MCYS minister: We miscalculated on YOG budget

All the last minute apologies are useless. Singapore voters want REAL CONCRETE actions from the PAP government.

That means, the $$$$ million ministers responsible for policies that has caused so much pains to the Singaporeans to be SACKED or DEMOTED with 2/3 pay cut (at least). It means MBT, WongKS, GanKY, Yacob, GohCT need to be taken out from Cabinet..

If you felt so proudly that you spend more lesser than why didn't you made Accountable to the Public after the event ended? Why wait till NOW (after many people ques you) than voice out? 1st time - Means what? Everything comes with a 1st time so are you trying to say 1 time NEVER MIND so shall I say in future if Sgp doesn't have the experience in organising any event better KEEP away from doing so. Are you BLAMING our PM Lee for NOT STOPPING you OR you wanted us to BLAME PM Lee for allowing you to OVER SPEND? Call yourself a Doctor .... How to trust you should you 1 2 give medical advise or treatment..... anything goes wrong expect NOTHING HAPPEN cos is 1st time. For your info since you know is your 1st time you should be even more cautious of what you are going to do by get things to the bottom of it doing more homework and research I believe with this will reduce the chance of risking a life or over spenting.
You call this ACCOUNTABLE!!!

so, vivian u r effectively saying that the budget was not overspent 3 times, but actually the budget was WRONGLY ESTIMATED? what a brilliant excuse for saying that it's the first time we are doing this, so the budget estimate is not easy to prepare.

i thought PAP has always pride itselt in getting strong and super-smart candidate. if u can't even estimate an IOG budget properly, what else can we rely on you to do?

before we consider buying anything, we always have to take into consideration how much it will cost. i mean, everybody would love to own a ferrari, but can everyone actually afford one? so, this time round, we are lucky that you made a mistake in your calculation, and we only end up with thrice the loss. i mean since u r so poor in calculation, that loss could have been easily been ten-fold, right?

in the unfortunate event that vivian keeps his seat in parliament, may i remind all ministers and MPs not to stress him with any maths problem. i mean don't even ask him what is 1+1, because this time round, he may actually say it's 6 in view of his previous mistake.

i have to stress this again, Mr Goh Chok Tong has said, we have a right to vote the minister out if he has done something wrong. is miscalculating the budget a mistake? but most important of all, so much money wasted, yet VOLUNTEERS ate crap!

why aren't these unscrupulous suppliers punish? why are arrests not made? who were the ones who supplied the food? all these are not explained yet. vivian, u cannot just say because you failed your maths in sec school, then we can forget about the IOG. there is still a lot of questions you have not answered yet!

No other model for reference? For starters, South East Asian games that singapore hosted could have been used as a cost reference model.

I not sure whether is it PAP last min resort or they cant came out of anymore excuse to win ppl heart that they have to explain YOG Budget and explain. WHY! WHY! when last min come they will come with explaination, i think this issue have be addressed ever since the YOG ended. And they just keep quiet. And no bother to explain. We ppl ask them why and they just keep quiet until now OPP came out with this issue and they address it. Everything last min, Why not wait for GE to finish and PAP lost half of the parliment seats and they start to address, i think by then we already not interest in what they are saying. Any all minister mistake will no admit they make a mistake, give all sort of excuse. Wong CK said he would step down and on the news saw him wave at everybody and drove away, next day saw him inside parliment, can we still trust our future leader to break all their promises, all singaporean even if you cant see at least you have heart to feel how we have been suffering for the last 5 yrs. Please wake up, dun let them treat us as SLAVE anymore. We are human too!!!!!!

vivian, i'm afraid to tell you that you are no more than a "yes" man to lee hsien loong.

it took you so long to admit your mistakes publicly? until days before polling commences for you to account your mistakes to the people?

make no mistakes, you will be punished for your slack in your job.

i do not wish for you to be my country's MP. you do not have my mandate as a representative in parliament.

your arrogance is distasteful !

your allegiance is misplaced.

perhaps it is high time you reflected on your ideals when you were an undergraduate. you were once very vocal against many of pap's policies. but like all mortals, you soon were blinded by your greed for power, glory and money.

you lost it. you betrayed your ideals. you therefore cannot hold the public office any longer.

you have my vote, of no confidence !!

If this is how you run the YOG, anyone can also do it. Just do and if the money is not enough, just increase it, and if not enough again, just increase it again. Than why need you?

"He revealed that Prime Minister.............more than S$300 million....To this, Dr Balakrishnan said that he would still do it, and had no regrets."

Hello, Vivian, of course you said that because it is not your money!

You are still proud of YOG, are you proud of the food poisoning, half empty stadiums, volunteer certificates printed wrongly, tickets to F1 received late???????

You are No 1 TCSS in pappie camp!

Vivian,

FEEDBACK .........for you to listen and take action or ignore..........totally your rights of call :-

1. Dont SURROUND YOURSELF ith BOOTLICKERS !!!...........seeing that LHL is gravitating towards that direction & thrives on it.

RESULT IS THAT ALL OF YOU WILL SPEAK IN ONE BUT WRONG VOICE !!!!

