TODAY: Workers' Party's website hacked

THE website of the Workers' Party, www.wp.org.sg, has come under attack twice in the last two days by a notorious Brazilian hacker group that call itself the Smurf_RedHat.

Early investigations showed that the website's password had been hacked.

The party's IT committee tracked the group to the Ir4Dex Deface Group, which was found to have used open proxy servers in Malaysia, South Korea and France to launch the attack.

"To them, it's like collecting trophies," a party official said. The party is monitoring if the hackers will attack again but said the website should be up by 6pm tomorrow. - Lee Ching Wern

TODAY: Birthday smiles and defiance

WP's birthday number

by Lee Ching Wern
chingwern@newstoday.com.sg


Workers' Party chief Low Thia Khiang, right, and Central Executive Committee member Dr Poh Lee Guan, left, at the celebration. - TODAY photo by ALVIN TOH

ANYONE entering Toa Payoh's Lucky Restaurant last Saturday night would have thought he had walked into a cosy family celebration.

Chinese music played softly in the background while people kept leaving their seats to shake hands with each other.

Only the flashing cameras and the throng of recorder-armed reporters hinted that this was not one of your run-of-the-mill birthday parties.

The Workers' Party was turning 45. Its leader, Mr Low Thia Khiang, was smiling broadly and other Opposition figures such as Mr Chiam See Tong were at hand to celebrate with him.

This usually tense and tight-lipped fraternity was completely relaxed.

"You know my daughter is a journalist," offered Mr Chiam, who doesn't always open up to the media.

The Potong Pasir MP then revealed that he had retired from his law practice last month. But, contrary to what some have speculated, he has every intention of running in the next election.

Non-Constituency MP Steve Chia, who had been criticised by columnist Ravi Veloo in this newspaper a couple of months back, said he had shrugged it off. "If you are going to be so sensitive to criticism, you shouldn't join opposition politics," he explained, saying that he was glad his response to the article was published in full.

Meanwhile, women members of WP, all wearing identical puffed sleeves, made a fashion statement. "We went shopping together at Toa Payoh to get this," laughed Ms Sylvia Lim, one of the party's latest recruits.

But the restaurant fell silent as WP, showing its embrace with technology, made a PowerPoint presentation of its history.

As sentimental background music played, dusty newspaper reports on its triumphs and disappointments were flashed on the big screen. Most of them referred to the one man who spurned the invitation to dinner that night. It was obvious, though, that the party's former chief, Mr JB Jeyaretnam, who has had a public falling out with Mr Low, would always be a part of WP's history.

His aggressive style, though, may have left the stage with him. Mr Low agreed that there seemed to be a greater convergence of views between the PAP and opposition parties.

"Is the PAP moving closer to the Opposition ... or is the Opposition leaning towards PAP?" asked Mr Low. "The Workers' Party will confront when necessary ... but we must not lose sight of the national interest. Our role is that of a watchdog. We do not propose to be a mad dog," he said.

All the six new central executive committee members introduced at the dinner - Dr Poh Lee Guan, Mr James Gomez, Mr Yaw Shin Leong, Mr Tan Wui Hua and Ms Sylvia Lim - are young educated professionals. So expect WP to field a team to contest in a GRC at the next polls, said Mr Low.

He said he had once asked Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew if he was certain that there would never be a PAP Government that might squander national reserves. SM Lee responded that while he could say he knew Mr Low, he couldn't say how Mr Low's son or grandson would turn out.

In other words, no one could predict the future. In that spirit, Mr Low said his party would continue to provide choices. "We fall, we stand up and move on - and 45 years of holding up is no small feat," he said.

Streats: Ready for hell

New Workers' Party cadre willing to lose all to stand up for what she believes in

By Yong Hui Mien


'I have no regrets joining WP. The path ahead is very uncertain, but I will regret more if I did not take that step to join.' - Ms Lim

WHEN law lecturer Sylvia Lim Swee Lian, 37, decided to join the Workers' Party, she resigned herself to two things: She might find herself in jail one day and she might be declared a bankrupt.

And when her friends learnt she was entering opposition politics, they too advised her to get her personal finances in order, just in case.

Even her father joked that she would land up in the lock-up one day, she said. While such thinking might be a major reason why so few Singaporeans join opposition political parties, Ms Lim, the WP's new cadre, said yesterday she was prepared to go to jail or through hell to uphold her beliefs.

Nothing will stand between her and her convictions, she said in an interview with Streats.

And one conviction is that there is an urgent need for diverse voices in the opposition camp.

