公路电子收费，上！新加坡梦，破灭！
June 25, 2008
●朱正熙
一次有关公路电子收费上涨的调侃。
如果你生来迷信，一个在中央商业区足足有五米直径的地陷，应该不是工程过失那么简单吧？它就发生在有关部门宣布有5处的新闸门将在7月7日起启用，使全岛闸门的总数增加到令人咋舌的65个。
然而，征兆是不容易解读的。如果我被问起地陷代表什么？我只能从以下几点中寻求答案？
1、代表主流媒体的诚信度也跟着沦陷
要是大家有看到最近海峡时报的头版文章，一定心生疑窦，怎么坏新闻会变得如此可喜？再深一层想，这种困惑会转成愤怒，因为这等于又一次“报喜不报忧“的政治宣传。 Read more
Rise, ERP! Collapse, the Singapore dream!
June 20, 2008
Choo Zheng Xi
An angry tongue-in-cheek critique of ERP hikes (TOC op-ed).
If you are superstitious, a cave-in in the Central Business District (CBD) that left a 5m-wide hole in the ground could be more than bad engineering.It happened on the same day it was announced that five new Electronic Road Pricing (ERP) gantries were to go up by 7 July, bringing the islandwide total to a eye-popping 65.
However, signs are never easy to interpret. So if I were asked about what exactly the cave-in could be symbolic of, I would have to choose from several plausible answers. Read more
TOC Human Rights Focus Week
June 10, 2008
The past few weeks have seen the sensational public demolition of one of Singapore’s most prominent human rights’ activists, Dr Chee Soon Juan. Singaporeans have also witnessed the arrest of an idiosyncratic ex-Worker’s Party member, Mr Gopalan Nair.
Lost amidst the storm of dust raised by the media’s caricatures of these colourful characters is the cause they are fighting for. There is an implicit linking of the term “human rights” with the drama of the players on the field of battle: if their standard bearers fall, so falls the flag of human rights, guilty by association. Read more
Callous labelling of mental illness smacks of gutter politics
June 9, 2008
TOC Editorial
The figure of speech “method in the madness” has taken on a decidedly less figurative connotation when used in relation to Dr Chee Soon Juan and his campaign of civil disobedience.
In the latest instalment of Chee’s altercations with the government, the People’s Action Party (PAP) and those sympathetic to it seem to be trying to close the book on him by portraying him as a lunatic.
It began with Minister Mentor (MM) Lee Kuan Yew sharing the opinion of his doctors on the witness stand that Dr Chee Soon Juan was a “near psychopath”. In a Saturday edition of TODAY, MP for Pasir-Ris Punggol Charles Chong misquoted MM as having said he was “psychotic”, and reminded Singaporeans of Chiam See Tong’s comments over a decade ago that Chee was a “megalomaniac”. Chua Lee Hoong, one of the Straits Times’ most vocal supporters of the PAP opined that he had an anti-social personality disorder. Read more
The Unions, the Press and the People
May 14, 2008
Leong Sze Hian & Choo Zheng Xi
Let the people eat…detergent?
Does the media’s reporting of detergent prices reveal a deeper conflict of interest that may harm the country?
Once in awhile pearls of wisdom are found in The New Paper. Larry Havekamp a.k.a. Dr Money, in his financial column in The New Paper, likened statistics to bikinis: what they reveal is suggestive, what they conceal is vital (New Paper, May 5).
We refer to the article in the Straits Times headlined “Rice and cooking oil lead price rise: New Case survey of prices across retailers points out cheaper options for buyers” (Straits Times, May 3).
Bloggers’ group proposes sweeping changes in Internet regulation
April 18, 2008
MEDIA RELEASE
For immediate release
By Choo Zheng Xi and Alex Au
18 April 2008
Bloggers’ group proposes sweeping changes in Internet regulation
A group of committed bloggers will submit recommendations to the Minister for Information, Communication and the Arts within the next few days, on the subject of Internet regulation. This open letter, which will be released to the public at the same time, will call for sweeping changes to bring Singapore in line with international norms and the reality of the new technology.
Its key proposals include:
1. All regulation of speech should be platform-neutral, given the steady convergence of various platforms as a result of the digital revolution. There should not be different rules for different media.
5 Minutes With…. Choo Zheng Xi on PM Lee’s interview
April 15, 2008
On PM Lee, succession, and weak leadership
TOC’s Chief Editor Choo Zheng Xi gives his response to today’s Straits Times’ reproduction of an interview done with Prime Minister Lee Hsien Long, and gets him to answer the tough questions the mainstream press isn’t.
(The ST report is titled “Beyond kissing babies”, April 15, Page H6.)
Zheng Xi will try to bust some myths, ask some tough questions, and attempt to shed some light on the PAP’s remarkably opaque succession plans.
Question 1: Succession?
The interview seems to focus quite a bit on questions relating to his Ministers’ caliber, as opposed to focusing on his collective assessment of his government’s work. Why is the press so keen on getting his appraisal of his ministers’ work as individuals?
TOC Feature: No female full Minister in Cabinet
March 31, 2008
Is something wrong with the process, the people, or the PAP?
Choo Zheng Xi
The government’s decision not to appoint a female full Minister has disappointed both male and female Singaporeans.
In a surprise move on Saturday, the People’s Action Party (PAP) government failed to break the 42-year female dry spell in the highest echelons of government. Prior to the reshuffle, many observers were expecting Ministers of State Mrs Lim Hwee Hua or Ms Grace Fu to be appointed full Minister.
Instead, Lim Hwee Hua is the new Senior Minister of State for Finance and Transport and Grace Fu is to be the new Senior Minister of State for Education, while continuing her present appointment as the Minister of State for National Development.
TOC Report: Bureacratic muddle leads to canning of International Fringe Festival event
January 27, 2008
By Choo Zheng Xi
Members of the Singapore Complaints Choir have an additional grievance to add to their future lyric sheets: they have been effectively muzzled by the city state’s police.
The arrival of the Finnish ‘Complaints Choir’ in Singapore was an eagerly anticipated component of the M1 Singapore Fringe Festival 2008. The Singapore leg of the Complaints Choir was billed as the first Asian Complaints Choir to be organized.
Now, the Choir’s experience will be remembered as a first for a very different reason: it was effectively banned from performing in public by the police because of foreign members’ participation in the choir. (See the choir’s press release below).
Have we lost our audacity to hope?
January 17, 2008
By Choo Zheng Xi
I’m completely unashamed to admit that watching Barack Obama give his Iowa Caucus victory speech sent shivers down my spine and made me more than a little misty eyed.
This wasn’t the first time I felt this way watching him speak: I remember the same reaction following his speeches ever since he gave the keynote address to the Democratic National Congress (DNC) in 2004, the speech that launched him to international prominence.
But this isn’t a paean to American politics or Barack Obama.
In fact, I credit much of that cathartic release to a transposition of emotion I feel at the inspiration deficit from our local political scene.
