Affluent S’pore residents verbally abused govt staff?
Member of Parliament (MP) Denise Phua said that staff from a government agency were verbally abused by highly-educated residents in an affluent estate.
The MP for Moulmein-Kallang GRC wrote in a Facebook status update on Thursday that these residents used vulgarities to scold the civil servants, who felt discouraged after the incident.
Some who reacted to her Facebook post were sympathetic to the staff who experienced such behaviour from well-educated Singaporeans, with one saying, "We are a civilised society and this is uncalled for."
Others have described such behaviour as part of a "vicious cycle" where "difficult" civil servants abuse their authority and consequently residents treat them poorly. The situation is then worsened when these civil servants react badly to such treatment.
One netizen, New Cow, recalled witnessing an incident when a government officer insisted that that the co-owner in a flat application must be present for the man to collect his house keys, despite his wife being in the hospital to give birth.
As a result, according to the netizen, the man gave up his chance to collect his house key.
In a comment to Ms Phua's post, local blogger Ravi Philemon questioned the context of the residents' behaviour towards the government officers mentioned.
He also asked: "Are they just disgruntled that residents hold staffs of govt agencies to higher standards now?"
While she did know the context of the case, Ms Phua replied that she would use this incident as a learning point to work on "two of the most difficult life skills: giving and receiving feedback."
