After having gone around to look for my friends at all the three McDonald’s near Chinatown MRT Station last evening(the result of a horrible 3G network not delivering my Whatsapp messages on time to my friends for them to inform me of their exact location), I was extremely hungry and also seething with anger when I finally arrived around 8pm at the correct McDonald’s restaurant. While I was chewing miserably on my Big Mac, I saw this on the Facebook app on my Xiaomi MI-2 phone:
The Singapore Democratic Party has called for a joint campaign with the Workers’ Party, where both parties field one SDP candidate. If victorious, the SDP candidate will enter Parliament and WP will run Punggol East Town Council.
I was suddenly laughing myself silly. After showing it to my friends, one of them gave this analogy (and I paraphrase):
It is like you have been wooing a girl, and when you are about to succeed some chap came around and say, “Hey, you let me have the girl. Support me while I woo her. If I marry her, I’ll specifically perform one husbandly duty – the sex, and you will bear all the rest of the husbandly responsibilities – like working to support her, love her, raise the children, take care of the in-laws etc. Consider this a combine effort to get ourselves a wife. On bo, BrooooOOOoooo?!”
If I was the Workers’ Party Secretary General, I would be laughing my ass off because this has got to be the dumbest proposal I have heard in my life. It not only insults my intelligence, it is simply political suicide! Just who will be so dumb to put in effort to run the town council for the SDP, and when things go wrong takes the blame for it? The proposal shows that the SDP is incapable of managing and running a town council just like the independent candidates. Running the town council is one of the yardstick in which an Member of Parliament is measured, and also one of the ways an MP can serve the voters who elected him. The SDP has basically told the voters of Punggol East that it is not interested in doing that, and they expect the voters to elect their candidate? Only the so-called “lunatic fringe” could have accepted and backed such an arrangement. This proposal is so outlandish and silly that Chee Soon Juan might as well also suggest to the Reform Party to back down and support the SDP’s so-called “Unity Candidate”, and whoever will be the Reform Party candidate can do the ‘Meet the People’ session and perhaps share half of the MP allowance if the SDP is elected. I wondered whether the SDP might actually get a favorable response, since Kenneth Jeyaratnam Jeyaretnam actually claimed credit for making a similar silly proposal to the WP even before the SDP did!
Someone had even suggested the SDP is determined to contest in Punggol East to block the WP from growing even stronger, because the WP has been growing at the expense of the other opposition parties. Well, that might explain why the SDP and RP are desperate to make a splash, or they risked marginalisation. But in their desperation, their stupidity has caused even the WP to lose credibility because the PAP Internet Brigade [IB] will now have a field day painting the entire opposition with the same brush. If this person’s assertion is true, the fact that the SDP and RP actually turned on the WP when they can’t eke out their own niche shows they are more interested in their own agenda, and not that of Singaporeans. Their attempt to keep all political parties equally matched and feeble will only help the PAP. On the other hand, some middle voters may even decide that it isn’t worth the time to listen to the opposition anymore. If this is some kind of grand melee, the PAP is awarded points for achieving a technical K.O. because the SDP and RP laid down on the canvas merely after the bell rung for Round 1. I am not upset because the SDP and RP (and a whole lot of other people) intends to contest the by-election in Punggol East as that is their right, and also that of any other eligible citizen to do so. But I am clearly upset now because these two opposition parties are insulting my intelligence!
