Daily Lessons from Life 10 July 2013 - WP's Low stands by MPs, says Vivian's attack not good politics

"WP's Low stands by MPs, says Vivian's attack not good politics - Singapolitics Jul 10, 2013 SINGAPORE - Workers' Party chief Low Thia Khiang has dismissed talk that he did not defend party comrades Sylvia Lim and Pritam Singh in Parliament on Tuesday. He said Environment and Water Resources Minister Vivian Balakrishnan, who made that observation in a Facebook post on Tuesday night, may not have heard him well, because his opening words in Parliament were that he “agreed” with Ms Lim. Speaking to reporters before his weekly Meet-the-People session on Wednesday night, Mr Low said he stood by the party's earlier investigation , which showed that the claims that the WP town council had asked for additional money to clean the high areas of two hawker centres in Bedok North were “baseless”. He added that no further investigations would be carried out, despite calls from the Minister for them. Asked what he thought of the Minister waiving parliamentary privilege, which many read as a challenge to WP leaders to sue if they thought he had defamed them when he accused them of lying, Mr Low referred to a recent comment by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong that Singapore needed to get its politics right. Mr Low said he did not think making personal attacks and challenging others to sue you constituted good politics." A master stroke by Mr Low with his reported last comment here: "It is NOT good politics to make personal attacks and challenging other to sue". No less referring PM Lee's recent comments about Singapore's need to 'get its politic right'! :-) Lessons for me are: 1. the facts are still murky at best. Some independent parties with the right credential and public trust can be invited to 'try to get ALL the parties involved to an informal trial' face-to-face to answer ALL doubts on what is what and what got 'misunderstood' and who is who. Failing that the distinction of 'are we talking about annual or quarterly cleaning and if 'spring cleaning' means quarterly or annual cleaning' remained blur!; 2. this S$7k issue is small and, of course, we must not just the severity of the implication just on the dollar amount as one opposition political member was once charged for 'abusing' postage/courier charges when the amount is far lower than S$7k. At the same time, the well known, famous or infamous over the budget by S$300m YOG where Minister Vivian was in charge, at least figuratively speaking, was explained away as Singapore's gain from international exposure and the world class infrastructure developed for the YOG are well spent. Forget about the poor planning or the lack of foresight to at least give some early indication that the 'original budget' was under-provided due to this or that omissions; 3. if this is an administrative mistake or misunderstanding, the key then is: are things acceptable to the hawkers now? That the annual cleaning which includes higher part of the areas to be cleaned are NOT cleaned without extra charges. That the quarterly cleaning will NOT include the higher part of the hawker center. If so, this case is closed. Continue to stir it up and trying to attach a greater meaning of 'political integrity' will have backslash. This is especially so when the advice by the Minister is: 'when you make mistakes, just owned up, apologise and move on.'. Something that many public feel that the government has not done enough. Except perhaps the outpouring of grieve and regret by PM Lee in the latter part of the last GE campaign. WP is not put on notice too. WP will have to raise its game. Be vigilant, be diligent, be even more professional when dealing with 'administrative matters'. A good experience for WP to learn and grow stronger and wiser - with integrity intact.