GE2015: WP will not engage PAP on AHPETC anymore
It's official: The Worker's Party (WP) has had enough of the long-running Aljunied Hougang Punggol East Town Council (AHPETC) saga. And the party's big guns would continue to focus on hot button issues like housing and transport policy, saying that it was the opposition's presence in Parliament that had helped pressure the government into policy U-turns.
Speaking in Mandarin at a party rally in Yishun Stadium last night (4 Sept), WP chief Low Thia Khiang noted that the party had already given a thorough accounting on the AHPETC at its first rally, and that the financial report for 2014/15 was available online.
Echoing his words from earlier in the day during a walkabout at Chong Pang Market and Food Centre, Low said, "We do not wish to go around in circles with the PAP. Mai chup ee ah! (Teochew for ignore them)"
Instead, Low took aim at the government on its housing policies, noting that it had refused to change course on the pricing of flats and the construction of new flats despite the spiralling cost of housing. Instead, the price of new flats was delinked from that of resale flats, and the construction of flats ramped up, only after the 2011 General Election.
"Today's PAP government is no longer the far-sighted government it once was. We cannot allow it to be indecisive in policies, such that it is desperately grasping for solutions only when problems arise. It is the people who will suffer when this happens,"said Low.
Low also noted that during the 2006 General Election, the government had said that it was not considering increasing the Goods and Services Tax. But it did increase the tax the following year. And when then-Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong was asked why this had been done, he said, "After winning the election, the PAP will implement unpopular policies. This is not wrong. This is politics."
Low warned, "During the election, the PAP can be like a cat. But once it is elected, it will open its mouth like a lion.”
Party chair Sylvia Lim also slammed People's Action Party (PAP) MPs who, she said, might object to certain policies but were unable to vote against the party. This meant that they could not be an effective check on the government.
Alluding to Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong's remark that the WP had been a "mouse in the house," she said, "A PAP MP may think that he roars like a tiger in Parliament, but when it comes to a vote, the PAP MP is the real mouse in the house. A little white mouse."
Lim added, "MPs who can vote against wrong policies are so important, because the PAP does not have all the answers"
She elaborated on three government "U-turns" after 2011, in the areas of transport, housing and the influx of foreigners. For example, the Bus Services Enhancement Programme (BSEP) saw the government injecting $1.1 billion of public funds to buy 1,000 new buses. The "huge influx of foreigners" has also slowed down, said Lim.
"The PAP has been trying during this election to convince you that many changes we see around us started before 2011. They are afraid that the Workers' Party will take credit for the changes. But we are not taking credit - the credit belongs to you, the voters. Your votes forced the PAP to wake up and do something about some of their big mistakes in policy and planning," said Lim.
The party's candidates for Nee Soon GRC - Kenneth Foo, Ron Tan, Cheryl Denise Loh, Gurmit Singh and Luke Koh - all spoke at the rally, as well as East Coast GRC candidates Gerald Giam and Associate Professor Daniel Goh.
Png Eng Huat, who is defending his seat in Hougang SMC, also spoke, and had some fiery comments of his own, "No party can be bigger than Singapore. This is what happened when you let a despotic regime run loose for 50 years: it began to think it owns Singapore."
