Singapore tightens protest noose
Francis XavierPublished: Apr 9, 2009 1:32 PM | Updated: Apr 9, 2009 5:59 PM
Unsurprisingly with an unassailable parliamentary majority there simply was not a single peep when Singapore's ruling Peoples' Action Party (PAP) had its way on a legislative bill it passed on March 23 to curb personal liberties for its citizens.
Unsurprisingly with an unassailable parliamentary majority there simply was not a single peep when Singapore's ruling Peoples' Action Party (PAP) had its way on a legislative bill it passed on March 23 to curb personal liberties for its citizens.
The bill in question is of course, the Public Order Bill, identified by the country's Home Affairs Ministry to "address gaps" in its existing laws.
The proposed law empowers authorities to prevent activists from leaving their home if a known political rally is anticipated.
In a departure from the past when a permit was needed when three or more people gathered at a rally, it now mandated a police permit no matter how many people are attending any such rallies.
With just two opposition members - one of whom is long-serving Chiam See Tong, who has since last year been felled by a stroke - there can be no discounting that a ‘paralysis of debate' in Malaysia's southern oasis is no more but a need for public order or as is well-documented; an extension of the country's entrenched culture of controlling political debate.
And that is despite growing global acknowledgement of the republic being a highly sophisticated economy with a well-informed citizenry schooled in ‘laissez-faire politics' as in laissez-faire economics.
Critics, however, have jabbed the latest move by comparisons as odious as to the political habitués of communist China.
"Even in communist China, peaceful protests are tolerated," dissident Chee Siok Chin was reported as saying in Reuters.
Chee, along with her charismatic, firebrand brother Chee Soon Juan (photo), the former leader of the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP), are now wilting in the political wilderness of their debarment from public life; a consequence of their long running campaign against what they claimed as repression in the city-state.
The restrictions also confirmed sentiments of late parliamentarian, Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam (known as JBJ).
JBJ once told an Indonesian radio station during the 2006 general election "of the dearth of political participation".
"We still cannot march down the streets and voice our grievances," he told the radio station.
JBJ was never ‘returned' to Parliament even after Singapore's highest court; London's Privy Council, indicated to Singapore authorities in 1988 to reinstate him after they overturned his conviction for the falsification of his party's accounts.
The council called his conviction a "grave injustice".
Where was the civil society debate?
Yet for a city-state understandably spooked by the escape of Jemaah Islamiah (JI) fugitive Mas Selamat Kestari and the SDP-led street protests during the IMF meet of 2006.
As such, controlling street protests have not only become a virtue in itself but a state-mandated necessity amidst recent memories or crippling flashbacks of unrest in Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.
It perhaps is also to prepare the ground as some say, to pre-empt some of the more embarrassing episodes like the time when local residents protested against the invasion of Iraq in 2003 before the US embassy.
Or for that matter, as others aver, use provisions under the new law to seize Falungong activists in their petition signing campaigns in the Republic so to prevent the very kind of upheavals it least wants: a potential diplomatic confrontation with Beijing.
But importantly, it is perhaps to ensure that the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Caucus (Apec) slated for this November, proceeds without any incident.
Interestingly into the bargain, there is no disputing that Singapore prospered even when controls existed firmly in place to control public discourse on a range of ‘untested' issues from the continued retention of the Internal Security Act, homosexuality and importantly of all, of unabridged political participation, among others.
Another interesting outcome over the proposed bill was the discernible lack of civil society debate.
That confirmed yet another fact, this time of the country's first Chief Minister David Marshall.
Marshall had in 1988 in his characteristic hard-hitting, flamboyant and colourful oratory called the "permanent spine curvature" of his compatriots, as chiefly to blame for allowing the powers to be, carte blanche in their affairs.
But for all the musing and caricatures of Singapore being an "economic oasis and a political desert" as vividly transcribed by the Republic's one-time outspoken head of state CV Devan Nair; nothing beats understanding that in a recession year issues that figure most are mostly of the mundane kind like jobs, money, security and home mortgage payments etc.
An appetite for abstract notions can expectedly in a time of ‘profound crisis' be neatly, in no small measure, be assigned to the marginal fringes of national debate.
The bill in question is of course, the Public Order Bill, identified by the country's Home Affairs Ministry to "address gaps" in its existing laws.
The proposed law empowers authorities to prevent activists from leaving their home if a known political rally is anticipated.
In a departure from the past when a permit was needed when three or more people gathered at a rally, it now mandated a police permit no matter how many people are attending any such rallies.
With just two opposition members - one of whom is long-serving Chiam See Tong, who has since last year been felled by a stroke - there can be no discounting that a ‘paralysis of debate' in Malaysia's southern oasis is no more but a need for public order or as is well-documented; an extension of the country's entrenched culture of controlling political debate.
And that is despite growing global acknowledgement of the republic being a highly sophisticated economy with a well-informed citizenry schooled in ‘laissez-faire politics' as in laissez-faire economics.
Critics, however, have jabbed the latest move by comparisons as odious as to the political habitués of communist China.
"Even in communist China, peaceful protests are tolerated," dissident Chee Siok Chin was reported as saying in Reuters.
Chee, along with her charismatic, firebrand brother Chee Soon Juan (photo), the former leader of the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP), are now wilting in the political wilderness of their debarment from public life; a consequence of their long running campaign against what they claimed as repression in the city-state.The restrictions also confirmed sentiments of late parliamentarian, Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam (known as JBJ).
JBJ once told an Indonesian radio station during the 2006 general election "of the dearth of political participation".
"We still cannot march down the streets and voice our grievances," he told the radio station.
JBJ was never ‘returned' to Parliament even after Singapore's highest court; London's Privy Council, indicated to Singapore authorities in 1988 to reinstate him after they overturned his conviction for the falsification of his party's accounts.
The council called his conviction a "grave injustice".
Where was the civil society debate?
Yet for a city-state understandably spooked by the escape of Jemaah Islamiah (JI) fugitive Mas Selamat Kestari and the SDP-led street protests during the IMF meet of 2006.
As such, controlling street protests have not only become a virtue in itself but a state-mandated necessity amidst recent memories or crippling flashbacks of unrest in Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.
It perhaps is also to prepare the ground as some say, to pre-empt some of the more embarrassing episodes like the time when local residents protested against the invasion of Iraq in 2003 before the US embassy.
Or for that matter, as others aver, use provisions under the new law to seize Falungong activists in their petition signing campaigns in the Republic so to prevent the very kind of upheavals it least wants: a potential diplomatic confrontation with Beijing.But importantly, it is perhaps to ensure that the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Caucus (Apec) slated for this November, proceeds without any incident.
Interestingly into the bargain, there is no disputing that Singapore prospered even when controls existed firmly in place to control public discourse on a range of ‘untested' issues from the continued retention of the Internal Security Act, homosexuality and importantly of all, of unabridged political participation, among others.
Another interesting outcome over the proposed bill was the discernible lack of civil society debate.
That confirmed yet another fact, this time of the country's first Chief Minister David Marshall.
Marshall had in 1988 in his characteristic hard-hitting, flamboyant and colourful oratory called the "permanent spine curvature" of his compatriots, as chiefly to blame for allowing the powers to be, carte blanche in their affairs.
But for all the musing and caricatures of Singapore being an "economic oasis and a political desert" as vividly transcribed by the Republic's one-time outspoken head of state CV Devan Nair; nothing beats understanding that in a recession year issues that figure most are mostly of the mundane kind like jobs, money, security and home mortgage payments etc.
An appetite for abstract notions can expectedly in a time of ‘profound crisis' be neatly, in no small measure, be assigned to the marginal fringes of national debate.
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