to find competent Indians and most of its 8,000 employees are based outside of India. Most Indians could not communicate effectively in English and only 3% of applicants could be employed. According to the article, “75% of technical graduates and more than 85% of general graduates are unemployable by India’s high-growth global industries”.
If Indians could not be employed in India, why does the PAP lay out the employment red carpet for Indians at the expense of local graduates? .
(Singaporean graduates had better wake up to the reality that PAP has contractual obligations to provide jobs for Indian nationals under CECA and it has NOTHING to do with creating good jobs for locals. Indian banks set up in Singapore hire mostly their nationals. Singaporean banks like DBS which set up branches in India hire mostly their nationals. Both ways, the Singaporean graduate will be screwed. Even DBS CEO is a new citizen from India.
CECA has enable DBS to set up 12 branches in 12 major Indian cities. Indian salaries are at least 5 times lower than Singapore’s and would DBS sacrifice it profits to employ Singaporeans at local wages in India?
To date, no minister has provided any statistics of all the good jobs created by our immigration policy because there is hardly any. PAP policies only serve its business interests.)
It is disingenuous of IDA to deny that a higher educational qualification plays no part in employing Nisha. If there were 9 other local graduate applicants without an MBA, wouldn’t IDA have considered Nisha’s MBA?
In TRE’s “Corruption in Indian universities – A way of life”, an Indian student was reported to have told a BBC reporter that “It is our democratic right! Cheating is our birthright”. Another person told the reporter, “India’s university system is in crisis. Cheating happens at every level. Students bribe to get admission and good results. Research students get professors to write their dissertations. And the professors cheat too, publishing articles in bogus journals.”
PAP has always been indifferent to a high level of corruption in foreign countries because its sole objective is to increase the profits of overseas Singaporean businesses, mostly GLCs. So long as PAP remains the dominant political party, there will never be any accountability for its lack of due diligence. PAP’s track record – NO ONE at ICA, MOM and IDA has been held accountable for letting in fake talents, eg Yang Yin.
A Singaporean spends at least 10 times more than an Indian on education. Is it fair for PAP to put us on par with foreigners? Is it not immoral to invent excuses for not conducting due diligence? Aren’t there thousands of foreigners with bogus degrees? Why has PAP not taken any action to weed out those scumbags and sent them packing?
Singaporean graduates had better understand how Singapore Inc works under PAP as it may be too late after falling victim to the system. PAP started with depressing low wages in the 1990s and all low wage workers have experienced real wage stagnation for more than a decade. But low wages can’t go any lower or even Indians and PRCs would not want to work here. PAP then targeted those without a degree, eg poly graduates now have to compete with foreign grads from PAP’s ‘reputable’ unis who are willing to accept a lower salary. Eventually, even Singaporean degree holders were not spared.
In 2013, it was revealed that the number of foreign lawyers grew 42% in the preceding 6 years compared to 27% for local ones. Soon to hit our shores in numbers will be Indian accountants and nurses. Nurses’ wages have already been depressed by foreigners from China and the Philippines in recent years. Who’s next?
PAP will stop at nothing to increase the foreigner population in order to reduce business costs. This is to maintain the high rental cost which benefits the government who is the biggest landowner. Reducing high rental cost will have a cascading effect on its income through lower property prices, GST, income/corporate tax revenues, etc. Our fake economic growth will be exposed.
Under the PAP, it is inevitable that Singaporean graduates will compete with foreign ones from ‘reputable’ unis, many with bogus degrees. If Singaporeans do not demand accountability from the PAP at the polls, we will have 5 years to repent.
For those who miss TRS, below is a saved copy.
WSJ: INDIA HAS MILLIONS OF GRADUATES EACH YEAR, BUT FEW ARE FIT TO HIRE
Post date:
29 Apr 2015 – 7:31pm
Call-center company 24/7 Customer Pvt. Ltd. is desperate to find new recruits who can answer questions by phone and email. It wants to hire 3,000 people this year. Yet in this country of 1.2 billion people, that is beginning to look like an impossible goal.
So few of the high school and college graduates who come through the door can communicate effectively in English, and so many lack a grasp of educational basics such as reading comprehension, that the company can hire just three out of every 100 applicants.
India projects an image of a nation churning out hundreds of thousands of students every year who are well educated, a looming threat to the better-paid middle-class workers of the West. Their abilities in math have been cited by President Barack Obama as a reason why the U.S. is facing competitive challenges.
Yet 24/7 Customer’s experience tells a very different story. Its increasing difficulty finding competent employees in India has forced the company to expand its search to the Philippines and Nicaragua. Most of its 8,000 employees are now based outside of India.
In the nation that made offshoring a household word, 24/7 finds itself so short of talent that it is having to offshore.
“With India’s population size, it should be so much easier to find employees,” says S. Nagarajan, founder of the company. “Instead, we’re scouring every nook and cranny.”