2. Be HUMBLE and do acknowledge your LACK of CAPABILITY AS BUDGET IS UNDER ESTIMATED BY 300%

a. In The private SECTOR & especially basing on the HUGE pay you are getting, NO EXCUSES ACCEPTED & WILL BE ASKED TO LEAVE THE COMPANY !!!!

------ not sure the case for Temasek & GIC !!!

b. Essentially over spend by $200 MiLLION

3. Is BUDGET OVERSPENDING LEGAL ?

Not questioning your integrity but just to highlight some of the common thoughts running Singaporeans that you must understand & get to the bottom quickly ......very important !!!

a. Remember SINGAPORE IS NOT CORRUPTION FREE !!!!

b. HAS HAPPENED IN SLA & ARMY recently !!!

SLA CORRUPTION :-
i. MAJOR PROBLEM is TOTALLY NO BUDGET CONTROL
ii. How can SLA Management simply hand out EXCESS $12 million worth of BUDGET (tax payers money) over 2 years at the whims of their subordinates who are directors ???
iii, THIS is THE FIRST STEP TO ALLOW THE CORRUPTION TO TAKE PLACE !!!

Hence budget CONTROL & SPENDING of ANY GOVT DEPTS MUST BE SCRUTINISED CLOSELY and CONTINOUSLY........this is where CPID is very USEFUL !!!

c. HAVE YOU INVESTIGATE THE DETAILS on the spending INITIATED BY YOUR TEAM/STAFF ?
If NO, Why NOT ?

MUST USE a 3rd PARTY for CREDIBILITY !!!!

4. Do NOT pick UP the BAD HABIT of ARROGANCE to all people including your own PAP MPs.

5. In THE CASE of SINGAPORE ON INCREASING COST OF LIVING ARE LARGELY CAUSED & CONTROLLED BY PAP !!!!

HENCE KINDLY DO NOT USE THE WRONG ATTITUDE IN ADDRESSING FLOOD ISSUE BY SIMPLY BLAME IT ON THE GODS & NATURE !!!!

6. BEING a doctor, are you prepare & able to SOLVE the AGING POPULATION NATIONAL ISSUE as obviously Ministry of Health Khaw do NOT bother as LHL is assessing his perfromance without this CRITERIA !!!!!

7. Can you share with all SINGAPOREANS on the NUMBER of SINGAPOREANS who HAVE MIGRATED overseas in the LAST 10 years and for each year............................do also include their professions too !!!

a. Are SINGAPOREANS walking OUT on SINGAPORE due to PAP ?
b. If not, what reasons that OTHER countries are deem MUCH better than Singapore for them to TAKE a VERY SERIOUS DECISION to UPROOT ?

So many issues so little time..........cause by PAP foolish mantra of "SINGAPOREANS LIKE TO COMPLAIN" & hence ignore all key issues until election time !!!

yes, u are proud of the volunteers but reward them with lousy food at first and expiry F1 tickets... THAT a GOOD ONE. i proud of u also.

The pieces of the puzzle still don't fit and there seems to be missing ones at that. Consider these:

1. Vivian says he and PAP blew the budget 3 times because there was no existing model to base their estimates on. Yet, when trying to downplay the significance of the overblown budget, he pointed to how the final numbers still looked favourable when compared to spendings on organising the Summer Olympics. If the Summer Olympics is not a relevant model, why make references to it to justify their case?

2. Vivian says the huge additional funds did not come from his Ministry's budget because the YOG had a separate budget. But if the YOG budget included only the budgeted costs, the huge additional funds must have come from somewhere. Surely the buffer worked into the budget to account for any variances that would inevitably arise could not have amounted to so much. So could we please know where the additional funds came from?

3. Vivian proudly declares they spent less much less. How on earth does one spend much less when one has overblown a budget 3 times?

Contrary to the headline of this report, the YOG budget issue has not been addressed. We get instead the typical bureaucratic half-baked response that is the hallmark of the PAP Government. No apologies and no remorse.

Just more questions. And ultimately, sadly but expectedly, no answers.

DR.VB YOU NOW OWE ALL SINGAPOREAN YOUR RESIGNATION AFTER ALL YOU ADMITED YOUR MISTAKE. HOW CAN A MINISTER HAVE MADE SUCH MISTAKES ON SIMPLE BUDGETABLE COST. THIS IS NO REASON, YOU SHOLD STEP DOWN NOW OR ON 7TH MAY BE BOOTED OUT.
YOU HAVE LOST ALL SENSES OF SHAME BY "BY SAYING YOU WILL DO IT AGAIN". YOU ARE THE FIRST MP IN SINGAPORE TO USE THE DIRTY SMEAR OF 'BACK POKING' I THINK THAT IS VULGAR FOR SINGAPOREAN SOCIETY AND TO MAKE THING WORST YOU 'COPY CAT OUR NORTHERN NEIGHBOUR' HA............ YOU ARE A NO IDEA MINISTER??????????? YOU
BETTER REPENT OR KARMA WILL BE ON YOU VERY SOON.... GOD AND ANGEL WATCHING YOU.............