"Nobody encouraged me to join politics," she said. "Who would? This is Singapore, you know."

Recalling her former job as a police inspector from 1991 to 1994, she said: "I have seen what can happen to people sometimes, like lawsuits and bankruptcies.

"I know what the score is. We only live life once and I refuse to live in fear. That's my philosophy."

Ms Lim, who is single, joined the WP soon after the General Election last November.

The spunky law lecturer at Temasek Polytechnic decided to join the opposition party after the PAP took 75 per cent of the seats at the election. WP's leader, Mr Low Thia Khiang, won in Hougang.

She recalled: "I sent a card to congratulate Mr Low after the General Election, along with a donation for the party. I also expressed my interest to contribute to the party. When he called me back, I was very excited, but I couldn't answer the phone because I was teaching a class. We met later in Tampines.

"I think he wanted to size me up - to see if I was a lunatic or if I have any personal agenda for wanting to join the party."

Besides being a council member in the party's policy-making central executive committee, Ms Lim is also the chairman of the WP's Party Vision Manifestal Committee and a member of the Policy and Current Affairs Committee.

Being in the opposition doesn't mean being being anti-PAP, she stressed.

"We are not here to bring down the Government. It's not our intention. They have been doing all right the past few years.

"I am aware of the broad government concerns, like I can see their operational considerations. This gives me a balanced view. I have become more realistic in my expectations."

But more can be done, she added.

"The WP has always been speaking for working class and the less well-off. I agree with this platform."

She and five other new WP members who joined since last June will be introduced at an anniversary dinner on Nov 16.

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She got me thinking

Comment
By YONG HUI MIEN

AS a typically apathetic third-generation, or 3G, Singaporean, I have never felt excited about local politics.

It didn't help that my constituency, Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC, had a walkover in the last General Election.

We complain that the political scene is one-sided but we do nothing about it. And we expect someone else to do the dirty job of championing our rights.

But my meeting yesterday with Ms Sylvia Lim, 37, a new Workers' Party cadre, set me thinking and made me somewhat ashamed of my apathy.

At the end of our hour-long chat, I went away impressed with her.

I was particularly touched by her willingness to sacrifice her privacy and her time.

That someone ensconced in a secure, well-paying job as a law lecturer is willing to brave all odds and fight the mighty machinery of the PAP is in itself admirable.

Ms Lim is currently sacrificing her weekends to pore over tedious parliamentary bills to help WP leader Low Thia Khiang prepare for debates in the House.

If she becomes a party election candidate one day, she will have to do much more - keep in touch with Singaporeans and carry out a myriad of party programmes.

I admire her guts. Rightly or wrongly, she believes there are dangers in opposition politics, yet she is going ahead, come hell or high water.

Why does she bother?

Ms Lim said the PAP's one-party voice in Parliament is too strong. There must be diverse voices. She hopes more younger Singaporeans will follow her steps and enter the arena.

Straits Times: WP grooming new faces ahead of next election

Underlining its push for self-renewal, it has in place a team with newcomers such as a lecturer and a financial controller

By AHMAD OSMAN


AZIZ HUSSIN
A wish to help the opposition prompted Ms Lim to join the WP. It's a matter of conscience, she says.


WONG KWAI CHOW   STREATS
Newcomers Mr Tan (left) and Mr Yaw hope to boost the WP's chances at the next GE.

GOING into its 45th year next month, the Workers' Party (WP) is pushing ahead with self-renewal and injecting new blood way before the next General Election (GE), which is due only in 2007.

A law lecturer, Ms Sylvia Lim, 37, and a financial controller, Mr Tan Wui-Hua, 36, are newcomers among the 14 members in the policy-making central executive committee led by Mr Low Thia Khiang.

The WP secretary-general and MP for Hougang is also beefing up his support with not one, but two assistant secretary-generals.

Besides training consultant Poh Lee-Guan, 40, who contested the Nee Soon East seat in the last GE, Mr Low also has researcher James Gomez, 36, as his other right-hand man.

Mr Gomez was instrumental in drafting the party's last election platform, emphasising the strains on the "new poor" in Singapore.

Another newcomer, Mr Yaw Shin Leong, 26, the deputy organising secretary, is also Mr Low's legislative assistant.

Both Mr Gomez and Mr Yaw were part of a WP team who tried to contest in the Aljunied GRC in the last election, but were disqualified because their nomination papers were not in order.

The new team will be introduced to members at an anniversary dinner on Nov 16, during which highlights of the WP's history since 1957 will be shown.

