Month: September 2011

Random Discourse – Skills Upgrading for Foreign Workers

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‘Foreign workers should get training too’, says MP Yeo Guat Kwang
Sep 19, 2011 (Straits Times)

Foreign workers should get skills upgrading similar to what Singaporeans go through, suggested labour MP Yeo Guat Kwang.

Noting that this would ‘create a level playing field’ for all workers, he said training and certification for work permit and S Pass holders should be done within the first two years of their employment.

Successful certification should then be used as a condition for work pass renewal, he said.

Mr Yeo, speaking to The Straits Times in his capacity as chairman of the Migrant Workers Centre (MWC), said training could be done in two ways – either through in-house courses conducted by employers, or via the Singapore Workforce Skills Qualifications (WSQ) programme.

I was hit by a Tin Pei Ling moment after reading this – I don’t know what to say. (I am also glad I wasn’t eating when I read this, because I would have choked.)

It wasn’t because I can’t think of what to say, but because there’s a few things going through my mind then and I needed to organise them. However, my mei Audrey beat me to it and she pointed out that if the skill set of these workers are obsolete, what we really need to do is not renew / extend their work permit when it expires. In her opinion, the policies should be concurrently tightened in such a way that the new intake will be qualified enough. (On further thoughts, I believe this would be a little difficult to implement even though I agree with this in principle. The reason being, what are employers who can’t find a better qualified staff going to do when the permit of his current employees expire?)

Frankly speaking, I consider the above suggestion to be completely ridiculous and hare-brained. The first first thing that came to my mind was: “Who is going to pay for it?” (The PAP has taught us too well to always ask this question, and that actually came before “Are you out of your fucking mind?!“)

If employers are expected to pay for these training on their own without any government assistance, it is then only logical to expect them to raise the price of their services – which ultimately will be paid for by consumers like me. That simply means my cost of living will increase and how is that going to be of any good to me while the threat of a double dip recession looms? How does Mr Yeo expect me to accept these ‘extra hardships’ while I am expecting a few more years of stagnant wages if I employed?

As to the WSQ programs, are these programs partly paid by the government? If so, shouldn’t priority be given to upgrade Singaporean workers to be more productive so we can reduce our reliance on foreign workers? It would be preposterous for the government to fund the training of foreign workers from taxes levied upon the citizens when the government has always been stingy prudent when spending money. It seems to me that Mr Yeo is so confused he can’t get his priorities right. Perhaps he is tired and if that is the case voters in his ward should help him along with his retirement from politics in 2016. After all, he has certainly given me the impression that he – if not the so-called labour movement that he is a part of – does not take the interests of Singaporeans to heart at all.

In fact, I would like to see more priority given in ensuring that all of these foreign workers are really qualified in the first place. The Ministry of Manpower [MOM] should do do more verifying the qualifications of all foreigners seeking employment in Singapore, especially after the case where 18 Chinese nationals were jailed over with forged degrees. I was recently told that even maids now have to take an English exam before they can be employed here, and I certainly like to see some foreigners taking up Professionals, Managers, Executives and Technicians [PMET] positions in Singapore go through the same English test as well because I have very often come across emails which are almost intelligible.

These days, I have seen foreigners with dazzling qualifications from universities I have never heard of taking up IT positions of other roles in the department. Unfortunately, their performance made some of us wonder whether they are actually capable of what they are employed to do. That’s not mentioning that we have never heard of those universities in the first place. Perhaps I am just an ignoramus but one of my colleague had tried to look up their rankings and none of these universities even ranked anywhere near NUS or NTU.

That is why I actually hoped that the MOM would set up some kind of central examination center where foreigners applying for professional and technical positions in Singapore should be tested, just like how IT professionals obtain their Microsoft Certified Professional [MCP] certification. They should be made to pay for the test, and until they have pass that test they should not be given employment in Singapore at all! If they failed this ‘verification test’ they can be allowed to retake as often as they like as long as their visa remain valid and they can pay for it (but not more than once every two weeks). That would give some charlatans second thoughts if they try to push their luck, not to mention generate some revenue out of these foreigners for our country as well.