India’s economic expansion was supposed to create opportunities for millions to rise out of poverty, get an education and land good jobs. But as India liberalized its economy starting in 1991 after decades of socialism, it failed to reform its heavily regulated education system.
Business executives say schools are hampered by overbearing bureaucracy and a focus on rote learning rather than critical thinking and comprehension. Government keeps tuition low, which makes schools accessible to more students, but also keeps teacher salaries and budgets low. What’s more, say educators and business leaders, the curriculum in most places is outdated and disconnected from the real world.
“If you pay peanuts, you get monkeys,” says Vijay Thadani, chief executive of New Delhi-based NIIT Ltd. India, a recruitment firm that also runs job-training programs for college graduates lacking the skills to land good jobs.
Muddying the picture is that on the surface, India appears to have met the demand for more educated workers with a quantum leap in graduates. Engineering colleges in India now have seats for 1.5 million students, nearly four times the 390,000 available in 2000, according to the National Association of Software and Services Companies, a trade group.
But 75% of technical graduates and more than 85% of general graduates are unemployable by India’s high-growth global industries, including information technology and call centers, according to results from assessment tests administered by the group.
Another survey, conducted annually by Pratham, a nongovernmental organization that aims to improve education for the poor, looked at grade-school performance at 13,000 schools in rural areas in India, where more than 70% of the population resides. It found that about half fifth graders can’t read at a second-grade level in india.
At stake is India’s ability to sustain growth—its economy is projected to expand 9% this year—while maintaining its advantages as a low-cost place to do business.
The challenge is especially pressing given the country’s more youthful population than the U.S., Europe and China. More than half of India’s population is under the age of 25, and one million people a month are expected to seek to join the labor force here over the next decade, the Indian government estimates. The fear is that if these young people aren’t trained well enough to participate in the country’s glittering new economy, they pose a potential threat to India’s stability.
“Economic reforms are not about goofy rich guys buying Mercedes cars,” says Manish Sabharwal, managing director of Teamlease Services Ltd., an employee recruitment and training firm in Bangalore. “Twenty years of reforms are worth nothing if we can’t get our kids into jobs.”
Yet even as the government and business leaders acknowledge the labor shortage, educational reforms are a long way from becoming law. A bill that gives schools more autonomy to design their own curriculum, for example, is expected to be introduced in the cabinet in the next few weeks, and in parliament later this year.
“I was not prepared at all to get a job,” says Pradeep Singh, 23, who graduated last year from RKDF College of Engineering, one of the city of Bhopal’s oldest engineering schools. He has been on five job interviews—none of which led to work. To make himself more attractive to potential employers, he has enrolled in a five-month-long computer programming course run by NIIT.
Mr. Singh and several other engineering graduates said they learned quickly that they needn’t bother to go to some classes. “The faculty take it very casually, and the students take it very casually, like they’ve all agreed not to be bothered too much,” Mr. Singh says. He says he routinely missed a couple of days of classes a week, and it took just three or four days of cramming from the textbook at the end of the semester to pass the exams.
Others said cheating, often in collaboration with test graders, is rampant. Deepak Sharma, 26, failed several exams when he was enrolled at a top engineering college outside of Delhi, until he finally figured out the trick: Writing his mobile number on the exam paper…
*Read the full article at http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748703515504576142092863219826
End of Article
[video=youtube;9zfC3kbOlQI]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zfC3kbOlQI[/video]
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It's old news but still valid
Lumbered with the boss's wife
Eric Ellis
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SINGAPOREANS aren’t usually given to open criticism of the Lee family that has ruled them for half a century. Rightly or wrongly, some presume that in their tightly controlled island state, walls have ears, and one never knows who is listening.
But this time it’s different. Singaporeans are deeply displeased with their Prime Minister’s wife, Ho Ching. She has run Temasek Holdings, the state-owned fund, since 2002, and has presided over a spectacular series of misjudgments that have lost Singaporeans billions.
There was the murky $3 billion deal she made in Bangkok in 2006, to buy then Thai PM Thaksin Shinawatra out of his telco. Ho’s massive plunges into European and American banks ended in tears last year when Temasek lost a third of its $100 billion portfolio. In Australia, Ho lost Temasek’s entire $400 million stake she’d plunged into Eddie Groves’ ABC Learning Centres, among other missteps.
So much for her much-lauded ‘‘Superwoman’’ smarts and vision when the state appointed her, even though her pre-Temasek record at Temasek-owned arms supplier Singapore Technologies was hardly Sorosesque. Today, Singaporeans are sick of Ho and have been for some time. They want her out of Temasek, lest she create any more financial havoc for them.
