I refer to Mr Low Thia Khiang’s letter of Oct 7 defending The Workers’ Party's lack of policy alternatives and its performance in Parliament. Mr Low points to the 130 policy suggestions in the Workers’ Party election manifesto, and how often WP MPs spoke in Parliament, to show that his party had presented alternative policies and done well.
But the point here is not the number of suggestions or speeches the WP make, but the quality, feasibility and coherence of its proposals.
A responsible opposition party should offer well thought-out, sustainable alternative policies, or at least serious critiques of what the government proposes. The WP has not done that.
Nor has it confronted unavoidable trade-offs or acknowledged difficult choices. For example, in one of its many variations on foreign worker policy, the WP wanted to tighten their inflow further, yet refused to explain exactly how this could be done without hurting SMEs, which are already finding things hard.
Indeed, it flip-flops so often on this issue, refusing to take a principled stand, precisely because it wants to curry favour with all sides of the debate. When the government does something popular, Mr Low and his colleagues have done little more than pat the government on the back, then say “do more”, “give more” or “should have done earlier”, or even claim it was their idea in the first place.
No WP MP has ever introduced a Private Member’s Bill, unlike former NMP Walter Woon and PAP MP Christopher de Souza.
Mr Low and his colleagues habitually show one face during elections and another in Parliament. For example, in Parliament, WP MPs supported this year’s Budget and praised several aspects of it. Mr Low himself had described the 2012 Budget as one that is “pro-people”. And yet, at election rallies recently, he attacked the government’s economic policies for lacking heart and his colleagues claimed that they favoured only the rich. All the positive statements in Parliament were forgotten.
Similarly the WP made a major issue of ministerial salaries in the 2011 GE. But when Parliament debated ministerial salaries in 2012, the WP proposed an alternative which would actually have resulted in a higher minimum and only slightly lower maximum than what the Government proposed.
Mr Low now tries to explain this away, but Mr Lin Shuxian has ably refuted him in his letter of 9 October, and the Hansard confirms Mr Lin’s account. Remarkably, Mr Low and his Chairman Ms Sylvia Lim had stayed silent throughout the debate, even when it was pointed out that the WP’s position on the matter was different from what it had previously stated.
During elections, the WP roars like a tiger and says whatever it thinks will win votes. In Parliament, it squeaks like a mouse and is circumspect because it knows that PAP ministers and backbenchers will challenge and rebut any reckless statements .
Indeed, when WP MPs are asked awkward questions, they have been known to declare that they won’t answer questions in Parliament. This is what Mr Pritam Singh did when asked to explain what had gone wrong in Aljunied-Hougang Punggol East Town Council. This is what the WP means by accountability and first world Parliament!
Strikingly, Mr Low’s letter was totally silent on the WP’s management of AHPETC, the one area where WP might have put its fine words into action. For four consecutive years, the AHPETC failed to submit a clean set of accounts, without disclaimers or qualifiers. As a High Court Judge observed, if AHPETC were a corporation, it might have faced criminal prosecution. Nor has the WP explained why it paid extravagant sums to its management agency, FMSS, which was owned by close associates of Mr Low, while AHPETC itself ran repeated deficits.
If Mr Low is unwilling to apologise for the WP’s shortcomings, he should at least have given an honest explanation to voters of why he allowed this to happen. The WP’s arrogant refusal to account for its record is the reason why many Singaporeans are frustrated with it. They can see it will say anything to score political points. They doubt the motivation of WP candidates who look good on paper, but are prepared to identify themselves with a party which is opportunistic and unprincipled.
If Mr Low had been less defensive, he would have realised that this was what the letters that upset him so much were trying to say.
The judgement of the people is an awesome thing. After every general election, the PAP does its best to analyse the results, understand what message voters are sending, remedy shortcomings and strive to do better the next time. That is what we did after the 2011 GE, and are doing after this GE.
Whether we receive 60 per cent or 70 per cent of the vote, our respect for the people’s verdict cannot change. It is not my place to offer advice to a veteran politician like Mr Low, but perhaps he too should study closely the results of GE 2015, listen carefully to voters and retool his politics.
The people are sovereign. As their servants, not masters, all who aspire to political office must always pay heed to the judgment of the people.
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