Said Mr Low, 46, who took over the reins of the WP in May last year: "We must bring in new blood. You must build an organisation, a team, rather than an individual."

The new members have updated the look of the party organ, The Hammer. And they are using it and the party's website to disseminate views and information on party activities.

His priority, Mr Low said, was to ensure that the party was not associated with just one man, as it was with its first leader, Mr David Marshall and, later, lawyer J.B. Jeyaretnam, who quit the party just before the last GE.

Ten other members quit along with him, but the membership base is still dominated by older people.

Mr Low declined to talk about an ongoing legal suit against the party by Mr Jeyaretnam, who is now a bankrupt raising money to pay off debts incurred from fighting court cases.

Contacted by The Straits Times, Ms Lim, a former police inspector and lawyer, said the People's Action Party's (PAP) victory in the last GE in November with 75 per cent of the total votes prompted her to join the WP after the polls.

After seeing how strapped the opposition was in its fight against the PAP in that election, she decided it was time for her to do something "as a matter of conscience".

Ms Lim, who is single and lectures at Temasek Polytechnic, helps Mr Low prepare for parliamentary debates by reviewing Bills presented by the Government to Parliament.

"Sometimes, I feel some of the laws are very widely drafted. Past experience has shown that, sometimes, the net may be cast too wide, which may have effects nobody intended," she said.

Mr Tan, who works in a real estate investment company, has three postgraduate and graduate degrees in accounting, business administration and mathematics.

He is the WP's deputy treasurer and wants to contribute ideas addressing issues like the factors stunting Singapore's economic growth.

Before the last election, expressing his wish to join the party, he wrote in an e-mail message to Mr Low: "Let's put our heads together.

"If we can come up with something good, let's try it out. If we can win the trust of the people and do something, at least in our lifetime, we can say that is an achievement."

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'No point wishing for a strong and credible opposition if one is not prepared to so anything.'
- Law lecturer Sylvia Lim, in an article in The Hammer entitled Stand Up For Singapore

Straits Times: Workers' Party slams proposal to raise GST

The Workers' Party (WP) has slammed the proposal to raise the Goods and Services Tax (GST) from 3 per cent to 5 per cent, saying that this will hit the poor hardest and is merely a means to ensure that the Government has a steady source of revenue.

While Mr Low Thia Khiang, the party's chief, noted that the proposal would help offset the revenue lost through proposed cuts in personal income and corporate taxes, he also asked: "Is the loss in revenue from the cuts so significant that GST must be increased?"

"And should this be done at a time when people are already facing hardship?"

The Economic Review Committee, which suggested the hike in GST, has suggested bringing the corporate tax rate, now at 24.5 per cent, and top marginal income tax rate, now at 26 per cent, down to 20 per cent within three years.

This is to make Singapore more attractive as a place to do business and work, and create more jobs.

But Mr Low noted yesterday that with tax rebates of 15 per cent, the effective top marginal tax rate has already been cut to 22.1 per cent in the last calender year.

The cuts in corporate and personal income tax benefit only businesses and high-income earners, not the two-thirds of workers in Singapore who do not pay these direct taxes, he said.

While rebates to cushion the impact of the increased GST have been promised, they are only temporary measures, he argued.

He suggested that the Government look at other ways to reduce costs. One way would be by reviewing its own expenditure on projects and buildings, which are sometimes "even more posh than five-star facilities".

He also asked if the Government's objective in raising the GST was to ensure a steady income for itself, to make up for the loss in revenue caused by lower corporate and income taxes, regardless of the state of the economy.

"The GST is therefore a tax instrument to ensure that the Government will continue to have a source of income from the people regardless of whether the economy is doing well or badly; it is a weapon which does not bother with whether our people are facing hardship or not."

Mr Tharman Shanmugaratnam, Senior Minister of State (Trade and Industry, and Education), who announced the tax proposals on Thursday, described the WP statement as "not unexpected" last night.

"We need to ask ourselves why we are proposing to cut taxes, why we are proposing to raise the GST. Why would we want to do something unless it was in the interest of Singaporeans?"

Singapore needed bold action or jobs will go and wages decline, hurting the lower-income most, he said. "We've got to address the issue forthrightly, not shrink from it or get caught up in a divisive argument of whether this is to benefit one group more than the other."

As for the WP's claim that the GST increase was a merely a tool to ensure a "steady income" for the Government, he said: "It is a predictable response and ignores the very grave situation we are in, and the grave responsibility that we have in getting Singapore going again."