Who will you vote for in the next general elections?

[DannyBoyBoy]

If Old Man is still around next elections, I'm pretty sure mine would still be a walkover ward

who know he might give up his IC on nomination day?

 

[Ah Hai]

Join the SDP in New Year countdown at Hong Lim Park

Join the SDP in New Year countdown at Hong Lim Park

The Singapore Democratic Party will be at Speakers’ Corner (Hong Lim Park) on 31st December (Wednesday) from 6pm to 12 midnight to ring in the new year.

According to the SDP website, the occasion is also to pay tribute to the late J B Jeyaretnam and singing songs in memory of him. “As 2008 passes into history, we will sing Auld Lang Syne to remember JBJ,” the website says, “and all that he has done for Singapore.”

Guests include Mr Tan Kin Lian, Mr Jufrie Mahmood and Mr Chia Ti Lik. They will be speaking at the countdown gathering.

Singapore Literature Prize winner, Mr Ng Yi-Sheng, will be on hand to do a poetry recital.

There will be singing and a simple dinner of hotdogs and chips will be served.

“Spend the evening with friends and fellow citizens who care about justice and democracy for our country,” the SDP says. “Rather than getting drunk and dancing to nothing in particular, make Wednesday evening a truly meaningful one.”
:oIo:

 

[Ah Hai]

Family of JBJ invites S’poreans to memorial

From the family of Mr JB Jeyaretnam

Kenneth and Philip Jeyaretnam and their families

Invite you to a service of Celebration and Thanksgiving to honour the memory of their dearly departed father.


Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam

5:00pm on Saturday, January 03rd

St Andrews Cathedral, North Bridge Rd

With high tea and an exhibition of memorabilia immediately following the service

 

[Ah Hai]

In memory of Mr. J. B. Jeyaretnam

Thursday, January 01, 2009
In memory of Mr. J. B. Jeyaretnam
Speech at Hong Lim Park, New Year's Eve Party

I wish to thank Chee Siok Chin for inviting me to this event and giving me the opportunity to speak a few words in memory of Mr. J. B. Jeyaretnam.

I do not know Mr. Jeyaretnam personally. I attended only one of his election rally in the late 1970s and only for a few minutes.

What I knew of him came mainly from reports in the newspapers over the next 20 years. They covered the unhappy events in his life, like defending against defamation suits or for infringements of certain regulations on his political activities. Like most Singaporeans, I had a somewhat negative opinion of him from these reports.

In July this year, my friend invited me to the inaugural dinner of the Reform Party that was just set up by Mr. Jeyaretnam. At the dinner, I decided to buy two copies of his books as a show of support. The book was a collection of his speeches in Parliament over the years.

My impression of Mr. Jeyaretnam changed quite completely after reading a few paragraphs from the book. Here was a man who was passionate about the well being of the people of Singapore and, especially in uplifting the life of the lower income levels in our society.

I realised that I shared many of his values and passion. I thought of finding the occasion to get to know him better as a person.

That opportunity is not gone forever. Mr. Jeyaretnam passed away suddenly a few months later.

Someone circulated an e-mail containing a tribute to Mr. Jeyaretnam. He described Mr. Jeyaretnam as a person who had done his best for what he believed to be good for Singapore and Singaporeans, and yet many Singaporeans did not know of him and his sacrifice. I decided to post this tribute in my blog.

A few people asked for signatures to an open letter to the Prime Minister to ask for the public service of Mr. Jeyaretnam to be recognised. I decided to join in and to help to get more signatures.

I was disappointed in getting only 25 signatures after a week, in spite of several efforts to publicise it. This number was so small, compared to an earlier signature campaign on the credit linked notes which collected nearly 1,000 signatures. Perhaps, Singaporeans did not see Mr. Jeyaretnam in a positive light or were afraid to be seen as supporting the call in the open letter.

I hope that, over the years, Singaporeans will get to know better of Mr. J. B. Jeyaretnam and what he has done for Singapore.

2008 has been a difficult year. 2009 will continue to be challenging. In spite of the uncertainties, let me wish all of you the very best for 2009 and the years ahead.

