Forum: Foreigner's appeal to Singaporeans

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I rarely read letters to the Forum but like his father, I bet the PM reads them as regularly as brushing his teeth. Unfortunately in this new year that might be where the similarity between father and son ends. One statement echos through my mind when I finished: abysmal failure of political leadership. The government conveniently assume our society will take care to adjust and adapt to foreigners. My earlier post, 'From SG plus to SG grave' is one conveniently located shred of evidence landed on my lap among countless you can find that the government never paid serious attention to integrating foreigners with the local population much less make sure the infrastructure and housing were adequate.

I couldn't find anywhere in Mishra's letter a desire to integrate with us to create a Singapore Plus. He is here to pursue his material and career dreams. No where can I find any desire to give back what we have given him.

As for Ramsamy, he belongs to the minority who takes a lot of pride in national achievements. Too many people are dislocated or suffering to share that mindset. The government love such types who are always ready if necessary to "eat bitterness" to create a big Singapore. This government serves Singapore the concept and not Singaporeans. The people are the means to bring Singapore glory. Not very different from the PRC government.

I agree with Wei Ming Kai point of view and I believe it is widely shared. Unlike many other societies carrying far fewer foreigners, none of them here will be lynched. The foreigner is sometimes a scapegoat and mostly collateral damage in our unhappiness with the government. It has overwhelmed us with so many of them that we are just unable to absorb them to achieve a SG Plus. Too many frightened foreigners naturally fail to see the point.

How many Mishras are there who are not keen to integrate? If that is their attitude we have an impossible problem. Who wants an impossible problem? Many of us are amazed at the naivety and stupidity of the PAP government. Instead of quickly and wisely go about rebuilding trust they invested in defending their superiority and went on to add insult to injury with the White Paper. Now I think unless the PM and DPM Teo step down, there is no hope for the PAP government. They have caused too much damage already. You can only apologize once and make good. He missed that only chance. At least Margaret Thatcher was stubborn but I am still trying to get over how my highly intelligent PM has turned out to be so foolish.

Update: 8am

Li Yeming has every right to make a police report but was that a clever move? Of course not. You are now a SG citizen. If you are serious about your citizenship, you want to integrate to add to making a SG Plus. If you are committed to this place you would realize that you have not put in the work expected of you to help your compatriots from China integrate, yourself included. We are bringing people like him here only to divide Singapore. This government only cared about the economic P&L.

We warmly welcome long term stayers but only if they respect our way of life and want to add to it. Folks like Li Yeming wants to turn this into a mini China. Now the other arrivals e.g., the Indians would by instinct do the same. Eventually we are back to the tinderbox of race relations from where we inherited this place from the British. If this is not stupid, what is?

The PAP has become stupid. LKY had often called people stupid. Never did he expect this is returning to his party and his son.