What a stupid explanation!!! What international name for the companies? I haven't heard any of the names/companies. Don't even know what products they supply.

If Ministers are paid a pittance, no one would be this mad but would even forgive their 'honest' mistakes.

So, what a great team, now, it is PM Lee who is at fault for allowing you to overspent. At least you got guts, not like Wong Kan Seng, get a peanut to take the blame for Mas Selamat escape.
So, you expect PM Lee to resign or ?

VOTERS, THERE IS A COLLABORATION IN THE PAP TEAM, WE NEED TO VOTE OPPOSITION AT ALL CONTESTED AREAS TO SAFEGUARD OUR MONEY AND MAKE THESE PEOPLE TO BE RESPONSIBLE AND ACCOUNTABLE.

Hougang, Potong Pasir, Aljunied is not sufficient, let's VOTE OPPOSITION TO ENSURE OUR GREIVANCES ARE HEARD.

Our dear PM Lee did say the foreign talent grow grow GDP by double digit. I saw my real income decline.

Without prejudice

PLEASE RESIGN FOR YOUR "GOOD" MISTAKE MADE!! YOUR "BECAUSE" ARE VERY EXPENSIVE!!

I think after hearing him trying so hard to be FRANK and yet INSISTED that he has NO REGRET for hosting YOG. My mind is fix that we really have to get the co-drivers into the parliament to prevent further damage to our precious tax payer money which could have been used to help our needy fellow Singaporeans.

Mr Vivian, please touch your heart and spare a thought for the poor. You appear to be so calculative when comes to debate for the increase of the subsidies for the needies and we thought that "ohh...this is a very prudent minister in the spending of our national money" and yet this YOG incident has totally change my view on you.

If there's any example that the word REPENT whom MM has used earlier should be applied to, your refusal to say SORRY and be ACCOUNTABLE for it should be one.

On a side note, i suddenly feel sad for our PM Lee, really.

Until election coming near then PAP started last minute addressing to citizens.

Once Election over and that's it.

Again they start their arrogant ways.

SORRY NO MORE CHANCE GIVEN.

of course no regrets lah, no need to make restitution, just say sorry!
you can't even appreciate the number of zeros in the amount,you work 10 years($25mil) , its only 10 times more ($250mil)
... but for many, we may earn only 2% your salary (40 grand a year)
the g&s package would have been more if not for such flagrant miscalculations by YOU
... or may not, if not for all the boo boos, you won't even need to give me money to appease me!
i call it the Pay And Pacify package.btw thanks for the money, i already use it to pay for my utilities and phone bills - no change for coffee :(

But vivie,

you know what is 2worst; you not only SCREWED up the YOG budget and stick uswith the bill; but in order to SAVE FACE in front of the foreigners, you sacrificed the VOLUNTEERS. Speaks volumes about YOUR attitude towards YOUR OWN PEOPLE.

This is not the first time that Singapore is holding international events, and you are paid an astromical salary supported by a team of planners for this particular event. You said that its a once of a life time event, all the more to get it right! With all resources on hand and the whole team can under budget by 283mil? Are you joking? Most of the overspent budget are spent on local companies providing services? So are you telling us that your team did not get the actual quotations needed for their services? If yes, the amount should not defer by that much! If no, what the hell are you and your team doing! And if after the companies provide their services, they should abid to their submitted quotations as there would have been a contract signed between the government and the companies. Are you telling us that the companies can quote $104 for during the tender period, and bill you $387! And you actually pay them? Its ridiculars! Please do not make me go the next step as to suspect that the payees are somewhat related to the payer.... Because in other businesses with government being the client, the companies / contractors HAVE TO follow the contractual sum, IRREGARDLESS of the outcome, even if they discovered that they have under quoted in the tendering process during or after they have rendered their services! The stand is simple, they have to fulfill the services based on the contractual sum that was signed BEFORE the commencement of the contract! Bite their teeth and get the job done at the awarded pricing! Else they risk being penalised and debarred from tendering all government projects. With this, all the YOG team can master is just a statement that they have underestimated the budget and proceeded to pay whatever sums the companies come up after the YOG event? So explaining is so simple as that? What about next? WHAT was the punishment for the culprits that had sevearly under budgeted the event? HOW did the underbudget came about? WHY are the companies paid almost 3 times over the contractual sum for their services? Budgeting means getting in the quotations before the event! Trying to explain that the Games organiser got back to Singapore 1 year later is not a reason. Inflation for one year DO NOT bring the figures to 387 mil from 104 mil! I seriously begin to doubt why on earth can there be such a HUGH disparity between the estimated and actual sum by a team that is being paid multi-millions..... You should be glad that you are not sacked along with all ur INCOMPETENT and NO SUBSTANCE subordinates! And to think that the only repercussion as a result is a pay increment and a 8 month bonus was paid after severe lapse! What a joke....! I believe the whole world is laughing their toes off on all Singaporeans that how stupid can we be..... Oh ya, you stressed that YOG have a separate budget. Ok, the original budget is 104mil. Surely the remaining 283mil has to come from somewhere. My last question is: Where?