Friday, January 9, 2009

Are We Having A Real Dose of Bad Government?

The Self-fulfilling Prophesy of A Real Dose of Bad Government.

We have been told not to complain about the obscene salary of ministers but to accept it with grace and gratitude. Ng Eng Hen said we are getting a bargain. According to Lee Kuan Yew, we will get a dose of bad government if we do not pay for political talents. The women in our family may end up as maids cleaning up after foreigners in other countries if we get a bunch of cheap idiots to rule Singapore.

Having paid the ransom, are we getting value for our money?

Straits Times on the front page of 9 Jan 2009 reported, "PM urges no let-up in keeping seniors at work". "Sometimes, family attitudes need changing. He gave the example of hotels favouring older women attendants to clean rooms. But they tend to drop out, often under pressure from their children. 'This is a delicate matter of face and status,' he said. Speaking up for such jobs which may be 'humble' but 'honourable', he said: "We should not discourage anyone from taking on such jobs. To do so would limit his options to be active, engaged and to earn an income."

Women attendants who clean rooms in hotels are chambermaids. They clean up after hotels guests usually foreigners who mess up the rooms. Not unlike domestic help (maid) who works in Singapore! I agree with PM Lee that it's "humble" and "honourable" job and I have nothing against maids or chambermaids. I respect what they do in earning an honest living. Call me crazy to disagree with a highly educated PM but I feel children of chambermaids want their mums to retire not because of "face or status" but because of "respect, love and piety".

Would PM Lee or any decent Singaporean let his ageing mother slog as a chambermaid if he can afford to let her retire in comfort? It's so easy to tell a story to encourage old folks to work till sickness or death comes but a little sensitivity will go a long way to show the care and concern that people expect of their prime minister. It is a crying shame that in not wanting to help the old, he would even blame the children for wanting (pressuring) their mother/father to retire and enjoy their golden years. in building Singapore Inc., what have we become? Money or nothing?

I hope msm will not make a song and dance of this and start a sensational, "I'm so proud that my mum is a chambermaid in a hotel. She cleans up the scum and mess in beds created by foreign guests and does the toilet too! More than that, I'm so happy that my mum is contributing to Singapore's economy and does not need to depend on the government for public assistance. I love her for not bugging me for money too.. A chambermaid is more honourable than collecting paper cartons and aluminium cans on the streets of Singapore!"

If retiring ladies in Singapore are encouraged to stayed as maids, are we now having the bad dose of goverment?
Are the highest paid polticians in the world doing their job?

Are we getting a bargain?

Thank God for filial children, kind relatives and friends who love us for what we are.

Thank goodness for knowing that, "Sometimes, overpaid politician's attitudes need changing!" and we get lemons too!

feedmetothefish

Please read the above with a pinch of salt.

10 Comments:

At January 10, 2009 at 4:38 PM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think the self-prophecy has come true. Our mothers and daughters do not have to go to Indonesia or Philippines to work as maids. But they sure are not much different if they have to work as chambermaids in our hotels here.

Funny, I once thought that if mothers or daughters do have to work as maids overseas, that would reflect badly on their children and parents, but now working as chambermaids over here has become 'honourable'. I like the spin.

 
At January 10, 2009 at 11:52 PM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

spinning till i am dizzy.

 
At January 12, 2009 at 3:08 PM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

Is this the NEW Singapore Dream our beloved PM is trying to sell us? In retirement (or sorry cannot retire in Singapore!), we are supposed to love and encourage our parents and then ourselves to be chambermaids and to be proud of it?
What happened to Swiss Standard Of Living? Do the Swiss old aspire to be working as chambermaids? More Good Years was another call. Is this the good years promised that in our golden years, instead of taking up hobbies, playing with grandchildren or a round of golf, we will aspire to do this?
Or is this moving together that our parents are to take up those jobs where it doesn't make much after deducting their transport and meal expenses?
The fact that we have to work till we drop shows CPF cannot fulfill it's original intended objectives with every increasing HDB prices that have sucked out a great amount of one's retirement savings. Wages have not grown to match Inflation and certainly not even the prices of HDB flats from the government!
Let's call a spade a spade.

