Good initiatives would not be possible without solvent town council: Shanmugam
(L-R) PAP candidates for Nee Soon GRC Er Dr Lee Bee Wah, Mr Henry kwek, Mr K Shanmugam, Mr Louis Ng and Asoc Prof Muhammad Faishal Ibrahim. Photo: Robin Choo
SINGAPORE — From cycling tracks connecting the whole of Yishun, expanding the estate’s polyclinic, lifts that stop at every floor of all eligible blocks to playgrounds and sheltered walkways — these projects in Nee Soon Group Representation Constituency (GRC) would not be possible without a solvent town council, Law and Foreign Affairs Minister K Shanmugam said yesterday (Aug 26).
Despite shelling out more than S$26 million in all for the initiatives, the town council ended up with surplus funds, he said. “Not everything, of course, is a given. It all depends on whether the town council has funds and whether it is solvent and whether it is run by honest people,” said Mr Shanmugam at a press conference to introduce the People’s Action Party (PAP) candidates for Nee Soon GRC.
Without alluding to the Workers’ Party-run Aljunied-Hougang-Punggol East Town Council — which had made the headlines for its lapses in financial management — Mr Shanmugam noted that the Nee Soon Town Council “never had its accounts qualified” and its accounts are in a “healthy position”.
“The voters will have to decide whether they want to subsidise any other town council that is in deficit. I’m sure that issue will come up because when there is a deficit, as it happened before, one way of cov-ering the deficit is merging with another town council with a healthy amount,” he said. Noting that Mem-bers of Parliament (MPs) can make significant difference on how some government plans affect resi-dents, Mr Shanmugam said that apart from managing estates and the town council, other qualities that Nee Soon residents should look for in candidates are their ability to run the Singapore Government, and to represent the residents in Parliament.
The new faces for the PAP’s Nee Soon GRC team are animal activist Louis Ng, 36, and Mr Henry Kwek, 39, executive director of private investment and trading company Foodtraco Supplies. Rounding up the slate, which will be anchored by Mr Shanmugam, are Dr Lee Bee Wah and Associate Professor Muhammad Faishal Ibrahim. Mr Shanmugam also trotted out five former party colleagues whom he de-scribed as his “secret weapon” who have been helping his team on
the ground. They include former Senior Minister of State (Law and Home Affairs) Ho Peng Kee, as well as former MPs Ong Ah Heng and Ang Mong Seng.
On the two new faces, Mr Shanmugam said Mr Ng and Mr Kwek could better represent the views of the current generation in Parliament.
“The Parliament has to be representative of those generational changes, otherwise you’ll get discon-nected,” he said, adding that the younger generation today are more interested in causes, green issues and the economic situation, among other things.
Mr Shanmugam said: “There’s got to be some people with experience — some wisdom gained from that experience — and young people who come in representing perhaps a new ethos, a new value sys-tem, a change in value system. That’s the only way ... A political party can stay relevant.”
He added: “If you look at the different PAP candidates, they will represent different sort of viewpoints because no one person, or no small group can represent all the viewpoints.”
On the timing of the General Election (GE), Mr Shanmugam said it is not the first time a GE was held soon after National Day. The 1991 GE, for example, was held on Aug 31. The PAP lost four single-seat wards then, in what was the ruling party’s worst showing until it was shaded by the 2011 GE.
Mr Shanmugam said that any government will choose what its thinks is the “right time” for holding elections. Singaporeans will not assess the situation based on the “National Day mood”, but whether there have been improvements in their lives, he added.
Mr Shanmugam said he felt that by and large, people agree that the Government is getting the broad policies right, is doing its best for Singapore, and steering the country in the right direction.
