Q: Will new citizens always vote for the PAP?

Okay for today, I will be tackling a tricky question which I have seen featured in therealsingapore.com and here is the article which sparked off the debate. Now in that article, the writer makes an assumption that newly naturalized citizens will automatically vote for the PAP. This is an assumption I have heard a lot of people make - how true is it? Let's look at the issue and analyze it today.

To kick things off, let me quote some statistics from the article:

"The number of Singapore citizens grew by close to 28,000* to 3.29 million over the one-year period. If constant 28k new citizen every year, by 2016 will have extra 140k votes for pappies. That is 4% more votes."

This summarizes how a lot of Singaporeans feel about the situation. 

Now clearly, the writer of that article feels that new citizens would automatically (or at least overwhelmingly vote for the PAP). Will they? Well, the reasoning is that the newly naturalized citizens would be grateful to the PAP for their liberal immigration policy and repay their kindness at the ballot box. Is this a fair assumption to make? Well I beg to differ.

I am sure the new citizens are glad to be in Singapore - but should they feel grateful to be allowed to come to Singapore? Well, I am going to use an analogy that would be very familiar to all of you Singaporeans and for my non-Singaporean readers, allow me to give you a little bit of background information.

All Singaporean students have to take an exam at the age of 12 called the Primary School Leaving Examination (aka PSLE). Your PSLE result would determine the secondary school you can get into - naturally, some secondary schools are more difficult to get into than others. The scores are calculated based on a bell curve and an average student will score about 210 whilst an outstanding student will score over 250. Each secondary school will have a limited number of places for each intake - let's say ABC Secondary School has 150 places for next year's secondary school intake, ABC Secondary School will sort through all the applicants and take in the best 150 students who applied. Hence the cut-off for ABC Secondary School is determined by the score of the worst student admitted into the school in that cohort. So if that student's score is 237, that's the cut off. If you have scored over 237 and have applied for ABC Secondary School, then you would have secured a place. If you have applied for ABC Secondary School but failed to score over 237, then you will be rejected. Now all this would sound all too familiar to all my Singaporean readers for they would've all been through that system.

Now I went to one of the secondary schools which was notoriously difficult to get into - Raffles Institution. They would always have one of the highest cut-offs marks every year (if not the highest cut-off amongst all the secondary schools in Singapore). Now I earned my place there fair & square based on my PSLE results - there were no favours, no donations, no brown envelops stuffed full with S$50 notes passed around, no bribes. I got in on the basis of merit.

Let's refer to this guy in the following story as "Sonny". Sonny was this boy in my cohort who was the son of someone in the government (who shall not be named) - his friends from his primary school said that there was no way he had earned himself a place in school on the basis of his PSLE results. He simply wasn't that bright and hadn't met the required PSLE cut-off - but guess what? His father was a big shot in the government and so some phone calls were made to the right people in the right places and lo and behold, Sonny got himself a place at the school of his choice. Now it was so many years ago and I cannot prove or disprove that story either way - but such is the difference. Sonny got something he didn't deserve and had a lot to be grateful for: there were loads of other students with better PSLE grades who were turned away from RI that year.

I earned myself a place at RI on the basis of merit. 

If you managed to get into a school or university on the basis of your merit, should you feel grateful to the school for giving you a chance? Or would you say, "Hey I earned my place here fair and square. There were no special chances or special favours." But in the case of Sonny, if it was indeed true that he benefited from his father's connections, then he should feel grateful to the person who did bend the rules and gave a place there despite not having met the admission criteria for the school.

Likewise, the same rules apply when it comes to immigration. All countries will have certain rules when it comes to foreigners looking to work in their country - these rules will vary from country to country but it works pretty much like the PSLE-secondary school admission system. As long as you meet the requirements, you're in. If you don't meet the requirements, then you will be turned away.

The exception is when countries give refugees from war-torn countries refuge on the basis of compassion, rather than merit per se. I can see how refugees can feel a great sense of gratitude for this compassion, but this is certainly not the same as economic migrants who have gotten in on their own merits. There is a big difference and I don't think many Singaporeans actually realize that. It is time to put this right and dispel this myth - allow Limpeh to explain this.

Economic migrants earn their right to live & work in another country.

Most countries set the bar quite high to make sure they only admit highly skilled professionals with special skills whilst turning away those lower down the food chain. Other countries may be keen to fill gaps in their labour market and will lower the standards for certain professionals with the right kind of skills. For example, the UK is desperately short of nurses and many of the nurses in our hospitals today are from the Philippines (amongst other countries, but the nurses seem to mostly Filipino these days in British hospitals).

