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Will 4G leadership bring in real changes to Singapore?
What Singapore needs is to discuss, debate but also to research what are considered taboo issues by the PAP.
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Singaporean activist Jolovan Wham arrives at the State Court in Singapore on Feb. 21, 2019 to face sentencing for allegedly organizing an illegal protest.
(AFP/Roslan Rahman)
I
have a deep admiration for Singapore and for all that the members of the People's Action Party (PAP) have amazingly created since independence. But I have a sort of obsession that this nation can truly become the best place on earth not just to live and work but also to express personal opinions, including lawful protesting.
It is true that on many benchmarks, the city-state is already the ultimate place to live and work. But what about for political and civil liberties?
Singapore has been a poster child for capitalism and globalization but my challenge is to lay the rationale for this state to become a global hotspot for personal freedoms and human rights. I deliberately raise this issue, again, after hearing the news that both The Online Citizen and New Naratif have had to move out of Singapore to be able to continue operating.
While editor of The Online Citizen, Terry Xu, was forced to move to Taiwan, Thum Ping Tjin, a cofounder of New Naratif that technically operates out of the country, just across the Causeway, decided to move to the Philippines. At the same time, Kirsten Han, another key figure at New Naratif and publisher of the newsletter We Citizens, boldly stays in Singapore.
Veteran Asia correspondent John Berthelsen, editor of the Asia Sentinel, while reporting the news, clearly explained the context: “International publications (…) have all felt the lash of contempt of court citations and defamation suits and been told they are not to report critically on Singapore”.
In such an environment where opinion-based journalism is fought against with all conceivable measures offered by unique types of “rule of law”, independent thinking is neither welcome nor much tolerated.
Let me challenge the status quo in Singapore and imagine how a better future is possible there.
