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.

---

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."

---

'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."

Straits Times: Hougang voters wanted me, and upgrading: Low

THE MORNING AFTER

They handed him a victory, but at a smaller margin because they want to see their flats upgraded as the PM promised, says WP chief

By AHMAD OSMAN

MANY voters in Hougang wanted to have the "best of both worlds".

They wanted to have Workers' Party (WP) chief Low Thia Khiang as their MP and enjoy upgrading at the same time.

That is why they trimmed his winning margin from 58 to 55 per cent, Mr Low told reporters yesterday after his victory parade in Hougang.

On Saturday, he was re-elected as MP for the ward for the third time, beating Mr Eric Low of the People's Action Party.

Before Polling Day, the Prime Minister had asked voters to cut overall support for the WP in Hougang from 58 to 52 per cent.

Mr Goh Chok Tong had said that if 45 per cent of the voters in any Hougang precinct voted for the PAP, he would consider that precinct for upgrading.

"The ball is in the PM's court now. The voters in Hougang have responded to his request. Is he going to keep his promise?" asked the WP secretary-general.

He said that he did not know if bookies taking bets on the outcome of the polls had helped to swing votes against him.

But he made it plain that the polling results would not hurt the WP's efforts to recruit younger Singaporeans who believe an opposition must be part of Singapore's political landscape.

The issue of whether Singaporeans want an opposition was not settled conclusively in this election because there had been other factors at play, he argued.

The economic downturn, for example, had made people more uncertain about voting for opposition candidates, he said.

And before the polls, he noted, his party had been bogged down by defamation suits against its former chief, Mr J.B. Jeyaretnam, and had not been able to begin working the ground as early as it should have.

During the hustings, the PAP tried to tie him down in Hougang and reduce the time he could spend helping Dr Poh Lee-Guan, the WP assistant secretary-general, who was defeated by Associate Professor Ho Peng Kee in Nee Soon East.

But he said that the voters in Hougang knew he did his best to serve them and was not the type to carry out a last-minute door-to-door campaign "to beg for votes" during an election.

"I don't do that," Mr Low said, adding: "I do my regular things and leave it to the people to decide in an election."

Mr Low said Dr Poh, who got 26 per cent of the valid votes, was new to politics and had had only nine days to campaign.

But the latter had to face the firepower of all the PAP's big guns, including Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew, he said, adding: "Why is there a need for all the big guns, including SM, to... go down to the ground?"

Dr Poh, who accompanied Mr Low on his victory parade yesterday, said he was happy with the result in the new single-seat ward of Nee Soon East, where his party had performed "pretty well" despite the challenges it had faced.

Asked whether he was prepared to stand with Mr Low in a group representation constituency in the next election, he replied: "We really have to ask the question again: What do the people of Singapore want?"

"We will see what we can do, add value to and contribute. The rules of engagement will remain the same. We will be responsible and constructive."

Streats: No media ban, but...

GE 2001
HotTalk

SINCE Nomination Day, the Workers' Party has shunned media attention.

No press conferences. No alerts about walkabouts. Only "no comment" when WP candidates are approached at rallies.

Is there a blanket ban on the media?

"Not that we know of," said council member James Gomez at a party rally last night at Nee Soon East.

"We have not talked to the media because we have nothing to say to them.

"The media has been trying to fish for information. And when they can't get a reply, they are quick to show their frustrations." Mr Gomez also attacked the standard of journalism in Singapore.

"The quality of analysis of so-called senior journalists, reporters and correspondents remains to be seen."- Adam Hashidy

New Paper: WP's Dr Poh: Got money, give money. Got energy, give energy

GENERAL ELECTION

BY TANYA FONG



A SELF-PROCLAIMED "Nee Soon boy", Workers' Party's Dr Poh Lee-Guan, 40, insists you call him "Ah Poh".

He said he spent his youth in Nee Soon.

Indeed, some people at the Workers' Party rallies can be heard shouting for "Ah Poh! Ah Poh!"

Dr Poh was made the assistant secretary-general of the WP in May this year, almost as soon as he joined the party.

He himself admitted that his grassroots experience is "very limited". This is his first foray into politics.

On Oct 26, a day after Nomination Day, Dr Poh went for a walkabout in Hougang with enthusiasm. Shaking hands with fishmongers and the elderly, he appeared to be at ease with the residents.

His reasoning: "I am the man-on-the-street. They are my elders and my peers, and I am one of them."

He reaches out to the coffeeshop and market folk with his fluent Hokkien.

His oft-repeated belief is: "The country and constituency is ours. There is only one Singapore between us. Got money, give money. Got energy, give energy."

Then there are the three Hokkien maxims his father, 60, a retired lorry driver, had taught him since he was a boy.

First: Ai lun (must tolerate).

Second: Mai luan gong (don't talk without discretion).

Third: Si mi dai zi buay ching chu, meng lao da, lim kopi, keng keng (when in doubt, consult your elders, have coffee, and talk).

Maybe this is why he shies away from giving any comments about his competitor in the single-seat ward Nee Soon East, Associate Professor Ho Peng Kee.

