Leong Sze Hian, a member of People’s Voice (PV) and its candidate for Jalan Besar GRC along with Lim Tean said he will champion greater accountability and transparency in Parliament if voted in.
Early this morning (1 July), PV shared a video on Facebook where Mr Leong shared his message in both Mandarin and English.
In it, Mr Leong revealed that he had served as the former chairman or president of four professional bodies such as the Singapore Professional Centre, Maruah, Society of Financial Service Professionals, as well as the Institute of Administrative Management, according to his LinkedIn profile.
“[With] my experience, I hope I can help to bring more transparency and accountability in Parliament. Vote wisely on 10 July, regain your dignity for a better future,” he said.
Mr Leong mentioned various issues of concern to his PV party in his message, largely arising from lack of data and statistics.
He started off his message by expressing that this is a “sad election”, because the General Election (GE) could be held by April 2021, yet the ruling party decided to hold a “snap election” now.
“The election this time is very sad because it can [initially] wait until April 2021. Why are we calling for the elections now –nine months before the due? The Government is just too much. It is like fooling around with your lives during the coronavirus pandemic.”
Mr Leong stressed that the Government would not reveal the statistics of COVID-19 screening in Singapore, as he felt that it is important to lay out the number of tests that were done on local Singaporeans, PRs, foreigners as well as migrant workers.
“The Government is still not transparent. Why are there no daily statistics on the number of people who are tested and screened for COVID-19? How many of the tested are Singaporeans, PRs, foreigners and foreign workers?”
Moving on, Mr Leong went on the express that a “good” Member of Parliament (MP) must “have the heart of the people”. He believed that the policies made by the Government should “put people first”.
One example given by him focused on HDB’s 99-year lease policy. He mentioned that the CPF and cash Singaporeans invested in their flat will be lost after 99 years.
“For example, how can you have a public housing policy in HDB whereby, at the end of the typical 99-year lease, your HDB flat becomes worthless. Then all the CPF and cash that you have utilised for your flat is lost.”
Having to spend 66 wonderful years in Singapore, Mr Leong was “pained” to see many Singaporeans “struggling to make ends meet”.
He proceeded to recall how his party cares about the issues that “really matter to Singaporeans”, such as the unemployment rate of local Singaporeans, as compared to PRs and foreigners.
“Peoples Voice is a great party. They have always hit the statistics really hard on the issues that really matter to Singaporeans. For example, the unemployment rate of Singaporeans seems to have gone up relatively more than PRs and foreigners.”