If the government is concerned that this might drive the talents away, let’s stop kidding ourselves. I am sure even the government acknowledged that many of these are not even the best countries like China or India has to offer. A lot of those really talented ones either stay in their home country to make a name for themselves or head off to the United States. Since those who are coming here are almost certain not to be the best, why are we even sucking up to them at all? If they feel humiliated by a simple test then it is clear their characters are flawed. So, good riddance to bad rubbish!

As I mentioned earlier, we should get our priorities right and our priority should be to ensure that these people at least measure up to our standards of talent while the weeds are rooted out. So, just why the hell are we even talking about upgrading the skills of foreign workers in the first place?

Random Discourse – Cancellation of the Halloween Horrors event

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On online forums such as HardwareZone, some have insinuated that Ms Loh, who took over only in July, cancelled the event because she was Christian.

Yesterday, the 51-year-old CEO clarified that she is Buddhist and gave her side of the story.

…

She said that some members of the team, including those who were directly involved in the planning of the spook fest event, asked her why the activity did not fit into the family theme.

It is here that the reference to ‘devil worship’ was made.

“I explained in an e-mail that that’s a lot of money spent on an infrastructure (Haunted House) of devil worship. That was the context of my remarks,” she said.

It must have really disappointed a lot of “Christianophobes” that Isabelle Loh isn’t Christian and the Christian community can now breathe a sigh of relief. It certainly won’t do the community much good if another over zealous believer bring the faith into the limelight again. After that round of attacks in May 2009, I am pretty sure Christians wouldn’t want anymore of such attention.

It was also good that we now get a better picture about that remark on “devil worship”. Otherwise, the following would have become fact when nary any attempt at verification was made by the person who reported it in his blog post: “that someone in the senior management said, in response to why the event was canceled, ‘We should not worship the devil. We can be creative and turn the bad for good.”

A lot of readers has re-posted and share the blog post carrying that comment and I shudder to imagine how many who read it were misled into believing all of the hearsay as the facts. Thank you for scoring one for the government, dude. Thank you very much for giving the government yet another example to say just how non-credible blog posts are. Some of us here struggling with about 150 to 200 hits a day still do like people to read what we write and consider us a credible source (even though we can only dream of being respectable or a celebrity like you), you know?

Anyway, when I first read this news, I didn’t even bother to read more on it. My initial stand was that I don’t give a shit about Halloween since it is not a Singaporean holiday or festival or whatever not you want to call it. I am surprised that we actually celebrated this though I probably also wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow had this been a lunar seventh month (“ghost month”) related event. It was until a colleague told me during lunch today that there are students involved, and their participation in this event would be graded that I took notice and catch up with this particular piece of news.

I really don’t buy Isabelle Loh’s story that she didn’t know the students involved would be graded for this event. Even though I read that the cancellation of this project wouldn’t have affected their grades, this is a utter public relations fiasco. The only consolation was that an MP of Tampines GRC had allowed the event to take place there so the students can complete their work.

Regardless of my personal preference, a thousand over tickets were sold meant some people are actually looking forward to the event. That’s not mentioning the million over dollars that was already spent. Frankly, if Isabelle Loh has too much money (and good will) to throw away, she should at just throw the money this way. I could have used that million to make a lot of people happy.

Just what the hell was she thinking? Whatever her reasons were for terminating the event, can’t she wait until it is over and announce that it wouldn’t be done anymore in the future? At least a lot less people would be upset about it. This clearly looked like an abuse of power, if not an attempt to show off “who is boss”. On top of which, her attempt to justify her decision by quoting the new Elected President was just plain lame. It was all the more annoying when some had cited this as yet another “Christian Conspiracy” because the President is a Christian. Her subsequent apology for this was of no comfort to me even though I had chuckled briefly at the thought of this as a classic example of an attempt at currying favor gone bad.