 
At January 12, 2009 at 3:58 PM , Blogger Xtrocious said...

Let the elders work as chambermaids...

But what if the elder is over-qualified?

This is the worst match of talent to job scope ever...sigh

Is this the best our highly-paid gahmen can come up with?

By the way, if it is a ransom, you will never get value :p

 
At January 13, 2009 at 10:47 PM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

The Singapore politicians ought to be ashamed of themselves. The Singapore economy, as we know, ride on the global economy and has nothing to do with their effort. A dose of bad government, well, we are enduring a high dosage of this for quite a while now, worst, we are paying them millions to treat us badly

 
At January 18, 2009 at 2:30 PM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

How old are we talking about here?

It is not easy to be a chambermaid. It can be quite physically demanding. I doubt I could do it at 60. 70? 80?

It is sad that my PM is telling me that I can look forward to such jobs when I get older.

 
At January 22, 2009 at 12:49 AM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

Some weeks ago didn’t they have just said that we are a family, Singapore is one big family as a whole? Then why is there classification? If majority of the family members are classified as “lesser mortals”, then shouldn’t it make sense that actually every member of this big family belongs to the same kind?

I am confused. Does my family members love me?

Along here, I would like to recommend this post:

http://informationreadbyme.blogspot.com/2009/01/its-life-lets-move-on-cpf-makes-me-rich.html

 
At January 26, 2009 at 4:36 PM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

In saying, he is possibly referring to the lesser mortal's retired parents... he possibly think & know rich kids's mum or rich mum will be holidaying in Europe, Japan, China and sipping wine with blue cheese in some faraway cool resort enjoying lallaby over a moonlit night.

He is possibly referring to families who did not make enough monies. Work helps keep social problems @ bay; works gives monies plus health and/or health insurance. Govt in happy situation this way. Not a bad idea after=all instead of having retired mom sitting down watching movies which is not very healthy anyway.

My opinion is not to give "rice parties" becos it is a false sense of hope. Elected officials & MP must do their part to alleviate poverty and gives low-income families a chance to get out of their situation.. definitely NOT conduct "rice parties" which is an example of bad government.. Temporary respite..and then what? more "rice parties".

 
At February 25, 2009 at 5:51 PM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

It is such a shame that Ministers have lost the plot. They have well and truly lost touch with the real world. Wages and salaries for the lower end of town ie the bottom 80% have not moved in the last 15 to 20 years. 15 years ago a shop assistant was earning ovedr $1000 a month. Today it is probably less. The message from our fearless leaders would be "Be thankful you have a job". In the meantime ruling class has given itself massive pay increases. The gap between rich (at present 10% of the population) and poor (at present around 75% TO 80%) has never been wider. Singapore has a very small middle class. Singapore has evolved into three classes of people - the aristocracy who think that the rest of us should eat cake (at present nearly 10%), the losers (the 10% or so of graduates who have not made it into the aristocratic ranks) and the peasants (the 80% who are fast going nowhere. Their wages will continue to be suppressed because of the hundreds of thousands of foreign workers. Ironically, at the aristocratic end, foreign workers actually push salaries and property values up thus benefitting the aristocracy even more. Singapore has developed into an unfair country. Justice goes to the aristocrats. If MM Lee lives for another ten years, by the time he goes there will not be too many who would be thanking him for what he has done for Singapore, which would be a shame but totally understandable and predictable. I for one, who has for so long been an ardent admirer and supporter of Lee will not be mourning his demise. The performance of the current crop of Singapore Ministers is clear evidence that 20 A stars at "A" level exams and 1st class honours degrees from prestigious overseas universities count for nought. Such a shame - all the work of the first cadre of PAP stalwarts has really gone down the drain. And they continue to shoot the messengers!! I really thought the young Lee was smart, he ain't. Pity, for Singapore.

 
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