Workers’ Party: Flag-hanging must portray the ideas of nationhood intuitively understood by every S’porean

Flag-hanging should be an individual, personal, or family effort and it must portray the ideas of nationhood intuitively understood by every Singaporean, said the Workers’ Party (WP) on Wednesday (27 May).
The Ministry of Culture, Community and Youth (MCCY) has previously urged every household in Singapore to display the national flag at their houses from now until 20 September 2020, as part of a community initiative during this tough period.
MCCY also stated that those who are unable to get hold of the flag at the moment can apply online to get a complimentary flag from the Ministry, and the flag will be mailed directly to their house address. The application starts from 27 May and ends next Wednesday (3 June).
On this matter, the WP took to Facebook on Wednesday to share a video of its members hanging Singapore’s national flag outside their houses. The post was titled #FlyOurFlag as a show of unity and solidarity in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The history of not just the flag, but the coat of arms and ‘Majulah Singapura’ goes back to 1959,” the opposition party asserted.
The WP cited S. Rajaratnam’s quote – the Minister of Culture in 1959 – who revealed in Parliament that in the process of designing the national flag and symbols, the Government “worked in close co-operation with opposition parties” to ensure that the symbols express the sentiments and aspirations, not of any particular group, Party or section, but “of the people of Singapore as a whole”.
“In the months of July and early-August each year, flag-hanging is often enough a product in many neighbourhoods of top-down grassroots efforts,” the WP said.
“But it should be an individual, personal/family effort and it must have meaning with the ideals of nationhood intuitively understood by every Singaporean,” it added.
The WP noted that Mr Rajaratnam had spoken “some strong words” to those who would compromise Singapore’s founding ideals as represented in the national flag.
It then cited, “The five stars represent the ideals on which the new State of Singapore was founded – democracy, peace, progress, justice and equality. Those who would destroy these are our enemies. Those who would repudiate them are false prophets.”
On that note, the WP questioned the meaning of a star in the national flag, “What does it mean when there is a star in our flag representing democracy? Or justice? Or equality? Or peace? Or progress?”