Singapore's institutions
How strong are they?
Blogger says they're too weak to survive Lee Kuan Yew. "They appear strong only because LKY is around to make sure of things." Young PAP Forum.
Oct 14, 2004

Young PAP Forum
Posted by sphinx
I have had occasion to be very disappointed with the Singapore system lately. From what I can observe, the NKF saga is not a one off thing. The NKF debacle is a sign of a deeper systemic malaise. People are not held accountable for their actions and power is assumed to be absolute.
This is the reason why Durai felt so confident in doing his dirty deeds. To safeguard their own interests, everyone strives to build his own private fiefdom and be a little prince in his own right.
Once you are in control, it is possible to think that you answer to no one but yourself. Despite the laws, there seems to be no rules that really govern how people ought to behave.
Rules and values that are tightly held and deeply cherished. In its place, we find the arbitrary rule of man.
Do you agree with me?
Why are things like that?
What happened to truth and justice? Such lofty and abstract ideals seem irrelevant when interest is brought to the fore. It is all the more puzzling because Lee Kuan Yew and his PAP rode to power on the wings of social justice. Forty years in power and they are beginning to assume that power is a birthright. Just because Lee Hsien Loong, the son, was made Prime Minister, everyone else starts to believe that only relevant consideration is the connection they possess to the men in power.
Is it corruption? No.
Is it nepotism? No.
Is it cronyism? That gets closer to what it is but not quite. It is not a case of incompetent men and women who are appointed by the powers that be and who exist only to serve those powers; rather, you have a thousand petty tyrants who are seeking to emulate the example of Lee Kuan Yew. They will rule by fiat and seek to disregard anything that is inconvenient. The problem is that these Harry Lee wannabes do not possess the moral sense that the grand old man has. Their instincts are wrong but the power that they acquire is real. These people are kept in check only because Lee Kuan Yew exists. When he goes, then the norms and values of absolute power remain but the excellent moral instincts disappear. Our Republic would then be imperiled by the very guardians Lee Kuan Yew had entrusted its care to.
What do you think?

JJ
The Nicoll Highway is a case in point.
LTA was the developer who commissioned the tunneling work.
They were also the state regulator on such matters.
Sounds like conflict of interest to me.
And when it all went wrong, I recall one LTA Engineer taking the rap for it.
And the structural engineer and construction company took a lot more blame than just the negligence and incompetence of one employee.
As a member of the public, I cannot imagine how one man can be responsible for everything that went wrong at LTA's end.
With all the checks and counter-checks you normally find at govt. institutions, I wonder how this could ever have escaped the eye of more senior officials at LTA.
How can one LTA guy can be responsible and held to account for such a catastrophe?
If no other more senior officials knew about it, should there not be an inquiry on the workings of LTA such that senior officials can be kept in the dark for so long on major matters like this?
Can someone enlighten me?
Pardon my ignorance but the logic of the legal proceedings is just beyond me.

sphinx
Judge, jury and prosecutor all rolled into one. I did not believe that Singapore's institutions could be so weak until my personal experience with institutional dysfunction. Has the system spawned a self-perpetuating class of mandarins whose sole interest is in self preservation?
The LTA saga is an interesting one to examine. You are right; it is odd that a lowly engineer would be the only person to suffer any consequences as a result of the negligence.
The argument goes that if you punish everyone, there will be no one left to man the station. The weakness of such arguments is that it gives non-performing groups the excuse to band together; that way, no one ever has to take responsibility for the failings.
It becomes an example of informal white-collar unionisation. Except this is not a case of powerless workers finding voice and strength in numbers, but a way for white-collar workers to victimize and oppress all others.
Do you not wonder who was the person who was let go at the LTA? My bet is that it was probably someone who was not very popular and who was made a scapegoat for that reason.

Alfred
It's usually such... problems in a mammoth bureaucracy.
Can't help shaking my head.
We're too little to do anything.

sphinx
Are we too little to do anything? Let me declare that I am a fool and that I believe in the moral majority of one. The faith that we should all have is that we are all reasoning and reasonable creatures. If we cannot possibly appeal to the conscience of our fellow men, then there is no hope. Why write and post unless you believe that someone will listen?
The great danger that confronts our country is that Singapore's institutions are simply too weak to survive Lee Kuan Yew. They appear strong only because LKY is around to make sure of things. When he passes, much that is wrong will be brought to the fore as injustice is perpetrated and justified solely on personal grounds.
The men and women who now govern these institutions believe that LKY's example ought to be emulated. Power should be absolute, and the people must simply obey. In so doing, they seek to create the personal authority that LKY possesses without realizing that such authority is really LKY's special prerogative. He is a founding father of this country, he built it, sweated blood for it, and not surprisingly, the people stand with him.
But the many petty tyrants that LKY has cultivated in his troop of scholar mandarins have never justified their position in any such way. These people simply rode on the coattails of LKY and yet, daringly lay claim to the same authority that the grand old man enjoys. These are the foxes that strut behind the tiger; who cannot seem to understand, that they will never be LKY.
Talking about it is the first step that we take. The next step would be to organise ourselves. There is a need for a coherent opposition that is free from the taint of Chee Soon Juan; one that will actually talk about substantive issues and whose presence will force positive changes on our political landscape. Our Republic must endure.

sphinx
What does it mean for you and me to have weak institutions? Are there more NKFs and TT Durais out there? People who abuse trust and power to further their own selfish interest? The problem of politics in Singapore is that we are used to presuming goodness on the part of our politicians. We have been fortunate to have had good leaders.
LKY may be heavy handed, but no one can deny his impressive achievements. The question that we need to ask ourselves is this - how have we achieved good governance and how can we perpetuate it?

Garfields
Once upon a time in old China, a engineer was digging a well so to provide water supply to the village.
While he was digging halfway, he felt that the well structure was unsafe and reported it to the mayor. Of cos, the mayor submitted his case to the governor. But without further investigation, the report was squashed and thrown out.
So the engineer wanted to retire and leave the job. But he was asked to keep mum and continue to dig in the well.
With lots of stress, the engineer committed sucide. So the deputy engineer took over the job. But after realising the seriousness of the situation, he also wanted to leave the job and decided to migrant to another province.
But luck was not on his side, as only a month to go before his migration, he lost his life in the course of digging.

ITANIMULLI
45 years of PAP rule makes Singapore what is it today - a nation with wealth and respect.
A minority will argue that it could be better.
The proof of the pudding it to eat it.
So pundits of anti-PAP have to ask this question.
Will S'pore be better off in 2026 with a different government than 1958 know what we know now.
It is always right to have 24/24 vision of the PAST.
It is the FUTURE that impact on 4,000,000 souls.
You want to gamble with the lives of 4 million to prove a point?
What is your agenda - or you missed out for 45 years and need change for change sake.
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