Tan Kin Lian
Posted by Tan Kin Lian at 7:02 AM

 

[Ah Hai]

Re: In memory of Mr. J. B. Jeyaretnam

1 comments:

Yan Siyu said...

Dear Mr Tan,

I still remember in my secondary or JC days when i see Mr Jeyaretnam selling his book in the MRT station. My friends and I will just look and know that he's part of the opposition party. Some old dog, crushed by PAP and still fighting. Madness and insanity is how we describe to fight against something that we can never win. (yes, i do admit that then, or maybe even now, alot of mid twenties and below people do not know or should i say care about the political/national events).

Unfortunately, i m one of the "Perhaps, Singaporeans did not see Mr. Jeyaretnam in a positive light".

I hope that i do not miss another person like him, which is why I told all my friends and family members about you standing up for the minibond victims. Wake Singaporeans up! and before you knew it, you ll find alot of like minded Singaporeans standing with and around you!

Regards,

Siyu
January 01, 2009 5:09 PM

 

[jw5]

Re: In memory of Mr. J. B. Jeyaretnam

I'll vote for anyone who speaks out and stands up for the rights of the Singapore born citizen, especially the poor, weak, disabled and under-priviledged.

 

[Ah Hai]

Rating of political leaders

Saturday, January 03, 2009
Rating of political leaders
Rating of political leaders, based on first 50 and 100 responses.
1=low rating, 3=neutral rating, 5=high rating

Leader 50 resp 100 resp
JBJ 3.83 4.02
CST 3.71 3.65
TT 3.31 3.43
LTK 3.39 3.34
LKY 3.02 3.10
KBW 2.90 3.00
SJ 2.65 2.77
TCH 2.60 2.71
GCT 2.60 2.70
CSJ 2.55 2.67
LHL 2.67 2.65

Excluding lowest 4 ratings.
Posted by Tan Kin Lian at 9:51 PM

 

[Porfirio Rubirosa]

Re: In memory of Mr. J. B. Jeyaretnam

Sorry but I got to ask this question of Tan Kin Lian. Why did it have to take him over 30 years to get to this point? Why only after he resigned as NTUC Income Chief?

Thursday, January 01, 2009
In memory of Mr. J. B. Jeyaretnam
Speech at Hong Lim Park, New Year's Eve Party

I wish to thank Chee Siok Chin for inviting me to this event and giving me the opportunity to speak a few words in memory of Mr. J. B. Jeyaretnam.

I do not know Mr. Jeyaretnam personally. I attended only one of his election rally in the late 1970s and only for a few minutes.

What I knew of him came mainly from reports in the newspapers over the next 20 years. They covered the unhappy events in his life, like defending against defamation suits or for infringements of certain regulations on his political activities. Like most Singaporeans, I had a somewhat negative opinion of him from these reports.

In July this year, my friend invited me to the inaugural dinner of the Reform Party that was just set up by Mr. Jeyaretnam. At the dinner, I decided to buy two copies of his books as a show of support. The book was a collection of his speeches in Parliament over the years.
Tan Kin Lian
Posted by Tan Kin Lian at 7:02 AM

 

[Porfirio Rubirosa]

Re: Rating of political leaders

Who is "SJ"?

Saturday, January 03, 2009
Rating of political leaders
Rating of political leaders, based on first 50 and 100 responses.
1=low rating, 3=neutral rating, 5=high rating

Leader 50 resp 100 resp
JBJ 3.83 4.02
CST 3.71 3.65
TT 3.31 3.43
LTK 3.39 3.34
LKY 3.02 3.10
KBW 2.90 3.00
SJ 2.65 2.77
TCH 2.60 2.71
GCT 2.60 2.70
CSJ 2.55 2.67
LHL 2.67 2.65

Excluding lowest 4 ratings.
Posted by Tan Kin Lian at 9:51 PM

 

[Perspective]

Re: Rating of political leaders

Who is "SJ"?

S Jayakumar?

