forever chee, the soon juan!

[leetahbar]

everything needs to change according chee the soon juan except he and SDP. looks like SDP has changed but the ingredients to their soup remain the same. forever chee, the soon juan. u want others to change, u ve to set the example first. and we thought he's missing after all this while. well, he isn't and is still scheming to slime singpaore until judgement day cometh. :(

“Unrealistic” to hope for reform with PAP – Chee Soon Juan
Posted by theonlinecitizen on September 1, 2011 58 Comments
9ShareThe Online Citizen catches up with Singapore Democratic Party (SDP) Secretary General Dr Chee Soon Juan for a post-GE interview.

During GE2011, the SDP did not win any seats but saw the highest climb percentage-wise in votes. Were you satisfied with the outcome for the SDP?

A political party’s objective is to win seats in parliament. Any time it fails to achieve this is obviously a disappointing outcome.

But we are not deterred because the political system we have in Singapore is not a democratic one. We don’t have a media that give all contesting parties a fair shake when it comes to election coverage. Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong stated very clearly before the last elections: “Not all opposition parties are the same…And I think there’s a difference in the way they approach politics and the way we approach them.”

Netizens will recall that the SDP was repeatedly excluded from Channel News Asia’s programmes when other parties were invited and we had to protest our exclusion before we were invited, even then under ridiculous conditions, on Talking Point.

The media gave the SDP little coverage despite the fact that we were all over the Internet as well as on the ground in our campaign. We held two pre-election rallies, conducted house visits and walkabouts on a weekly basis, produced an alternative economic programme, published a shadow budget, produced countless videos, launched The SDP Promise and the list goes on. But our coverage on the mass media did not reflect this reality.

SPH journalists have intimated to me that there is a more pronounced bias against the SDP than other opposition parties.

After years of targeting the SDP, and then giving us minimal coverage during the hustings, is it any wonder we did not get more than what we polled? For these reasons, it is difficult to conclude that the election results is an accurate reflection of the views of an informed electorate.

Despite this, as you mentioned, we were still the best performing party. This is because we knew what we were up against and we relied on the Internet to get our message across. Our members and associates performed heroically, never complained and just got on with the job of getting our message out to the voters. The results showed.

Did you think the New Paper’s report on your alleged desire to stage a protest march after an SDP rally affect the outcome in anyway?

Whenever the press run such biased reports, they always negatively affect our effort. But that’s nothing new, they have been doing this for years and they have been getting away with it.

But things are beginning to change with the advent of new Internet tools. We will continue to use them to explain to the people what we really are about. The state media cannot continue to smear us with impunity. The new media has made an impact and they are slowly changing Singaporeans’ views about us.

This elections saw 40% voting against the PAP and 6 seats going to the opposition. Do you think it’s a good outcome?

Any time the opposition makes gains electorally, it’s a good thing. But, as I said, we must remember that we have a system that is undemocratic and under the control of the PAP.

The PAP will continue to treat different parties differently according to which party it likes and which it doesn’t. The PAP has not hidden the fact that the SDP is the opposition party that it doesn’t like, and has done everything to marginalise and demonise us through biased media coverage.

Under such a system, real and meaningful change cannot occur. The only way that Singaporeans are going to see real change is when a democratic opposition gets into Parliament.

If real change is going to come, the PAP must not be allowed to dictate what the voters get to read and watch about the various opposition parties. We are confident that given fair media coverage, the SDP would be in Parliament to make the necessary changes Singaporeans so desperately want and need.

What do you think of the PAP’s efforts to change itself so far, post-GE?

If the PAP has changed then they’ve done a pretty good job of masquerading it. Yes, some ministers are no longer in the cabinet but these changes are purely cosmetic. It is unrealistic to hope for reform from within the party. The party culture is so autocratic and entrenched that the earth would stop revolving first before we see meaningful change there.

The media are still completely in its hands, our reserves are still tied up in the hands of the few, and the Singaporeans still labour under an economic system that exploits them.

What are SDP’s plans for the next five years?

We will double our efforts to speak up for our fellow Singaporeans. We will not forget why we got into politics in the first place, that we are here for the people, we are here to serve them. We want to see a compassionate system that genuinely cares for the people.

Our Community Services Subcomittee is doing great job reaching out to the folks who are in most need of help. Our GO! (Ground Operations) team is also busy preparing for our ground work. And, of course, we will continue to come up with alternative ideas and solutions that we have become known for.

