Democracy and a Free Media, a Hindrance for India

It is a few days since the Hyderabad explosion and the blame game has begun. Effective intelligence is more important than post-incident investigation. Coming up with various theories after an explosion is not of much help, it is rather a mere excuse to cover up the failure of Intelligence to prevent it.

There must be a resolve to take quiet and firm action, not public pronouncements that can be inimical to the security of the nation and give needless publicity to terror outfits.

One 9/11 is all it took the U.S. to clamp down on terrorism and make the country safe for its citizens.

In contrast, India has lived with terror since Independence and it only appears to get worse with more and more militant outfits enjoying patronage from within and without!

Both the U.S. and India are democracies, so the blame cannot be put on this element! One difference is that the U.S. is a literate, civilised country that is able to distinguish between free speech and antinational activity.

India has all the while been happy blaming Pakistan for any terror attacks in the country without taking serious action to put an end to it.

I have said this before and will reiterate it now — India does not need democracy! It needs a system and leadership that enable governance with an iron fist. The Singapore model of the past may be an option. A selfless, high-calibre leader with a vision for the country and a media that does not try to trip him will be a dream combination!

As long as you have a free media there will always be people who violently oppose dispensation of justice, be it hanging of Kasab and Ajmal or staging anti-India demonstrations in Pakistan. 

The nation will be ready for true democracy after it achieves 100% literacy and becomes an economic powerhouse with a civilised population.

But it must be ensured the country does not end up being governed by unscrupulous, corrupt scoundrels such as the ones we now have but without a free media.

G Joslin Vethakumar

PEE in Singapore

Population Expansion Exercise (PEE), that is! Not the peeing in HDB lifts that one hears about occasionally!

The Workers’ Party is a very careful opposition party. Not surprising, for obvious reasons! If the PAP wants 6.9 million by 2030, the WP wants a tad less. Both parties share the same concerns on the falling fertility rates in Singapore. Both talk about protecting the Singaporean core. All this can make one wonder if the WP is an extension of the PAP.

The difference between past opposition leaders and those from the WP stable is that the latter is making inroads into Parliament, thanks to a stumbling and fumbling PAP.

Nothing but Trouble: Singapore was not an impoverished country with a poor quality of life when the population was about half of what it is now about two decades ago. The surging, government-induced population brought nothing but trouble for the country, with a deteriorating quality of life. Income levels may have gone up, but so have costs

• Fresh Singaporean graduates, from local as well as top overseas universities, struggle to find even an entry-level job while those with fake degrees from overseas seem to easily land managerial jobs. And when they are found to have used fake degrees, they are let off with a simple fine as some recent examples show!
• Experienced Singaporeans come under pressure from younger, cheaper, mediocre people in the name of foreign talent who get trained here.
• So both the young and old of Singapore are impacted by the immigration policies of the government that always tries to tell people that businesses will pack up and go elsewhere if they are not allowed to bring in immigrant workforce. Which neighbouring country allows free import of people!

University Seats: If Singapore thinks that there is a serious shortage of locals with the right skills, then that is only a pointer to the failure of the Government in giving the education system the needed revamp and fillip. Still, how on earth are the Singapore universities ranked among the top 50 in the world? Is it because foreigners are able to find admissions in all plum courses at the expense of locals?

• And why lump PRs and citizens together, providing the former with all kinds of funding (including CITREP)? Let Singapore not forget that PRs are also foreigners!

Room for Only Real Talent, Not Half-Wits: Businesses are not here to serve Singaporeans. They are simply here to make money and flourish. They will scoot if their business falters even if they have a full complement of staff! Singapore does not need firms without a viable business model.

Bring in talent, but make sure it is real talent – not a flood of half-wits who get trained here and nurture ambitions of using Singapore as a springboard to a career in the U.S. It was very common in the recent past and if they are here longer now it is only because of the job crunch in the U.S. and Europe.

Let us forget the local vs foreigner debate. A Singapore with 7 million people in the next 17 years is something every resident will have to dread. Singapore is too small to accommodate that kind of a population without seeing a deep dip in the quality of life!

G Joslin Vethakumar

Why give Media Mileage to Terrorists and Separatists!

Yasin Malik Must be Quietly Dealt With for his Anti-India Rant in Islamabad

Democracy does not mean the right to be antinational. By giving mileage to Kashmir separatist leader Yasin Malik, the Indian news channels are openly patronising someone who ought to be silently put behind bars for treason and treachery.

Throughout the day today, Times Now has been airing clippings of Yasin Malik openly saying that he did nothing wrong by sharing the dais with Hafeez Sayeed, Lashkar-e-Taiba founder wanted in connection with the Mumbai explosions, in Islamabad.

While the airing was to ostensibly expose Malik’s anti-India rant from foreign soil, and that in Pakistan, Times Now gave him media space to give his side of the story. And at regular intervals!

While it may be right in terms of journalistic ethics, more so in a democracy, the media ought to act in a way that does not compromise the nation’s interests. Yasin Malik sounded arrogant and defiant, he is that kind of a guy who should be completely blacked out from the media. Why allow such an antinational to stir passions among his followers and the Muslim population in the country!

Terrorists and separatists clamour for publicity and by pandering to it the news channels are only indirectly contributing to whipping up sentiments and emotions from both sides of the fence.

The media can instead quietly contribute to the government quietly nailing antinational elements rather than sensationalising it to enhance their own viewership and readership.

Afzal Guru Hanging: The same goes with the hanging of Afzal Guru, a traitor who deserved to die. I cannot understand why some sections of the media and pseudo-intellectual human rights activists are rushing to his defence by raising their voice against the death penalty. He should have in fact been executed 10 years ago itself! No mercy should be shown to antinationals and killers!

