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Straits
Times equivocates about publishing Chee's reply yet
again
Singapore
Democrats
31 Mar 08
28 Mar 08
Dear Dr
Chee,
Thank you for your letter. We will publish it if you
trim it down and confine it to the issues raised by Mr Paul
Fernandez. Your letter goes into many areas not pertinent to the
issues raised by Mr Fernandez.
Sincerely,
Yap Koon
Hong
Editor
Straits Times Forum
To:
Straits Times Forum
stforum@sph.com.sg
31 Mar 08
Dear Mr Yap Koon Hong,
Stop your
prevarication about my reply not addressing the issues that Mr
Fernandez raised. It is clear that I have stuck to the issue at
hand. Nevertheless I have shortened my letter to well within the
400-word limit (see below). Now publish it.
Chee Soon
Juan
Revised
version of Dr Chee's original letter. Dr Chee has removed the
portions in bold:
I
thank Mr Paul Antony Fernandez for his advice (Advice
to Chee: Don't waste taxpayers' money,
ST 20 March 2008). Unfortunately, it is misplaced.
Just
because Mr Fernandez is "grateful" and "appreciative"
of the Government does not mean that it is right for the ruling
party to ignore the Constitution that guarantees the right of
Singaporeans to freedoms of speech and peaceful assembly.
For
every Paul Antony Fernandez who is leading a "trouble-free
life", there are several others who toil under an
unforgiving economic regime that strips them of all dignity and
hope.
The writer has a well-constructed channel to
express his love for what benefits him. What about those who
disagree with him?
They have two ways of making their
views heard: One is through the elections. The other is through
peaceful public assembly. Both are guaranteed under the
Constitution and absolutely essential to a functioning democracy.
Just as Mr Fernandez does not think that elections are a
waste of taxpayers' money, why should he think that way about
public protests?
Perhaps it's because in elections the PAP
can bribe and intimidate voters, fix the opposition, and make up
the rules as it goes along in order to achieve a certain outcome.
The result is that, in such unfair and unfree elections,
issues important to voters become submerged under the onslaught
of misinformation propagated by the PAP-controlled media.
Note
that Freedom House, in its annual report, states that "Citizens
of Singapore cannot democratically change their government."
[The
Asia Network for Free Elections (ANFREL) observed the 2006
general elections and concluded that reform of the election
system is needed.]
Such
control of the citizens' views and the production of a
predetermined outcome in elections is much more difficult to
achieve in public protests.
In
addition, it is only through peaceful mass protests that the
people can compel the PAP Government to reform the election
system.
Peaceful assemblies, especially in an
authoritarian state where elections are manipulated, are far from
a waste of taxpayers' money; they are the lifeline of the
disenfranchised, the weak and the voiceless.
Mr
Fernandez also wants the SDP to "form a coalition and work
in tandem with the ruling party." [This
sounds curiously similar to what Mr Peh Shing Huei had advocated
in his piece "The
partitioning of the opposition."
There seems to be an effort to try to get the SDP to
accept the ruling party as the unchallenged power and for the
opposition to be a political ornament in a PAP-state.
It
must be made absolutely clear that under such a one-party system,
the only way for the opposition to work in tandem with the ruling
party is for us to abandon our democratic principles and become
client-party of the PAP.]
The
only way for the opposition to work in tandem with the ruling
party is for us to abandon our democratic principles and become
client-party of the PAP.
Hell will freeze over
first.
[In
case it is not already clear, let me reiterate the party's stand:
The SDP is not for sale.
We make this pledge to the
people of Singapore: We will continue to fight to empower
Singaporeans so that they can have a voice in the policies that
affect their everyday lives.
Peaceful assemblies,
especially in an authoritarian state where elections are
manipulated, are far from a waste of taxpayers' money; they are
the lifeline of the disenfranchised, the weak and the
voiceless.]
Chee
Soon Juan
Secretary-General
Singapore Democratic Party
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