While I am not against the SDP or anyone else contesting in Punggol East, I must point out that the SDP clearly over-estimates itself as it often does. Though that’s not as bad as Kenneth Jeyaratnam Jeyaretnam who clearly over-estimates himself when he offered himself as a candidate for the WP to back. First of all, the SDP says that if the WP would stand behind it, and it will field a candidate that will be able to defeat the PAP. It has got to be dreaming because in the 2011 General Elections, Michael Palmer of the PAP polled 54.54% (16,994 votes) of the votes. That’s not only more than half of the eligible votes polled but more than half of Punggol East’s 33,281 voters. Both opposition candidates polled a collective amount of 45.46% of the votes. The victory margin of the PAP was 9.08% (2830 votes). Assuming the PAP suffered a 10% vote loss from their supporters due to Palmer-Laura Ong affair, at best that would add 1,700 votes to the opposition and make the contest evenly matched when we must also consider that some of the opposition voters might also swing in the PAP’s favor. In comparison, for the WP victory in Aljunied to happen, the PAP suffered almost a 20% vote loss in Aljunied compared to their votes polled in 2006 and that include a reduction in voters in Aljunied as a whole. In other words, the SDP wants us to believe it will not only outperform the opposition showing in the previous contest, it can actually defeat the PAP when there is no conclusive evidence that there will be a definite opposition victory. That’s not forgetting that regardless of the credentials of the SDP candidates, the SDP name has been so poisoned that it actually gives some middle voters pause when making their decision, which might add to the vote loss the opposition is also expected to suffer. Furthermore, if the WP backed another party and not participate, voters who previously voted for the WP in GE2011 may also be pissed about being “abandoned” after they have offered their support just slightly less than 2 years ago. Perhaps the SDP leadership has some crystal ball that we do not know of to be so confident in their assertion.
The only hope for a opposition victory would be opposition voters voting defensively and sensibly so we can see the ‘Anson Spirit’. If the RP thinks this is my endorsement of their bid to contest in Punggol East, I must say whether there is a Jeyaratnam Jeyaretnam in this contest doesn’t matter at all. In fact, the Jeyaratnam Jeyaretnam name would be further sullied if the votes it obtained paled in comparison even to that of Harbans Singh in 1981. I wonder if the old man would be rolling in his grave. Personally, I hope the RP Secretary General would stop invoking the name and memories of his father, because he has drawn down on that account so often that it is now perhaps into overdraft.
It is my wish that the SDP and RP end their childish behavior, and just concentrate on the upcoming campaign. At the very present, they seem to be doing more to destroy their campaign than to win it. If all these talks will win anyone the seat in Punggol East, there is only one party they should be talking to, the PAP. Because whoever who can talk the PAP out of the contest really deserved the seat hands down and the other parties should just abstain.
Regardless whether the opposition gained the seat in Punggol East, it doesn’t really matter because it doesn’t really tip the balance in Parliament in anyway. However, it would have the effect of a mid-term election for the ruling party, because it will be a signal to the PAP whether the people are accepting what it has been doing since GE2011. In any case, the star of some parties will rise higher while some would fall. No matter how the SDP and RP perform in this coming election, they will most likely only sink deeper back into the cesspool they are already in. There might not be any effect for the already dismal Singapore Democratic Alliance [SDA] overall, but many voters do expect the non-WP opposition parties to do what they felt is sensible. Surprisingly, by virtue of doing almost absolutely nothing (except announcing that it would not contest in Punggol East), one party has elevated itself to a position right after the WP – the National Solidarity Party [NSP]. Some might think that the NSP must be regretting its decision not to contest, but by staying clear of the controversy, it would gain some respect for its resolve. By seemingly doing nothing, the NSP has done the most for opposition unity!
Even the Singapore People’s Party [SPP] also somewhat elevated itself up the ranks, though one would say Mrs Chiam maybe no less a maniac than Chee Soon Juan. But Lina Chiam was a nurse, and is Mr Chiam’s wife. In my considered opinion, Lina Chiam is fiercely loyal to her husband and may not necessarily be a power hungry person out to seize power. Whatever she has been doing may simply be a faithful wife doing everything necessary to protect her husband from further harm, considering Mr Chiam’s physical condition after his stroke. I am not surprised if everything she does is what she perceived to be in the best interest of Mr Chiam, considering his experience with the other party he founded – the SDP – and also the SDA. Sadly, Mrs Chiam may not be aware that her actions is doing far more to destroy Mr Chiam’s legacy while she protects him from further harm.
Advertisement:
