DERRICK: I’ve been reading the flame war between Shanmugam (Law and Home Affairs Minister) and various Workers’ Party members with great disgust. Here we have a minister using Facebook to launch so many accusations of fraud and corruption against the WP for its handling of AHPETC. Why is a minister being so childish? Is social media really a place for ministers to carry out such activities?
Personally, I’m quite gutted by the KPMG auditors’ findings about the mismanagement of funds by AHPETC. The WP were given 5 years to make something good of the town council and show Singaporeans that it had the substance to move on to bigger things. Not 1 or 2 years, but 5 years, and Sylvia (WP Chairman, Sylvia Lim) comes out and admits that the party didn’t do a good job. It’s quite defeating to hear this and I truly hope that the WP cannot make something good out of the next 5 years.
But all this flaming online has to stop. We don’t need to be minister-calibre to see what Shanmugam is trying to say and how bad a picture he is trying to paint of the WP. The same goes for opposition opportunist Goh Meng Seng, who appears more than happy to twist the knife further with one hand while on the other waving the banner of “opposition unity”.
But Goh Meng Seng is just an un-elected loudmouth. Shanmugam is our law and home affair minister. If there is really any corruption or fraud involved, surely he has enough power to recommend in parliament that an independent CPIB-led investigation be launched into the affairs of AHPETC? This would dispel all doubt that the WP people managing the town council were up to no good. That is, if they had really engaged in corrupt practices with the purpose of defrauding the public.
If there is no such independent investigation into the accusations of corruption, I hope that Shanmugam will shut his trap because after dragging this incident on for the past 3 years, the barking is getting too much to bear. If WP members are indeed corrupt, then expose them as the frauds they are for the good of the public, instead of simply cow beh cow bu-ing on Facebook.
Thanks Derrick for this letter.
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Goh Meng Seng
July 26, 2016 at 9:23 pm
I stand by what I have said here.
They author Derick is self-contradicting. He acknowledges that WP has screwed up badly but yet, he didn’t want other to call a spade a spade!
There will NOT be any improvement if WP and its supporters were to hold such attitude. One must face the criticisms and problems head on, acknowledge that this is a SERIOUS problem before one could take such problems SERIOUSLY.
It is an INCONVENIENT Truth but it must be addressed. WP is NOT lack of experiences in running a TC and it had claimed to have over 20 years of experiences in running Hougang.
Now it begs the questions. Has it been running Hougang TC the way it runs AHPETC? It is unimaginable how bad the situation is.
Goh Meng Seng