Ladies and Gentlemen,
To many Singaporeans the reported "critically ill" Lee Kuan Yew on life support is actually already dead, regardless what the island's state controlled papers say. Many believe that he died as far back as weeks ago. And can anyone fault them in believing this?
The Singapore media is simply government news, or put in another way, news that the government wants you to know. It is reported to have less press freedom than Somalia by the respected Reporters Without borders who have placed it at the bottom of international press rankings. To say that it has lost all credibility is an understatement. It is Pravda and Izvestia combined of the former Soviet Union reporting that Soviet grain production has increased 10 fold when in fact the entire industry has just collapsed.
Under Singapore's Newspapers and Printing Presses Act, the entire media in the island is controlled by Lee Kuan Yew, his son the Prime Minister and their Peoples Action Party which controls everything and everybody in that tiny island with a tiny population.
So when Singaporeans distrust every single bit of rubbish written in those pages, can anyone blame them from drawing their own conclusions? And in response, this increasingly insecure government does the only thing it has known for the last 50 years, mainly under the father Lee and now under the son Loong, which is, arrest and prosecute anyone who says anything they do not like.
The state controlled newspaper "Today" of Friday 20th March 2015 has this report "Uproar over hoax as Mr. Lee remains in critical condition" http://www.todayonline.com/singapore/mr-lee-kuan-yews-condition-remains-critical-police-warn-against-spreading-falsehoods
According to this report, someone had copied Loong's (Lee Hsien Loong, Lee's son) Prime Minister's official website on the Internet and stated Lee Kuan Yew had already died. Outraged that this individual is not buying the government official line that Lee Kuan Yew is still alive, they have commenced a police investigation to apprehend and prosecute him.
Their anger at this citizen can be seen in the report of the Assistant Police Commissioner here:
“We take a very stern view against anyone who doctors a government website to spread false information to deceive the public. We will spare no effort to bring them to task. We also advise the public not to spread falsehoods,” said Assistant Commissioner of Police Melvin Yong, the director of the police public affairs department.
In the circumstances where the island of Singapore has been placed below Somalia for international press freedom rankings by the respected Reporters Without Borders and where the entire media is state controlled as it is in North Korea and where these disgraceful pages are used by this one party police state to defame and discredit honest decent citizens who oppose the regime, it is perfectly understandable that people believe whatever they want to believe, which in many circles is that Lee Kuan Yew is already dead.
Instead of threatening and flexing their muscles to bully their own citizens for views that they understandably possess in the circumstances, this one party police state of Loong and company should put their own house in order, and restore credibility in their press before they go around arresting and jailing innocent citizens.
I myself am not convinced by these reports put out in these state controlled press. Really I don't know what to believe.
Many of my contacts in the island have told me he died as far back as 2 weeks ago and was secretly taken out from the hospital in the middle of the night at 2 am in an unmarked lorry and privately cremated in a secret location and his ashes dumped in the Kallang River, at downtown Singapore after the entire vicinity was cordoned off to keep onlookers out.
Perhaps he is already dead, perhaps not, who knows, in this one party police state with only the Singapore version of the Stalinist Pravda and Izvestia.
Is he going to have me arrested as well for my belief?
Gopalan Nair
Attorney at Law
A Singaporean in Exile
Fremont, California USA
Tel: 510 491 8525
Email: nair.gopalan@yahoo.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/singapore.dissident
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2 comments:
Elections coming soon! Sympathy card may be played!
PM Lee and Family
Some of us know that they are supposed to feel sad at the passing of MM Lee.
In any event, now that MM Lee is dead, can you return our parents’ CPF monies to them, that your father has coerced them to “contribute” over the years when your father was alive?
We know it’s a fact that a significant portion of our CPF monies have been lost in wasted investment through you and Ho Ching via Temasek Holdings. But we will be thankful if you still can return whatever is left back to us.
We promise not to apply for summary judgement against your family in the abovementioned extortion, as well as other atrocities your family has enacted upon your fellow Singaporeans, including acts through Internal Security Department. It is now common knowledge that you jailed a lady from our pioneer generation, before she has an opportunity to step into her election-won Havelock zone then, without trial for 6 years. Is that how you intend to celebrate SG50 too?
We’ll leave your family’s reputation and judgement to the international civilized community, who is not under any vested interest to or threat under your shriveling political reach, which has now decomposed further with Mm Lee’s death.
Return CPF to our pioneer generations in this year of SG50. Save all your rhetorical Machiavellian policies propagated through your state-controlled media, to spare further local and international squirming embarassment to Singaporeans, if not for yourself, please.
Afterall, it is the living who needs and can spend money, not the dead.
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