Except she’s not going. In a February ‘‘transition’’ — not a sacking, as Temasek spun furiously — Ho was supposed to hand over Temasek to Chip Goodyear, the 51-year-old American (and North Melbourne supporter) who pointed BHP-Billiton at China for four years and made billions.
The big idea was that Goodyear would fix the mess Ho made in banking and tilt Singapore into the booming China and India growth stories, which meant placing Temasek at the middle of big regional resources plays. But that, too, has ended in tears, when Temasek last week cited ‘‘strategic differences,’’ announcing it was "mutually agreed" Goodyear would not become CEO.
It seems clear that after five months hanging around the Temasek office, Goodyear has been paid millions for his life-long silence.
But only a few days earlier, Goodyear was doing the rounds of Temasek satellites mapping out his vision. One CEO I spoke to expressed shock, saying he had been on the ‘‘same page’’ as Goodyear and was looking forward to working with him. The implication was clear: Goodyear was a genuine businessperson whereas Ho was not.
That was mid-July. A week later, Chip was chopped. Temasek’s board met the weekend before last, then announced Goodyear was gone. So what happened?
The Government-controlled Straits Times said Goodyear’s proposals to shake up Temasek were viewed as "too risky" by the board. Too risky? Ho’s bad bets in banks lost Temasek around $30 billion. What could be riskier than that?
More likely is the take doing the rounds of Singapore’s banking and business communities. Local insiders, under few illusions that little happens at Temasek without Government say-so, say the Government has been spooked by the arrest in China of Rio-Tinto executive Stern Hu.
Temasek hired Goodyear because they wanted him to do for it what he had done at BHP, expertly play China, which is far more politically important for an Asian nation such as tiny Chinese-dominated Singapore than it is for a global mining giant. But after the Chinese Government arrested Hu and sent a message it was taking back control of its resources management, it wouldn’t do now, they say, for a foreigner who knows so much about Chinese resources to front mostly Singapore Inc’s ambitions in China.
The handling of Goodyear has deeply embarrassed Singapore and seems to give lie to the fiction that Temasek operates transparently and separately from Government policy. And knowing how deep runs the anger among its readers that Ho has squandered a big chunk of their nest egg, even the normally lap-dog Straits Times was moved to ask how ‘‘private sector’’ can Temasek really be, commenting: ‘‘Like it or not, Temasek cannot get away from the fact that it is inextricably linked to the Singapore Government’’.
It’s shaken up the arcane world of sovereign wealth funds too, where Temasek liked to portray itself as the model for emerging wealthy states. Delegations from around the world made pilgrimages to Singapore to see how it was done, how their state’s strategic jewels can be packaged and managed into an investment vehicle that maintained the illusion it was somehow separated from the Government. Journalists describing Temasek as "Government-controlled" invited a welter of complaints to their editors from Temasek’s spinners who demanded it be benignly referenced as an "Asian investment company" with no references to the Government whatsoever, and certainly not to describe the family connections of Ho’s. Failure to comply would mean an outlet would be blackballed by Temasek, which in Singapore ultimately suggests a libel suit no media company has ever won there.
East Timor decided the Temasek model wasn’t for them, and chose a Norwegian-inspired transparent route for its now $6 billion petroleum royalties pile. In many respects, it’s actually a model for Temasek. Certainly, the East Timorese fund made more money than Temasek has recently — it invested in boring US treasury bonds while Ho was plunging billions into Merrill Lynch.
Unsurprisingly, Temasek’s model appeals more to the more authoritarian and less democratic of states, such as Kazakhstan which, like Singapore, is run along family lines.
Now Singapore Inc is in a pickle. It said it wants to internationalise Temasek, and appointing the much-respected Goodyear was a huge – and widely welcomed – statement. Now it’s stuck with the bumbling Ho, for at least another year, which simply deepens the market’s conviction that dealing with Temasek is akin to de facto dealing with the Government.
Temasek says it is continuing its international search for a new boss. But after Goodyear’s bad year at Temasek, why would anyone want to go there?
Eric Ellis is a business writer based in Singapore
http://www.smh.com.au/business/lumbered-with-the-bosss-wife-20090729-e1oc?stb=fb&skin=dumb-phone
Lumbered with the boss's wife
Eric Ellis
inShare
submit to redditEmail articlePrintReprints & permissions
SINGAPOREANS aren’t usually given to open criticism of the Lee family that has ruled them for half a century. Rightly or wrongly, some presume that in their tightly controlled island state, walls have ears, and one never knows who is listening.
But this time it’s different. Singaporeans are deeply displeased with their Prime Minister’s wife, Ho Ching. She has run Temasek Holdings, the state-owned fund, since 2002, and has presided over a spectacular series of misjudgments that have lost Singaporeans billions.
