People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people.
It was bold and it was obvious. The
"If you don't vote for the PAP, your government will not represent you."
Aside from the aforementioned SGD$2.6 billion warchest that the PAP controls, we also have threats and some arm twisting(!) Has a party ever been so brazen? Has a democracy ever been so twisted? Maybe it's just me but doesn't that sound like corruption at a governmental level? What, if anything, is a government's role if it's not to serve her people? Why then deny certain people of privilleges if they voted for the other guys? Does that seem fair to you? Does it not hark back to Hurricane Katrina and the delay of help to people who did not vote for the party in power? Isn't the democratic process supposed to be one in which we have a choice? And isn't that choice a right that we have?
Should we be punished because we vote?*
Some people seem to think so. And those are the people who are desperate to cling on to power. And to take power exclusively for themselves. Almost everything in me says "rebel!". But the cynic in me says "let's just stop all this election bullshit and just call ourselves an oligarchy." And rewrite the damn pledge. After all, the founding father who wrote it's dead and I think it calls for an upgrade:
"We the citizens of PAP
Pledge ourselves as one compliant nation
Regardless of freedom, thought or choice
To help the party stay in power
Based on Toadying and Elitism
So as to achieve happiness, prosperity and progress for our government."
The hypocrisy of the election really pisses me off. More so than it should. I mean, I KNOW it's not a democratic system. It just sucks when all you hear are the pretense of a "fair and balanced" voting/campaigning process.
Now, where did I put that Guy Fawke's mask?
*What choice is there when your government punishes you for "voting wrong"?
3 Comments:
i remember when i was still living in Yishun, and the medical centre near my place was already nicely built, just not quite up and running yet. Then the opposition party got voted in and for 4 fucking years, the place remained closed.
guess which party won at the next election?
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It is wrong to use public funds for political purposes. It is however very difficult to prove beyond the reasonable doubt of the judges in singapore that such a thing is happening in singapore.
But it's also up to the rest of us to (a) realise that the PAP does not have a monopoly on good ideas to improve our lives, (b) have the balls to vote for the other people who can make our society better as well, and (c) stand for election if we are those people, with all the risk that entails.
A party that starts giving handouts after insisting (as part of party philosophy) that handouts are bad for the country is a party that has run out of ideas on how to win people's votes. Either that or they're out to ruin our country (according to their own philosophy), which of course is not true, so it must be the former explanation.
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