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I am a Practitioner of 'The 7e Way of Leaders' where a Leader will Envision, Enable (ASK for TOP D), Empower, Execute, Energize, and Evolve grounded on ETHICS!

Monday, April 19, 2010

Daily Lessons from Life 19 April 2010 - Opposition has to up its game

"Opposition has to up its game - Mon, Apr 19, 2010 my paper

SOME netizens have been speculating that the People's Action Party (PAP) may lose its hold on power, with some even predicting its downfall at the next election.

Many also say that the influx of foreigners will be the deciding issue that will push fence-sitters to cast their vote for the opposition. Bread and butter issues have always been the top factor for Singaporeans voting for the PAP."

I believed 'some of these netizens' will have their 'dream' crushed' without a doubt! There is no way in heaven that the PAP may lose its hold on power in this coming general election, unless the definition of 'lose its hold on power' means losing more than 2 seats in the parliament!

Lessons for me are:

1. there is a disconnect between the top political leadership and the grassroots folks, especially those who were impacted negatively by the structural unemployment, the non-contest with the low and lower waged FWs, the replacement by FTs who are hired by FTs, the rightly-or-wrongly blame on migrants that pushed up property prices, the gap of understanding of the property prices deemed still affordable vs. the perception of the affected lots, etc. There is no doubt there is a disconnect. Just how can the top leaders explain and help the people to see things 'their way' is what troubled or disturbed the intelligent government most!;

2. the opposition cannot 'up its game' now to make a significant difference as it has a severe lack of resources - human capital and others! Its best hope and strategy is to 'take another 2-5 seats of parliament' from the PAP in the coming GE is more realistic;

3. as the incumbent government and leaders of Singapore, they are very disturbed at why the Singaporeans do not seems to understand the TRUTH that they have presented. Why are some of these Singaporeans are not able to understand. For me, as leaders of a big group of people, you will just have to continue to explain in another fashion and with higher frequencies and facts and showing empathy to the people in order to reach some form of mutual understanding on difficult issues. This will be an ongoing process regardless of timing of GE.

Hopefully in the coming GE, the opposition members will also produce their well argued and fact-based points of views to suggest that they are capable of being a good grey hound to make sure that the majority-PAP government invest more time and effort to explain their policies a bit more. They are doing the PAP a favour as it will help PAP to sharpen its skills and win more seats the next time - assuming that they will and do lose another 2-5 seats of parliament! Singapore - Together Everyone Achieve More! i.e. Singapore TEAM!

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