Now try telling a Filipino nurse that she should be grateful to the British government for giving her a chance to work in the UK. Her reply would probably be, (to be read in a Leticiacia accent, ref clip below) "Uloh! Putang ina-mo! Umalis ka dito! You guys need nurses more than I need this job, without us Filipino nurses your national health service would fall apart, you should be grateful to us for stepping in to save you from all the sick British people dying in the hospitals. You have some cheek to ask me to be grateful to you, when you should be the one thanking us! Uloh!"

Likewise, I was born in Singapore but I am now a British citizen. Given that Tony Blair was the prime minister when I naturalized as a British citizen, should I be grateful to the Labour party? I say, putang ina-mo to the pucking Labour party. They were a pucking disaster and Tony Blair is a war criminal who should be arrested. Hopefully they will never be in power ever again in my lifetime.  I came to the UK the very same way I got into Raffles Institution - fair & square on my own merits. No special favours, no special chances. That's why I feel thoroughly offended by the mere suggestions that immigrants should somehow be "grateful" for having been let in. Hell no. What is there to be grateful for when I didn't get any special favours? I am glad to be here, but I am certainly not "grateful" to the government, let's get this crystal clear. I earned my right to be here fair & square!

Now you can argue that maybe the bar isn't set high enough for many new migrants from places like China. You can argue that new rules - such as an English proficiency test should be implemented for new migrants and those who cannot speak a decent standard of English should be denied citizenship. This is a very common rule for most countries in the world. You want to become a citizen of a country, you jolly well prove that you can speak their national language and learn about the local culture. Please, take it away Lulu!

However, it doesn't change the fact that the Singapore government has set the bar very low and as a result, many new migrants did get in because they did meet these low standards. They got in fair & square, they didn't "cheat" or "bribe" their way in - hell no. It's not like they are some refugees from a war torn country who were given refuge in Singapore by a benevolent government who felt sorry for their plight. Such is human psychology - if you are convinced that you have legitimately met the criteria of admission (be it for a school or country), then you take the credit for having been so fucking brilliant you earned yourself your rightful place there.

So no, you've all been so wrong with assuming that these migrants would be grateful to the PAP for letting them in. Maybe they would've preferred to have gone to somewhere like Australia, Canada or America instead - but have settled for Singapore when they couldn't meet the more stringent admission criteria for those countries. Singapore then becomes a poor second choice in that context, something you settle for in a worst case scenario rather than the promised land they had been dreaming about. By that token, it is hard to feel particularly grateful for something which is but a second choice, a consolation prize.

This reminds me of American gymnast McKayla Maroney at the 2012 London Olympics. She was favourite to win the gold medal on the women's vault finals at the gymnastics event and was the 2011 world champion on the event. After having executed an excellent first vault, winning the gold almost felt certain for her. However, she made an unfortunate error on her second vault and landed on her butt! (The two scores are averaged.) As a result she had to settle for the silver medal whilst Sanda Izbasa of Romania took the gold medal. Maroney didn't win the silver medal per se, oh no. She lost the gold and she pulled such a face during the medal presentation it became a social media sensation. You must've seen the photo below and that priceless expression on her face!

Silver medal? Bah! McKayla is not impressed. 

She was sulking so much it was hilarious. Would you want to try telling Maroney that she should be grateful for having won the silver? I wouldn't dare. By the same token, maybe these PRCs were aspiring for the American dream but had to settle for Singapore when the US said no to them - are they grateful for this consolation prize, this second-choice? Or does waking up in Singapore everyday remind them of how they didn't get what they really wanted? Hey Singaporeans, don't flatter yourselves - some of these new migrants aren't as grateful as you think. They probably look at their pink IC the same way McKayla Maroney looks at that Olympic silver medal.

Heck, many (including myself) thought that Maroney should be grateful for getting a medal of any colour after landing so unceremoniously on her butt on her second vault - but hey, she begs to differ. Likewise, you may feel that some of these ex-PRCs should be grateful for their new status as Singaporeans - but hey, they may beg to differ too. It's time to stop assuming how people should feel about their respective situations and actually look at the evidence (such as Maroney's expression upon receiving that silver medal). Just because you think they should feel grateful doesn't mean they actually do feel grateful. Oh and for those of you who have not yet seen Maroney land on her butt in London, here's the video below:

Where does that leave us? IMHO, that means that new citizens are going to vote for the party that will give them the best possible future in Singapore, rather than express any kind of blind loyalty at the ballot box. After all, new citizens face exactly the same problems all other Singaporeans face: rising costs of public housing, competition from foreign talents, the burden of national service for their sons, an elitist education system, lack of support for the disabled, the absence of a welfare state, an ageing population, the rising cost of living, a public transport system that is struggling to cope, the lack of freedom of speech - need I go on? Whether you were born in Singapore or abroad, as long as you live in Singapore, you have to face the same problems and challenges.