 

[Porfirio Rubirosa]

Re: Rating of political leaders

My goodness if that is indeed the case

S Jayakumar?

 

[Rakyat]

Re: Rating of political leaders

I will vote for anything except PAP. some places dun even have chance to vote leh :(

 

[Ah Hai]

Rating of political leaders

Friday, January 09, 2009
Rating of political leaders
Rating of political leaders, based on first 50 and 100 responses.
1=low rating, 3=neutral rating, 5=high rating

Leader 50 resp 100 resp 150 resp 200 resp
JBJ 3.83 4.02 4.01 3.73
CST 3.71 3.65 3.55 3.43
TT 3.31 3.43 3.40 3.33
LTK 3.39 3.34 3.35 3.24
LKY 3.02 3.10 3.13 3.08
KBW 2.90 3.00 2.94 2.89
CSJ 2.55 2.67 2.69 2.73
GCT 2.60 2.70 2.67 2.68
SJ 2.65 2.77 2.65 2.60
TCH 2.60 2.71 2.64 2.58
LHL 2.67 2.65 2.52 2.50

Excluding lowest 4 ratings.

Most of the ratings based on 200 responses are quite close to the initial rating based on 50 responses. It suggests that the initial results based on 25 or 50 replies are quite reliable.

Posted by Tan Kin Lian at 4:00 PM

 

[Ah Hai]

Re: Rating of political leaders

19 Comments

Anonymous Anonymous said...

LHL is ranked lowest consistently in both responses. So what?

What really matters is he is rated highly among the PAP MPs. That's why he is PM!

Mr Tan, such ratings initiated by you are actually quite irrelevant, just like the petitions you sent to the authorities. Irrelevant because they make no impact, no difference to the course of events.

Maybe you should rethink your strategy beyond rankings, surveys, statistics, blogs and Hong Lim gatherings(you have ended it for good).

January 04, 2009 12:33 AM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Dear Mr. Tan,

I think the survey shows the majority of the visitors to your blogg is anti-establishment.

January 04, 2009 11:32 AM
Blogger Tan Kin Lian said...

Hi 11:32 AM

I suspect that many of the visitors to my blog have lost a lot of money on the mini-bonds and other credit linked notes, and they are disappointed at the response of the authority. This makes them appear to be "anti-establishment".

January 04, 2009 11:40 AM
Blogger Falcon said...

LHL is not ranked lowest in both responses as alleged by Anon 12.33 am. It always baffled me that the country has people who cannot even analyse a simple survey yet want to criticise just for the sake of criticising. I suspect our president is the one who is ranked lowest in both responses, even though I do not have the information since it is not revealed.
I participated in the survey and surprisingly, my inputs were mirrored quite closely with the release of the survey results for 11 of the personalities surveyed.
I did not lose any money in the minibond saga. I am still actively investing all this time and still able to make good percentages in my investments. In fact, my most recent investment netted me over 40% profit and I will be collecting the profit tomorrow.
I am also not "anti-establishment".
Let me share my thoughts on why I voted this way.
JBJ has my highest rating because he has demonstrated his fighting spirit even until death. His indomitable spirit spanning decades has my highest respect and he has achieved many first, including breaking the ruling party dominance, indeed an uphill task. He has also not been indicted in any scandal or unfair or dishonest dealings. So we have an honest man, whom the PAP machinery could not uncover any dirt. What he believed and stood for is clear for anyone to see.
LKY got a slightly higher than medium rating from me because of his many past mega achievements and for what he has done for Singapore. However, his ratings got negated by the fact that his recent performance, or lack of it, especially his few major strategic political errors he has made in recent years, lowered his ranking in my mind.
TT got a fairly high ranking because of his no nonsense and steady performance but did not get the highest ranking because of his involvement with Temasek. He still got a higher ranking from me than LKY because he is not that active in making strategic errors relating to the human heart.
KBW got a relatively high rating from me than the other bigwigs because of his steady and factual approach. Somehow his ranking is lower than what I have voted for partly I think is because of the continued high costs of healthcare and means testing but I am with him on means testing but a little bit concerned with the fact that rich foreigners are able to get immediate medical attention while subsidised Singaporeans have to be put on waiting lists even for major medical conditions like cardiac problems.
CSJ got a relative high rating from me because of his never say die attitude and his sacrifice for his fellow Singaporeans even though some of his antics are also not popular with the masses and me.
LHL got a low rating from me but not the lowest, I reserved that for SRN.
LHL got a low rating from me because of his lack of leadership in the many issues that arose in the past months. I expected a sharper response from the Prime Minister of a first world country and I could not see him demonstrate that. But he is a sincere man though that is not good enough for me as I have the highest expectation of a Prime Minister.
SRN got the lowest rating from me because of the impression that I get of him just existing for the highest position in the land. In my opinion, he is not a people's president as he is not seen to be actively safeguarding the people's rights and concerns. He seems quite contented to be just saluted and accorded twenty one gun salutes on national events.
I am giving this candid appraisal in the hope that everyone who got lower ratings than they expected to work harder to win the hearts and minds of the masses and for those who have got high ratings, with the exception of JBJ, to work even harder to maintain their high ratings.
This is also for Tan KL, to let him know that his surveys are taken seriously, and not just by people who lost money or are anti-establishments or who cannot make it in life or who have money problems. There are real people out here who are logical and analytical who takes part in his surveys are are not afraid to be counted to play his part as a Singaporean.