What do you think the upcoming Presidential election will be about? What should Singaporeans expect from the next President? (The interview was conducted before the start of the Presidential Elections – Ed)

The President’s first obligation is to the people of this country who will elect him, not the government of the day. We hope to hear the candidates make their stand on this matter clearly and without equivocation during their campaigns, and that they will remain true to this promise whoever is elected.

One of the roles of the President is to safeguard our reserves. This can only be done if the people know how much the reserves are and how they are being used. In other words the next president cannot continue in the mode of the President S R Nathan where the people’s reserves are operated without transparency and he makes no attempt to keep the public informed.

 

[leetahbar]

SDP lost, it was forseeable and inevitable. there's an uncanny resemblance between chee and tkl - both just have the habit to push the blames. with this sort of leadership, double confirmed the party is fully condemned for good.

 

[steffychun]

And that is why SDP will forever fail

 

[spotter542]

Chiam would be very sad to see SDP in this sorry state.
Chee will be forever branded as the lunatic leader of SDP :p
Don't they ever learn ?
Branding is very important

 

[leetahbar]

chee is the authentic tyrant and despot wannabe. he asks, u must answer. we ask, it's ok for him to delude answer. to chee, pap has to be transparent. naked not enough. MUST BE TRANSPARENT. as for chee himself, only in undies with lots of teasing is good enough.

it's like only chee can burn joss-sticks but nobody else can burn incense paper. hmmm....sounds familiar this lame quote?

 

[leetahbar]

hopefully, tan jee say is not returning to SDP and hopefully if he doesn't, he would reveal the motivating reasons for him to permanently quit SDP. like tan kin lian, his PE loss is entirely to blame his unfortunate liasion with sdp.

something obviously not right. chee wasn't there to support tjs or tjs demanded the absence of chee or else he would be the other casualty to lose his security deposit. in fact most of the SDP bigtimers were absent. strategy? disagreement? or more storm coming along the way?

 

[Forvendet]

CSJ is a fucktard despot who keeps chanting the retarded mantra, vote for him, then there'll be democracy. Then went the extra yard to get himself disqualified to prove that there's no democracy. That's retarded, is it? Democracy is about a free choice. His meaning of democracy is the same as in Democratic Republic of Korea a.k.a. North Korea. He's not trying to serve the Singapore. He's trying to portray the Singapore as North Korea or South Africa pre-Mandela. No matter how imperfect Singapore is, anyone who believes that must be going nuts.

The recent GE and PE results show that majority of Singaporean are not going nuts, neither are they fearful of the government to vote against it if they feel they don't like it. We don't need a redundant prophet like CSJ. CSJ stands for neither democracy nor unity. He stands for personal despotism and national divisiveness.

 

[leetahbar]

CSJ is a fucktard despot who keeps chanting the retarded mantra, vote for him, then there'll be democracy. Then went the extra yard to get himself disqualified to prove that there's no democracy. That's retarded, is it? Democracy is about a free choice. His meaning of democracy is the same as in Democratic Republic of Korea a.k.a. North Korea. He's not trying to serve the Singapore. He's trying to portray the Singapore as North Korea or South Africa pre-Mandela. No matter how imperfect Singapore is, anyone who believes that must be going nuts.

The recent GE and PE results show that majority of Singaporean are not going nuts, neither are they fearful of the government to vote against it if they feel they don't like it. We don't need a redundant prophet like CSJ. CSJ stands for neither democracy nor unity. He stands for personal despotism and national divisiveness.

i wonder am i the only one to find it strange that most of chee's follwers have the same arrogant and lame behavioral problem. for eg, if u look at tjs, it apppears like there's a chee manifestation in him somewhere and there switch voters off.

 

[leetahbar]