I don’t even want to waste more time talk about her idea for a replacement event. From now on the name Isabelle Loh will be synonymous with FAIL, along with the likes of Saw Phaik Hwa and Lim Hwee Hua. Just where the hell did they dig up all these “jewels”

*sigh*

Random Discourse – The People’s Association

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The PA has also sent two letters to the media, stating that “it is not possible” to appoint opposition MPs as advisers, because it cannot ask opposition MPs to help the government connect better with the people, or be able to help explain, implement and improve its policies.

I have not commented on this because I was too tired working on the 7am ~ 4pm cover last week. I have to say this is utter bollocks because I am certain that even if the opposition MP wouldn’t care to explain or implement government policies, he / she would still want to connect better with the people who elected them. Furthermore, even if they are opposing certain policies, they might not necessary want to stop them but because they want to see them improved (or given some re-think). That’s not mentioning that if the government wants to connect better with the people to obtain feedback, there’s no better and honest feedback compared to those given earnestly and passionately by an opposition MP. (Really, all that other stuff from PAP back-benchers really means zilch when in the end they voted for whatever they seem to passionately opposed earlier anyway. I am not aware any of them had dared to vote “NO” in spite of the whip since Tan Cheng Bock did so when the Nominated Member of Parliament bill was passed.)

Now, back to the part about connecting with the people. There have been several events in the past few months this year at the void deck of my block. I am quite sure those were done by the Resident Committee [RC]. If I am not wrong, the RC is a part of the People’s Association [PA]. Basically, I have never been informed by anyone from the RC when such events take place. (That’s not mentioning that in all my 14 years in Jurong West, I have never seen my MP do door-to-door vists – not even during the elections. So much for connecting with the people.)

I happened to walk past one of the events one Saturday evening several weeks ago, and I didn’t even bother to take a look at what the event was. To be frank, I don’t give a damn. But as I approached, I could see that the attendance is pretty bad, because there’s probably just about 100 odd people. Now, there are 5 HDB blocks in my area, and each block has approximately 120 units. That makes 600 families and if each family has 3 people, there would be 1800 people within just that few blocks. Now, if there’s only just a 100 odd people, it means the attendance rate is not even 10%. How is that connecting the people? Frankly, I see more of the Muslim community attending the Ramadan prayers at the same area in the void deck because there are easily 300 faithful Muslims turning up to pray every night!

I wonder, whether these RC events are really meant to connect the residents or just for lackeys RC or PAP members only. If they are for residents, then I must say the RC (and in extension, the PA) has done a very bad job because I have no idea what those events were, nor were any invitations ever extended to us! I must point out that even if the events may not have been relevant to any members of my family (since I only have 2 old folks at home and no kids), it wouldn’t harm to tell us what activities is slated for the residents, right? No wonder my parents didn’t know where to get free food and be ferried to attend PAP rallies.

I also noticed that there is an RC notice board at the ground floor lift lobby so any event notifications could be there. Unfortunately, I have never seen anyone stopping to read them – because if they were I would have been curious what caught my neighbours’ attention and do the same. Though I do get some publications from the Town Council every now and then, I rarely bother to read them either. Simply put, I would consider the attempt to connect with the people to be absolutely feeble. If all of these were the PA’s means to connect with us, I must say that if there was a notice that my block would be demolished tomorrow, I probably wouldn’t know until too late just like that poor soul in Douglas Adam’s “Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy”.

RC activities aside, I personally do not even know what else the PA really is doing. It seems to serve no useful purpose at all. I asked a whole bunch of people in my age group (between 35 ~ 45) and none (including myself) could ever remember participating in any PA or RC related activities. If connecting the people to the government and strengthening the bond between citizens are part of the Key Performance Indicators [KPI] for the PA, then it has failed spectacularly in both of them. After all, I do not even know just who the hell the RC members are, and I wondered who selected / elected them in the first place. To be frank, I don’t even know the faces of my neighbours further than 2 units on either side of my unit, and sadly I may actually know my Malay neighbours’ white cat a lot better than its owners since it often perched on the common corridor. (Or the other neighbour’s edgy dog which seem to panic and bark at everything and anything, including neighbours it sees everyday.)