January 04, 2009 5:44 PM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

What have JBJ and CST done to help the plight of this group of marginalised people?

January 04, 2009 7:12 PM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

To prevent this blog from creating the impression that is is becoming antigovernment, I think a lot depends on the background of those who are involved in the survey.
I may have nominated Mr Tan Kin Lian to be the hopeful president of Singapore, however, my utmost respect is always with Mr Lee Kuan Yew.

January 04, 2009 9:16 PM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

A survey is... just a survey.

Not ranking PAP ministers high = anti-establishment?

For goodness sake, all Tan Kin Lian did was open a survey, invited readers of his blog, most of whom are anonymous to him to fill up the survey.

Suppose you choose 100 random strangers from the street, ask them to complete the same survey and got the same result, are you going to conclude that the people from that street are mostly anti-establishment just because they did not rank PAP highly?

Grow up friends. A survey is just a survey. If you want to see skewed statistics that always show PAP high on the score, you can always skip this blog and just buy a copy of Straits Time.

January 05, 2009 6:37 AM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

May I know who are: CST, TT, SJ & CSJ?

January 05, 2009 9:29 AM
Blogger soojenn said...

As Falcon said of Anon 12.33 - it is baffling that the country has "people who cannot even analyse a simple survey yet want to criticise just for the sake of criticising.". Also why remain anon. My views are similar to Falcon who has succinctly describe reasons for the ratings that he/she ahs given. I am also not anti establishment. The survey is relatively balanced as you can see that LKY is among the top 5 being from the establishment. One gives credit where it deserves. LHL is a far shadow from his father. Even GCT has done better during his reign as PM. Instead of viewing this survey as a possible feedback from the people, netizens in this case, and understand the reasons behind this, you have one of these people (possibly pro establishment), who sees this as criticism and not constructive feedback.

Relevance is not the issue. It is interesting to understand how netizens view the current politicians since we will never be able to get this out from the mainstream media, especially with editors like Ms Chua Lee Hoong who profanes outright in her articles on the opposition, quoting from Singapore enquirer "the outright disrespect and contempt displayed by the mainstream media against Singapore’s opposition as exemplified by the same writer’s (Ms Chua Lee Hoong) malicious assault on Dr Chee’s character in a previous article, have ailenated and peeved many Singaporeans off, including those who are politically neutral."

 

[Ah Hai]

Re: Rating of political leaders

Anon 12.33 also writes - "Mr Tan, such ratings initiated by you are actually quite irrelevant, just like the petitions you sent to the authorities. Irrelevant because they make no impact, no difference to the course of events."

* Why does he/she feel that this is irrelevant - to him/her only?
* What makes him/her think that there is no impact, no difference to the course of action?

