The PAP government has created policies that favour rich foreigners. And the rich are allowed to accumulate their wealth, while living inside their own bubbles and gated communities, while turning a blind eye to the poor and middle-class. When you have a government that believes in only protecting the rich and allowing the rich to be willful in their ways, you will attract only the rich who would be spoilt and ignorant. If you have a government which believes in fairness and equality, it would attract foreigners who would believe in sharing and caring, and respecting the people they live with. The problem isnt a specific problem about how Singaporeans dislike foreigners. The problem is that we have a government which panders shamelessly to the rich and mighty who do not care a hoot about others, and a government which would bend themselves backwards to such unkind people, simply because of the money they can get. When you have a government which does not have a backbone, integrity and pride, you have a government which would allow the rich to chastise the poor and most of Singaporeans, while yet asking Singaporeans to show empathy and forgiveness to the very people who trample on us. Yet, the government allows them to do so, because is it not that the government themselves are already trampling all over Singaporeans, while we keep quiet and suffer in silence, as they rob us of our CPF, our wages and our social and mental well-being? And all this time, we continue to hope and hang on to that finite hope that one day, the PAP will turn around and one day, the PAP will realise their misdeeds and that they will start to protect Singaporeans again. The PAP has stopped doing so for 15 years now. The current PAP politicians are in it for different reasons. They are no Goh Keng Swee or Toh Chin Chye or S. Rajaratnam. They are a completely different breed who are there for different reasons, and who have been brought up to think differently from the caring and empathetic true PAP leaders that once were. Singaporeans can keep being sentimental and hope the PAP of the past can one day materialise in the current PAP politicians. We can hope until the cow comes home, and the cow will be laughing as it bypasses the home and lost hope that we are hanging on to. We can be sentimental because we fear for our lives, for our children and for our childrens children, and which is why we choose to ignore the atrocities that the PAP has done to us. We can choose to accept their bullying because we fear, and hope that even if they treat us just that bit little better, that we can swallow our pride and accept that little pittance they give to us, while they amass the rest from us. Yet, we dont realise that it is for this very fact that we are willing to pretend and deny the PAPs wrongdoings to us that they continue to do so and will never change because we allow it, and it is in our denial that our children and their children will suffer if this continues. And when our children look back, will they blame us for not having taken a stand against a government which would rob them of their future? In our fear to do anything against the PAP, we are destroying the future of our children and theirs. Arent we as well guilty of turning a blind eye from the atrocities that our children and theirs would have to live with, simply because we dont have the courage and honesty to do whats right? We can hope that the PAP will turn around, but we have waited for 15 years and theyve not done so, so how long more must we wait? How long more must we wait before they further savage us and when we are finally at our wits ends, before we decide to take a stand? Another 5, 10, 15 years? But can Singapore still wait that long? And by then, will Singapore be in even deeper trouble? By then, will we have a harder time trying to undo what has been done to us by 30 years then? The Singapore Population White Paper for 2030 isnt a joke and until we realise that we need to have the courage and honesty to stop pretending that things are well, and to realise that we need to take a stand, shall we come out the better and not allow more Anton Caseys and more appeals for us to show empathy and forgiveness to them. Until we learn to stand up for ourselves, will people learn to take us seriously, will people then learn to treat us with respect, and show us empathy. Only then will the government not create policies that push us aside because we are not good enough for them. If we want change to happen in Singapore, its high time we stop waiting. Its high time we start realising how weve allowed ourselves to stay silent amidst the disdainful treatment of us, and to stand up and take a clear stand. We know what needs to be done. We know we can do it. But until we find the courage within us, and the honesty within us to do, we shall forever allow Anton Caseys to trample all over us. And until we take pride and take a firm stand, we shall always be subject to fare hikes which are claimed not to improve the service quality for us, but for the profits of transport operators. And until we take a stand, shall we regain the independence that our parents, and their parents have so hard fought for, to allow us to live the lives we can now. Before the life that we have are dismantled by our very inaction, we need to learn how to put the voice back into ourselves, and stand up and fight for the lives that we want, and the pride and dignity that we want our lives to be, and of our childrens and their children.
Posted on: Sun, 26 Jan 2014 05:26:16 +0000
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