A friend mentioned to me that the PA is a statuary board under a ministry (like the HDB) and thus it must be headed by a minister. That reminds me that the PA is thus funded by public monies. Since that is the case, I have to agree with the Workers’ Party [WP] that we should abolish the PA entirely because clearly it has utterly failed in doing what it was supposed to do (as far as I am concerned). Abolishing it would make no difference to the apparent disconnect between the government and the people. Abolishing it would end the spat between it and the elected MPs of Aljunied GRC and Hougang SMC. Abolishing it would release the funding this inept statuary board is doing and free them up for other more useful purposes or better means to reconnect the government to the people.

Had it been abolished earlier, it would even have saved the Prime Minister the trouble of explaining why the PA can only appoint members of his party to grassroot advisor positions. A lot of trees would be saved as well since there will be less to report on the papers. It is perhaps time for the government to do away with the PA dinosaur and endeavour in some political innovation to more effectively connect with the people it claimed it wanted to serve.

Random Discourse – Remembering Sep 11, 2001

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When the attacks on the World Trade Center (WTC) in New York happened, I was out having dinner with some some friends. I only realised it has happened, when another friend sent me an SMS informing me that the twin towers have collapsed. I thought he was joking because the WTC has been attacked before. He simply replied that I should just watch the news on television.

I was only 5 minutes away from home when I received the message so when I turned on the TV, a shocking sight that greeted me. One tower has collapsed and the other was still burning. It wasn’t long before the remaining tower came crashing down before my eyes.

I wrote an email to a friend in New York (the only Singaporean I know who works there) because I couldn’t get him on the phone. It was several long hours before he replied to my mail and I only read it the next morning. His brother was also unscathed, though he was close enough to Ground Zero when it happened.

I was outraged. I was outrage not because I am pro-American. I was outraged because I have a friend whose life was threatened. The terrorists may try and justify what they do, but it has nothing to do with my friend and his brother. Neither has it got much to do with the 2600 over souls which perished in the twin towers that day. Whatever good reasons there might be for these attacks, the very actions of these terrorists invalidated them.

I can still remember the look in the eyes of one of the traders in my office the next day. He was an American. He came into the office and placed a small American flag on one of his screens. I also recalled the Cantor Fitzgerald screens that went blank, and it was very much later that I realised that a total of 658 employees died in the Cantor Fitzgerald office located in the South Tower.

Regardless of my disagreement with certain American foreign policies and some military action taken in other parts of the world, what Osama bin Laden and his henchmen did was unforgivable. It was a pity that he died a quick death only a few months ago at the hands of a Navy SEAL team. I would have preferred that he stand trial for his crimes against humanity, and then hung on the Brooklyn bridge by his scrotum with two fishing hooks which pierced his testicles and tied to a small silk handkerchief like Saddam Hussein. It would be nice if we can all see the hanging of this devil in a live telecast. I would have considered getting shot dead by the SEAL team in Abbottabad as mercy for him.

Sadly, Osama Bin Laden and the ideologies of Al Qaeda has spawned numerous other outfits in the regionn. Whatever political reasons I had to oppose the Internal Security Act [ISA] is set aside because of the threat of Jemaah Islamiah [JI], though I still believe that we should still charge them in court and sentence them formally instead of detaining them indefinitely without trial.

There should be no compromise with these extremists. If they do not treat the lives of the rest of the human race and their property with respect, then they should be treated like wise. These self-righteous, criminal hypocrites claiming to be Muslims and hijacking the religion have no place in human society. Everyone of them should be hunted down like a rabid animal and eliminated with extreme prejudice.