Anon 11.32 writes - "I think the survey shows the majority of the visitors to your blogg is anti-establishment." - do you mean that majority of the 890,114 visitors so far to TKL blog is anti-establishment. Come on. I have also not purchased any mini bonds.

Anon 6.37 - "A survey is... just a survey.....If you want to see skewed statistics that always show PAP high on the score, you can always skip this blog and just buy a copy of Straits Time."

January 05, 2009 6:28 PM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Especailly with Chua Lee Hoonng the writer . She is a gahmen propagandist

January 05, 2009 9:36 PM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Dear Falcon
My wife salute your analysis - independent, logical and straight to the point.

From CASHEW NUT

January 05, 2009 10:56 PM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The sad thing is that the survey will never translate into votes ( partly because of GRC and partly because some contituencies will never have an opposition candidate standing )

January 06, 2009 12:31 AM
Anonymous Century said...

"I suspect that many of the visitors to my blog have lost a lot of money on the mini-bonds and other credit linked notes, and they are disappointed at the response of the authority. This makes them appear to be "anti-establishment"."

erm. biased survey ?

January 06, 2009 7:56 AM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

After trying for a few days, still could not figure out TT and SJ. Can some kind soul drop some hints without revealing their names? Thank you very much.

Rdgs
Still trying hard

January 06, 2009 9:36 AM
Blogger Falcon said...

Anon January 05, 2009 9:29 AM asked:
May I know who are: CST, TT, SJ & CSJ?

Chiam See Tong, Tony Tan, S Jayakumar & Chee Soon Juan.

Thanks Cashew Nut for your wife's salute and SooJenn for your comments.

January 06, 2009 11:10 AM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Thanks Falcon for enlightening.

Rdgs,
Still trying hard

January 06, 2009 3:31 PM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Anyone able to tell who are the 4 lowest ratings?

I dont see Wong Kan Seng on the list above.

January 09, 2009 6:06 PM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Some people commented that this survey is biased and voters are anti establishment. I disagree.

TT has a high rating.

In SG it is fashionable to condemn a person for even very very minor mistake or wrong doing. Yet, for all the atrocious past deeds of LKY all are forgotten or forgiven and he still earns a high rating.

If voters are anti establishment then I say LKY would not even be listed, ie fall out of the list since it will be right at the bottom far below LHL.

January 09, 2009 10:16 PM
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I did not take the survey on Politicians because I don't know them all. Among those more prominent in the news, I would rank LKY, TT, CST higher than LHL, CSJ.

We should not generalize that those who read Mr Tan's blog are minibond victims or anti-govt.

I first came to know Mr Tan's blog at the height of Lehman's saga. I gain lots of insight reading Mr Tan's advice on Insurance. I took part in his survey on Life Insurance Policy because he raised a very VALID point, which no one has raised in Parliament yet(?)

I am not anti-govt, nor pro-opposition. I access each candidate for their merits.

Just like LKY has ensured MULTI-RACIAL HARMONY, I hope to see LSL work to reduce unhealthy POLITICS sentiments; and also to be MORE PROACTIVE and to RESPOND to the voices/cries of the people, especially during this difficult times. Hence I rank LSL quite low, but LKY very high. Nothing to do with PAP or not.

January 09, 2009 11:11 PM

 

[PAPsupporter]

We should vote for the great PAP. Singapore success today has to pay some credit to them. We should not refrain fromvoting for them due to the global recession and some misleading matters.

 

[techiedick]

all except SDP - Singapore Disparaging Party

Only want to tarnish the image of SG

 

[Sideswipe]

This are good headlines.

only 6 out of 60 netizens will vote for PAP at next GE!
twice as many peoples wanted to vote for SDP compared to PAP!

 

[Rakyat]

We should vote for the great PAP. Singapore success today has to pay some credit to them. We should not refrain fromvoting for them due to the global recession and some misleading matters.

all except - PAP N SDP
:oIo::oIo::oIo:

 

[angie II]

Wow! PAP is the clear winner!!