chee undecisive whether he's nelson mandela or gandhi

Singapore’s ‘Martyr,’ Chee Soon Juan
July/August 2006
By Hugo Restall
Striding into the Chinese restaurant of Singapore’s historic Fullerton
Hotel, Chee Soon Juan hardly looks like a dangerous revolutionary.
Casually dressed in a blue shirt with a gold pen clipped to the pocket, he
could pass as just another mild-mannered, apolitical Singaporean. Smiling,
he courteously apologizes for being late—even though it is only two
minutes after the appointed time.
Nevertheless, according to prosecutors, this same man is not only a
criminal, but a repeat offender. The opposition party leader has just come
from a pre-trial conference at the courthouse, where he faces eight counts
of speaking in public without a permit. He has already served numerous
prison terms for this and other political offenses, including eight days in
March for denying the independence of the judiciary. He expects to go to
jail again later this year.
Mr. Chee does not seem too perturbed about this, but it drives Singaporean
Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong up the wall. Asked about his
government’s persecution of the opposition during a trip to New Zealand
last month, Mr. Lee launched into a tirade of abuse against Mr. Chee.
“He’s a liar, he’s a cheat, he’s deceitful, he’s confrontational, it’s a
destructive form of politics designed not to win elections in Singapore but
to impress foreign supporters and make himself out to be a martyr,” Mr.
Lee ranted. “He’s deliberately going against the rules because he says,
‘I’m like Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi. I want to be a martyr.’”Coming at the end of a trip in which the prime minister essentially got a
free ride on human rights from his hosts—New Zealand Prime Minister
Helen Clark didn’t even raise the issue—this outburst showed a lack of
self-control and acumen. Former Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, the man
who many believe still runs Singapore and who is the current prime
minister’s father, has said much the same things about Mr. Chee—“a
political gangster, a liar and a cheat”—but that was at home, and in the
heat of an election campaign.
Mr. Chee smiles when it’s suggested that he must be doing something
right. “Every time he says something stupid like that, I think to myself, the
worst thing to happen would be to be ignored. That would mean we’re not
making any headway,” he agrees.
But one charge made by the government does stick: Mr. Chee is not
terribly concerned about election results. Which is just as well, because
his Singapore Democratic Party did not do very well in the May 6 polls. It
would be foolish, he suggests, for an opposition party in Singapore to pin
its hopes on gaining one, or perhaps two, seats in parliament. He is aiming
for a much bigger goal: bringing down the city-state’s one-party system of
government. His weapon is a campaign of civil disobedience against laws
designed to curtail democratic freedoms.
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designed to curtail democratic freedoms.
“You don’t vote out a dictatorship,” he says. “And basically that’s what
Singapore is, albeit a very sophisticated one. It’s not possible for us to
effect change just through the ballot box. They’ve got control of
everything else around us.” Instead what’s needed is a coalition of civil
society and political society coming together and demanding change—a
color revolution for Singapore.
So far Mr. Chee doesn’t seem to be getting much, if any traction. While
many Singaporeans don’t particularly like the PAP’s arrogant style of
government, the ruling party has succeeded in depoliticizing the population
to the extent that anybody who presses them to take action to make a
change is regarded with resentment. And in a climate of fear—Mr. Chee
lost his job as a psychology lecturer at the national university soon after
entering opposition politics—a reluctance to get involved is hardly
surprising.
Why is all this oppression necessary in a peaceful and prosperous country
like Singapore where citizens otherwise enjoy so many freedoms? Mr.
Chee has his own theory that the answer lies with strongman Lee Kuan
Yew himself: “Why is he still so afraid? I honestly think that through the
years he has accumulated enough skeletons in his closet that he knows that
when he is gone, his son and the generations after him will have a price to
pay. If we had parliamentary debates where the opposition could pry and
ask questions, I think he is actually afraid of something like that.”
That raises the question of whether Singapore deserves its reputation for
squeaky-clean government. A scandal involving the country’s biggest
charity, the National Kidney Foundation, erupted in 2004 when it turned
out that its Chief Executive T.T. Durai was not only drawing a $357,000
annual salary, but the charity was paying for his first-class flights,
maintenance on his Mercedes, and gold-plated fixtures in his private office
bathroom.
The scandal was a gift for the opposition, which naturally raised questions
about why the government didn’t do a better job of supervising the highly
secretive NKF, whose patron was the wife of former Prime Minister Goh
Chok Tong (she called Mr. Durai’s salary “peanuts”). But it had wider
implications too. The government controls huge pools of public money in
the Central Provident Fund and the Government of Singapore Investment
Corp., both of which are highly nontransparent. It also controls spending
on the public housing most Singaporeans live in, and openly uses the