"He is a friendly competitor," that's all he said.

Dr Poh obtained his Business Administration doctorate from the University of Southern Queensland (Australia) in May this year.

He feels his specialty in "knowledge management and creation" would "effectively contribute to the development of policies to strengthen our economic competitiveness". He said he decided to join the WP because he and Mr Low Thia Khiang, the party secretary-general, whom he has known for almost five years, "share the same values".

He said: "I am very comfortable with his rules of engagement - responsible and constructive politics."

Dr Poh is married, and has a 4 1/2-year-old son. The family lives in an HDB flat in Woodlands.

---

NEW FACE

BIODATA

Name: Dr Poh Lee-Guan, assistant secretary-general, Workers' Party

Age: 40

Occupation: Training consultant

Seat contested: Nee Soon East, a single ward

TODAY: It's no joke

Elections 2001

WP's James Gomez falls at the first hurdle

by Zackaria Abdul Rahim and Francis Kan



WHEN he first said he was contesting the elections, it turned out to be an April Fool's joke.

But, it seemed that political activist James Gomez (picture) was serious this time around when he was announced as a new candidate of the Workers' Party.

And, the word was that he would help to realise his party's dream of winning a GRC.

He had also coined the catchy phrase "New Poor" which was set to be his campaign platform.

All this came to an end yesterday, when the nomination papers that he and his fellow candidates who were vying for the Aljunied GRC were rejected on technical grounds. It was the only team the Opposition had fielded for a GRC that was rejected.

Explaining this, Returning Officer Tan Boon Huat of the Elections Department said the papers were invalid because when delivered, they contained blanks where the candidates were required to state the electoral division they were qualified to stand in.

WP's secretary-general, Mr Low Thia Khiang, called it "an oversight" and took "full responsibility" for it.

Mr Gomez told reporters how they had tried to remedy the situation by writing in the electoral division that they were standing in. But, this was rejected because they had to be reaffirmed before a Commissioner of Oaths. Mr Gomez criticised the stringent electoral process.

"We wanted to remedy on the spot ... we called a lawyer who is a Commissioner of Oaths to rush down," said Mr Gomez.

But, he said, it was already 12.20pm and the Returning Officer declined his request to extend the deadline.

Mr Tan said: "Everyone knows that they have 11 to 12 o'clock to file the proper documents, there's no leeway for extension," he said.

Mr Gomez said "the whole process of recourse was absent".

Here again, the law is clear. Mr Tan said that returning officers, by law, cannot advise candidates on how to fill out their nomination forms.

When TODAY pointed out that if the candidates were serious enough, they should also double-check that their papers are in order, Mr Low said: "We do ... nevertheless, this is an oversight."

And, that seems to be the mystery of it all. If the nomination papers for WP candidates in Nee Soon East and Hougang - Dr Poh Lee Guan and Mr Low - were in order, why then were these five nomination papers for Aljunied GRC defective?

"We have done our best but we are not perfect," said Mr Low who had sent a letter of appeal to the Elections Department.

On this, Mr Tan said: "I (had) replied saying that I had no powers to entertain any appeal."

Besides Aljunied GRC, the Workers' Party had also indicated interest in Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC.

So, was it a last-minute decision to contest in Aljunied, thereby explaining the blank space in the declaration form?

"It is not a last-minute decision at all," said Mr Low, and raising his voice, he added: "Certainly it was not made this morning."

When asked for his comment at a separate press conference, Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong said: "I don't know the whole story but I found the whole team was disqualified. I don't know if it's another of those April Fool's jokes."

TODAY: Gomez rejected

Elections 2001

TODAY PHOTOS



WORKERS' Party candidate James Gomez (picture) and his team turned up to file nomination papers for the Aljunied GRC but ended up conceding a walkover to the PAP.

WP chief Low Thia Khiang said his party had to pull out because of a technicality - the candidates had not entered the name of the electoral division on their nomination forms.

According to an elections department official, the nomination papers submitted by the WP were not delivered in compliance with the law.

TODAY: What the political parties promise ...

Elections 2001

Workers' Party
Power to the People and New Poor
Power to the People: giving people the power to vote

New Poor

1. People who have to contend with increasing high costs of living and are relatively poor.

2. These people include the unemployed, people in low-paid or part-time employment, struggling local entrepreneurs, the sick and disabled, older people and a sizeable portion of the middle-class

3. They face rising costs in areas like school and tuition fees, public transport, food prices, health care, utility charges, office rentals and telecommunication costs.

4. Young and elderly Singaporeans will have to contend with foreign workers in the job market. WP chief Low Thia Khiang calls for a more stringent foreign talent policy

5. Companies suffering from poor business have to down size and relocate to lower cost places like China and Third World countries.

TODAY: Chiku politics: Ripe for the picking?

Elections 2001

Hougang

In 1991, Mr Low Thia Khiang, then 35, wrested Hougang from Mr Tang Guan Seng with a 52.8 per cent win. The Teochew speaker won again in 1997, with an increase in support to 58 per cent.