There was the murky $3 billion deal she made in Bangkok in 2006, to buy then Thai PM Thaksin Shinawatra out of his telco. Ho’s massive plunges into European and American banks ended in tears last year when Temasek lost a third of its $100 billion portfolio. In Australia, Ho lost Temasek’s entire $400 million stake she’d plunged into Eddie Groves’ ABC Learning Centres, among other missteps.
So much for her much-lauded ‘‘Superwoman’’ smarts and vision when the state appointed her, even though her pre-Temasek record at Temasek-owned arms supplier Singapore Technologies was hardly Sorosesque. Today, Singaporeans are sick of Ho and have been for some time. They want her out of Temasek, lest she create any more financial havoc for them.
Except she’s not going. In a February ‘‘transition’’ — not a sacking, as Temasek spun furiously — Ho was supposed to hand over Temasek to Chip Goodyear, the 51-year-old American (and North Melbourne supporter) who pointed BHP-Billiton at China for four years and made billions.
The big idea was that Goodyear would fix the mess Ho made in banking and tilt Singapore into the booming China and India growth stories, which meant placing Temasek at the middle of big regional resources plays. But that, too, has ended in tears, when Temasek last week cited ‘‘strategic differences,’’ announcing it was "mutually agreed" Goodyear would not become CEO.
It seems clear that after five months hanging around the Temasek office, Goodyear has been paid millions for his life-long silence.
But only a few days earlier, Goodyear was doing the rounds of Temasek satellites mapping out his vision. One CEO I spoke to expressed shock, saying he had been on the ‘‘same page’’ as Goodyear and was looking forward to working with him. The implication was clear: Goodyear was a genuine businessperson whereas Ho was not.
That was mid-July. A week later, Chip was chopped. Temasek’s board met the weekend before last, then announced Goodyear was gone. So what happened?
The Government-controlled Straits Times said Goodyear’s proposals to shake up Temasek were viewed as "too risky" by the board. Too risky? Ho’s bad bets in banks lost Temasek around $30 billion. What could be riskier than that?
More likely is the take doing the rounds of Singapore’s banking and business communities. Local insiders, under few illusions that little happens at Temasek without Government say-so, say the Government has been spooked by the arrest in China of Rio-Tinto executive Stern Hu.
Temasek hired Goodyear because they wanted him to do for it what he had done at BHP, expertly play China, which is far more politically important for an Asian nation such as tiny Chinese-dominated Singapore than it is for a global mining giant. But after the Chinese Government arrested Hu and sent a message it was taking back control of its resources management, it wouldn’t do now, they say, for a foreigner who knows so much about Chinese resources to front mostly Singapore Inc’s ambitions in China.
The handling of Goodyear has deeply embarrassed Singapore and seems to give lie to the fiction that Temasek operates transparently and separately from Government policy. And knowing how deep runs the anger among its readers that Ho has squandered a big chunk of their nest egg, even the normally lap-dog Straits Times was moved to ask how ‘‘private sector’’ can Temasek really be, commenting: ‘‘Like it or not, Temasek cannot get away from the fact that it is inextricably linked to the Singapore Government’’.
It’s shaken up the arcane world of sovereign wealth funds too, where Temasek liked to portray itself as the model for emerging wealthy states. Delegations from around the world made pilgrimages to Singapore to see how it was done, how their state’s strategic jewels can be packaged and managed into an investment vehicle that maintained the illusion it was somehow separated from the Government. Journalists describing Temasek as "Government-controlled" invited a welter of complaints to their editors from Temasek’s spinners who demanded it be benignly referenced as an "Asian investment company" with no references to the Government whatsoever, and certainly not to describe the family connections of Ho’s. Failure to comply would mean an outlet would be blackballed by Temasek, which in Singapore ultimately suggests a libel suit no media company has ever won there.
East Timor decided the Temasek model wasn’t for them, and chose a Norwegian-inspired transparent route for its now $6 billion petroleum royalties pile. In many respects, it’s actually a model for Temasek. Certainly, the East Timorese fund made more money than Temasek has recently — it invested in boring US treasury bonds while Ho was plunging billions into Merrill Lynch.
Unsurprisingly, Temasek’s model appeals more to the more authoritarian and less democratic of states, such as Kazakhstan which, like Singapore, is run along family lines.
Now Singapore Inc is in a pickle. It said it wants to internationalise Temasek, and appointing the much-respected Goodyear was a huge – and widely welcomed – statement. Now it’s stuck with the bumbling Ho, for at least another year, which simply deepens the market’s conviction that dealing with Temasek is akin to de facto dealing with the Government.
Temasek says it is continuing its international search for a new boss. But after Goodyear’s bad year at Temasek, why would anyone want to go there?
Eric Ellis is a business writer based in Singapore
http://www.smh.com.au/business/lumbered-with-the-bosss-wife-20090729-e1oc?stb=fb&skin=dumb-phone
Vote Opposition ! Vote against the 6.9 million population target !!
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