funds for refurbishing apartment blocks as a bribe for districts that vote for
the ruling party. Singaporeans have no way of knowing whether officials
are abusing their trust as Mr. Durai did.
It gets worse. Mr. Durai’s abuses only came to light because he sued the
Straits Times newspaper for libel over an article detailing some of his
perks. Why was Mr. Durai so confident he could win a libel suit when the
allegations against him were true? Because he had done it before. The
NKF won a libel case in 1998 against defendants who alleged it had paid
for first-class flights for Mr. Durai. This time, however, he was up against
a major bulwark of the regime, Singapore Press Holdings; its lawyers
uncovered the truth.
Singaporean officials have a remarkable record of success in winning libel
suits against their critics. The question then is, how many other libel suits
have Singapore’s great and good wrongly won, resulting in the cover-up of
real misdeeds? And are libel suits deliberately used as a tool to suppress
questioning voices?
The bottling up of dissent conceals pressures and prevents conflicts from
being resolved. For instance, extreme sensitivity over the issue of race
being resolved. For instance, extreme sensitivity over the issue of race
relations means that the persistence of discrimination is a taboo topic. Yet
according to Mr. Chee it is a problem that should be debated so that it can
be better resolved. “The harder they press now, the stronger will be the
reaction when he’s no longer around,” he says of Lee Kuan Yew.
The paternalism of the PAP also rankles, especially since foreigners get
more consideration than locals. The World Bank and International
Monetary Fund will hold their annual meeting in Singapore this fall, and
have been trying to convince the authorities to allow the usual
demonstrations to take place. The likely result is that international NGO
groups will be given a designated area to scream and shout. “So we have a
situation here where locals don’t have the right to protest in their own
country, while foreigners are able to do that,” Mr. Chee marvels. Likewise,
Singaporeans can’t organize freely into unions to negotiate wages; instead
a National Wages Council sets salaries with input from the corporate
sector, including foreign chambers of commerce.
All these tensions will erupt when strongman Lee Kuan Yew dies. Mr.
Chee notes that the ruling party is so insecure that Singapore’s founder has
been unable to step back from front-line politics. The PAP still needs the
fear he inspires in order to keep the population in line. Power may have
officially passed to his son, Lee Hsien Loong, but even supporters
privately admit that the new prime minister doesn’t inspire confidence.
During the election, Prime Minister Lee made what should have been a
routine attack on multiparty democracy: “Suppose you had 10, 15, 20
opposition members in parliament. Instead of spending my time thinking
what is the right policy for Singapore, I’m going to spend all my time
thinking what’s the right way to fix them, to buy my supporters’ votes,
how can I solve this week’s problem and forget about next year’s
challenges?” But of course the ominous phrases “buy votes” and “fix
them” stuck out. That is the kind of mistake, Mr. Chee suggests, Lee Sr.
would not make.
“He’s got a kind of intelligence that would serve you very well when you
put a problem in front of him,” he says of the prime minister. “But when
it comes to administration or political leadership, when you really need to
be media savvy and motivate people, I think he is very lacking in that
area. And his father senses it as well.”
However, the elder Mr. Lee’s death—he is now 82—is a necessary but not
sufficient condition for change. Another big factor is how civil society is
able to use new technologies to bypass PAP control over information and
free speech. The government has tried to stifle political filmmaking,
blogging and podcasting. Singapore Rebel, a 2004 film about Mr. Chee by
independent artist Martyn See, was banned but is widely available on the
Internet.
Meanwhile, pressure for Singapore to remain competitive in the region has
sparked debate about the government’s dominant role in the economy. Can
a top-down approach promote creativity and independent thinking? The
need for transparency and accountability also means that Singapore will
have to change. That is the source of Mr. Chee’s optimism in the face of
all his setbacks: “I realize that Singapore is not at that level yet. But we’ve
got to start somewhere. And I’m prepared to see this out, in the sense that
in the next five, 10, 15 years, time is on our side. We need to continue to
organize and educate and encourage. And it will come.”
He doesn’t dwell on his personal tribulations, but mentions in passing
selling his self-published books on the street. That is his primary source of
income to feed his family, along with the occasional grant. As to the
charge of wanting to be a martyr, once he started dissenting, he found it
impossible to stop in good conscience. “The more you got involved, the
impossible to stop in good conscience. “The more you got involved, the
more you found out what they’re capable of, it steels you, so you say, ‘No,
I will not back down.’ It makes you more determined.”
Perhaps it’s in his genes. One of Mr. Chee’s daughters is old enough that
she had to be told that her father was going to prison. She stood up before
her class and announced, “My papa is in jail, but he didn’t do anything
wrong. People have just been unfair to him.”
Mr. Restall is editor of the REVIEW.
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