By that token, self-interest will kick in and they will vote for whichever party can deliver a better future for them. Remember, these new citizens are not given their pink ICs on arrival in Singapore, oh no. They would've had to spend at least 5 years in Singapore before they can become a citizen and by the time they become a citizen, it's not like they would risk losing their citizenship if they didn't vote for the PAP. Hell no. They can vote whichever way they like.

Some Singaporeans imagined that there was some kind of shading dealing going on like, "you have no hope of ever meeting our new migrant criteria but if you promise to vote for the PAP, we will give you citizenship in exchange for your vote and that's the only way you're ever going to become a Singaporean - deal? Okay. Sign here." But no, there weren't deals like that going on - just a straight forward system which had a pretty low admission criteria. Now I know some new PRC migrants like the PAP because they see a similarity between the PAP and the CPC (Communist Party of China) - a strong party which just gets things done quickly and efficiently and it is a familiar kind of system they can trust. However, that is a judgement call for them to make on the basis of their political beliefs, not a knee-jerk reactionary vote out of gratitude per se.

What do new citizens want out of life in Singapore? 

More to the point, let's get real: the PAP can do what it wants for now. The biggest challenge currently is that the opposition parties haven't gotten their act together - you could cite all the different obstacles that the PAP has allegedly placed in their path but it's still up to them to get their act together. I'd like to see different opposition parties put their differences aside and come to together and form an opposition coalition - so they can present a united front against the PAP. Otherwise, there are all simply too small as individual parties to take on the mighty PAP.

I remember this story from when I was child to illustrate the principle of 团结就是力量 ("in unity there is strength"). A boy saw his grandmother gathering thin slender wooden sticks in the courtyard and he asked her, "Why are you gathering those twigs granny?" She replied, "Sometimes when I walk to the market, there are wild dogs in the way and I want something that can scare them off." The young boy picked up one of the sticks and easily snapped it in two with very little effort. "Granny please, come on, how is that supposed to work?" He remarked. "Even I can snap these twigs just like that, these little twigs are totally useless."

The opposition needs to band together in a coalition to take down the PAP.

Granny then put all the twigs she had gathered together and tied them together with a string. "Here, now you try to break this, " she said as she handed it to her grandson. Her grandson tried hard but despite using all his strength, he couldn't even break one twig because they were tightly held together by the string. She then explained, "Sure it is easy for you to snap each stick one by one, but when you put all of them together, they become incredibly strong together because 团结就是力量 - in unity there is strength." You get the idea, the PAP can snap each opposition party just like that and they have over the years - so until they form a formidable coalition and combine their strengths like that bunch of sticks tied together. I certainly hope that happens before the next election. 

Furthermore, back in 1997 (the year I left Singapore) there were far less foreigners then and the PAP won about 75% of the votes then. Fast forward to 2011 with a far more foreigners (and new citizens) in Singapore the percentage of PAP votes actually fell to a historic low of 60.14%. Surely the figures speak for themselves - more foreigners, less votes for the PAP. There is a very clear correlation between the two figures - so if the PAP is genuinely trying to boost their vote by letting more foreigners in, well, it just isn't working. Why? Because the small number of new migrants who will vote PAP is hugely outweighed by the large number of locals who are pissed off by the PAP opening the floodgates to so many new migrants, particularly from China. The only way for this strategy to work is for them to import so many new citizens that they will make the local-born Singaporeans a minority - but that would mean such overcrowding that it is simply not feasible. But wait, new migrants may not always vote for the PAP as well ...

Is Singapore overcrowded already? How many more migrants can this city take?

Let's be clear about this - I don't think "importing new citizens" was ever a workable strategy to increase their hold on power, but what it has worked though was increasing the wealth of Singapore, making the country (and her government) a lot richer as a result of all these new migrants. PAP has always banked on the fact that they can deliver economic growth and prosperity for the country and they have not deviated from this theme. They had hoped that Singaporeans - new and indigenous alike - would be happy to see their country prosper and become one of the richest countries in the world.

So there you go, that's my take on the issue. Let's give the new citizens a bit more credit as thinking individuals trying their best to make a better future for themselves and their families. What do you think? Are you an indigenous Singaporean who is sick of all these new migrants? Are you a migrant from China looking for a better future in Singapore? You know the drill guys, leave a comment below and let me know what you think. Thanks everyone.

PS. On a totally unrelated note - Psy's Gangnam Style has reached no. 1 in the UK charts today, YAY!!!