I think all these so-called human rights activists will have divergent public and private views and faces. In public they present a holier-than-thou attitude and pass themselves off as someone ready to offer their other cheek when slapped on one. In private, perhaps, they will want the guilty to be punished!

Actions against terrorism and antinational activities must be kept under wraps! If the government is seen to be soft and friendly with terrorists, then the media can break its silence!

G Joslin Vethakumar

Fear Not the Snake, Live with it! No Escape!

Happy Chinese New Year!

What do you do when you spot a snake within a dangerously striking distance? React with fear and trepidation? Think of how to engineer an escape? Or look at ways to kill it?

Starting today and for the next 12 months, we will have to live with it! The Chinese New Year of the Snake, that is! Perhaps with all of those emotions, thoughts and more!

We had a good start to the lunar new year, leaving behind the Year of the Dragon, with a lunch celebration at our Chinese neighbour’s home. This has been the practice the last few years, refreshingly so in multi-racial Singapore!

Inevitably, we talked about what is in store this new year and about the ominous predictions of most feng shui masters — that the world will have to be ready for disasters, natural and man-made, as well as financial mayhem.

If the past years of the snake are anything to go by, there is not much by way of encouragement. Here is a view of what happened in some earlier years of the snake:

• 2001 – 9/11 attacks in the U.S., over 3000 killed
• 1989 – Tianenmen Massacre, around 3000 crushed to death, / Wall Street collapse
• 1941 – Pearl Harbour attack
• 1929 –Wall Street crash leading to the Great Depression

But then it was in 1965, another year of the Snake, that Singapore became an independent country!

Happy Chinese New Year all!

G Joslin Vethakumar

Human Rights Watch 2013 – India Fares Poorly Again

Violence against women continues to haunt India along with a host of other problems. Details are available in the Human Rights Watch 2013 report available here – http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/wr2013_web.pdf

But India has some funny human rights activists. They are a bunch of pseudo activists who have no shame calling for freedom for a juvenile monster, a near 18-year-old who raped and murdered a 23-year-old girl in Delhi (Nirbhaya) in December. Funnily, they call him a child. These are times when 12-year-olds beget children and these jokers call the rapist a child!

G Joslin Vethakumar

Overpopulation — a Great Singapore Sellout?

Singapore will end up with a population of around 6.9 million by 2030, from 5.3 million currently.  That is, if there is no stiff, meaningful resistance to the government’s plan for a massive spike in population!

There will by then be 4.4 million Singaporeans. But out of this, around a million people will be above 65 years old. In effect, about 3.4 million Singaporeans will vie for jobs and school/varsity slots with about 2.5 million foreigners.

But, wait, it can get worse if one million more people (assuming there are as many people in the age group of 45 to 65 years) are taken out from the total population of Singaporeans. Jobs are going to be scarce for those in this segment of the population.

Therefore, it is possible that 2.4 million Singaporeans will be pitted against 2.5 million foreigners for jobs and seats in educational institutions by 2030. This is a scenario where Singaporeans may be outnumbered by foreigners.

And the growth in population is not even translating to spectacular economic development. The GDP growth is still expected to be only 2-3%!

The government and the local media are going to be busy the next few years trying to justify their land use and population plans to destroy Singapore. They have already started making silly comparisons with international cities such as London, New York City and Toronto.

What is glossed over is that people in those metropolitan areas have the option to live in neighbouring cities/towns/suburbs that are typically around an hour’s (or less) drive away (for instance, Jersey city to New York City).  The same goes with most other cities – Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, London, Vancouver, etc.

So, the message the government seems to be giving to Singaporeans is that if they want a better quality of life they can choose to migrate to Australia, New Zealand, Canada or Europe where they can savour the luxury of space in communion with nature.

Singaporeans who study overseas will think twice before returning home. Others in the workforce will also seriously start scouting for jobs in the West to avoid being stuck in the concrete jungle (merely planting some trees around all the high-rise buildings cannot be construed as nature-friendliness!)

The Singapore of 2030 will be one where people from anywhere can come, study, work or rip it apart and move on. A sense of belonging may diminish among locals, with little emotional bonding, in a soulless Singapore staring at the threat of becoming a nation of vagabonds.

So, has the sellout of Singapore begun? A different kind of Great Singapore Sale?

G Joslin Vethakumar

My other posts on this issue..

• Preparing for the worst, hoping for the worst is not good governance – https://joslinv.wordpress.com/2013/02/01/singapores-overpopulation-issue-planning-for-the-worst-and-hoping-for-the-best-is-not-good-governance/
• Population density, Hong Kong vs Singapore – https://joslinv.wordpress.com/2013/01/30/which-has-higher-population-density-singapore-of-hong-kong/
• Overpopulation behind all problems in Singapore — https://joslinv.wordpress.com/2013/01/28/overpopulation-behind-all-major-problems-in-singapore/ 

Singapore’s Overpopulation Issue — Planning for the worst and hoping for the best is not good governance

Singapore’s National Development Minister Khaw Boon Wan has stressed that the projected 6.9 million population by 2030 is the “worst case scenario” and not the target. It is all about planning for the worst and hoping for the best. Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong also agrees with it.

Good governance is all about planning right, not gambling with numbers. After all, it is entirely within the government to decide what kind of population growth they want. Ultimately, it is going to be based on the number of people they choose to bring from overseas.

The land use plan announced by the government is all good. But, to me, that should be to cope with today’s population in Singapore, not to deal with the projected population. Singapore’s focus should be either on maintaining, or reducing, today’s population, not to further swell it.

G Joslin Vethakumar