Understanding the PAP's apparent own goal

OK there have been many posts about the PAP's rather heavy handed response to Alex Au's post titled “PAP mis-AIMed, faces blowback”. Many bloggers and people on social media have spoken out in support of Alex Au - I too am shocked at PAP's latest move and offer my wholehearted support for Alex Au. I want to move beyond condemning he PAP's actions (are you surprised? I'm not) and try to figure out what the hell is going on here.

Now my biggest surprise in this entire case has been Lee Hsien Loong, the PM himself actually getting involved by directly taking legal action against Alex Au. LHL is the prime minister - the big man himself. I would have been rather surprised if the prime minister had micromanaged the transaction between the PAP town councils and the firm Action Information Management (AIM). I know Singapore isn't a big country, but one would imagine that such matters are handled by staff further down the food chain rather than the PM himself. Surely the appropriate response would be for the prime minister to be shielded and protected from any potential fall out and damage that such a scandal may bring?

Where are the layers of civil servants protecting the PM from this PR storm?

If this had happened in other countries, the PM would have been protected by layers and layers of government bureaucrats and civil servants. In America for example, so much false information has been spread about Obama by the Republicans especially in the run up towards the 2012 Presidential Election, but did Obama personally sue each and every single person who said something defamatory about him? No he didn't - because to have done so would be 'unpresidential'. Obama has far better things to do - such as sorting out the American economy and dealing with conflicts around the world, rather than hunting down political enemies. In any case, Obama has an excellent legal team (he is a lawyer himself) and he would allow his legal team to do all the dirty work - he wouldn't get his own hands dirty. That would be unpresidential.

This is why it shocks me that LHL would actually get his hands dirty by allowing himself to be personally involved in this scandal. Good grief. I wonder who has been giving him PR advice? I understand that he wants to defend the reputation of the PAP at this point, but he is taking quite a big risk in getting himself involved rather than delegating it to one of the many departments in his government to deal with. Even if he does get what he wants (no doubt he will) in getting Alex Au to retract his blog post and apologize, this whole episode has made so many more people interested in the AIM saga. Heck, I've not said anything about it so far on my blog but even I can't ignore it now. I want to ask: what is going on here? I present two possibilities. First possibility: it is a knee-jerk reaction and he's doing it because he is angry.

Did LHL react in the right way to Alex Au?

It's a very human response and I've seen that a lot in the corporate world before. Usually, the boss would gladly allow the customer services team deal with an unhappy customer, so he can keep some distance between himself and the customer. But years ago, I worked for this company where this boss got to fed up with the way the new customer services manager was dealing with the difficult customer he literally grabbed the phone out of her hand and dealt with the difficult customer directly. The boss wasn't really thinking, he was simply running out of patience and thought he could solve the matter a lot more quickly if he had dealt with it personally.

LHL has pushed aside any middleman and has stepped into the frontline himself. It is clearly a case of "老板亲自出马" - has he totally lost faith in the middleman who has been entrusted to resolve this issue? We don't know that - I can only speculate as only someone privy to the inner most workings of the PAP would be able to confirm or deny that.

Did the big boss lose faith in his team?

There is also the possibility that LHL may not be the easiest person to advice - heck, I also find it hard to give my boss advice sometimes. He's my boss, he pays my wages - even when things are going wrong, I have to sugar coat my advice in a way to come across as respectful rather than tactless. There could be an element of that going on within the PAP - I am sure you are all familiar with Hans Christian Andersen's tale, "The Emperor's New Clothes". Nobody wants to be the first one to give the emperor the bad news, even if it is the truth - so nobody speaks up. It is quite a universal human trait - that's why this tale has such universal appeal even if it was written way back in 1837.

In any case, LHL's father LKY has done something similar before and the same principle applies. Everyone holds LKY in such awe and great respect, nobody would dare to question his judgement or decisions - well, certainly not anyone in the PAP in any case. LKY crossed swords with opposition politician Francis Seow back in 1986 on a debate on prime time TV. Is history repeating itself? As the saying go, the apples doesn't fall too far from the tree - is this a case of like father like son? It seems that like his father, LHL could probably do with a big team of advisors whom he can trust and listen to - to guide him through the political minefield and avoid bad decisions.

The other possibility of course, is that this is a anything but a rash decision. It is a well considered, even smart move on his part to make an example of Alex Au. As the saying goes: 杀一儆百 (to warn a hundred by killing just one). The PAP has flirted with the idea of a more engaging style of government which participates in social media and listens to the people - but they like to be in control of the situation and if there are too many bloggers like Alex Au (and others like myself) who are clearly anti-PAP, then they need to nip some of these people in the bud and shut them up from time to time. Alex Au is clearly an easy target - he has a rather high profile because he is openly gay and the PAP are capitalizing on Singaporean homophobia to persuade those on the fence that Alex Au is wrong in this case.

Is this a warning to all bloggers who write about Singapore?

In my opinion, that's dirty politics - whom Alex Au chooses to have sex with or love has nothing to do with what has happened in the AIM affair and there are questions to be answered. Personally, I feel sorry for Alex Au because he is fighting an uphill battle, a losing battle and whilst I don't understand his motivations, I do salute his guts for daring to speak up in a place like Singapore. Heck, I am halfway around the world. I am an ex-Singaporean with British citizenship currently working in Belgium. The same way the PAP has used Au's sexuality to discredit him, they will use my nationality to discredit me too if they felt that I was a threat.

Perhaps this is about LHL appearing tough and strong, in a "don't mess with me" stance - some people like that. Certainly, leaders like Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Il have never shied away from opportunities to flex their political muscles and in the case of Putin, literally flex his muscles for the camera. It may make the leader look a bit like a bully, but then nobody dares to mess with the bully - and it may be a calculated move to sacrifice a bit of positive PR to achieve a desired effect very efficiently. If the side effects can be contained or mitigated, who are we to question his tactics if they work at the end of the day?

Politicians often choose the most efficient method to get the job done. 

However, in reacting so strongly to this issue and getting involved personally, LHL is stirring up further international media interest in the story. Journalists in America, Australia, Europe and Japan are now tweeting each other, "hey have you heard about the Singaporean blogger who managed to upset the Singaporean PM with his blog to the point where the PM is personally suing him?" This has gone from just another local Singaporean story (that would be probably forgotten within months) to something that can well and truly become an international media story about the PM of Singapore. After all, hardly anyone outside Singapore knows who Alex Au is, he is not a celebrity. Yet LHL is a big shot, he is the PM of Singapore - people very are interested in what he does, what he says and whom he sues.

LHL can able to control the press in Singapore - whilst this is a domestic story, few journalists outside Singapore will want to take any interest in it. But once this becomes big and goes international, the PAP may be annoyed that they simply have no control over what the foreign media may want to say about issue - from the way bloggers are treated to the alleged corruption by the PAP over the AIM affair. Surely when your government is already in a challenging situation, the last thing you need is any interest from the international media; yet this is exactly what they have engineered today. This is the part I totally don't understand and perhaps some of you can explain to me why this apparent own goal by the PAP. C'est incroyable. 

The system in Singapore confuses me at times!

In 2011 in the UK, some of you may remember the story of Ryan Giggs the footballer who sought a 'superinjunction' to gag the media on a story about an affair he had with Welsh celebrity Imgoen Thomas. Legally, what Giggs did was perfectly legal and it was his right to take that route - however, it generated so much publicity about this "footballer whom we cannot name because of the superinjunction" that the superinjunction became the focus of the story, rather than the affair and Ryan Giggs was eventually exposed through Twitter that he was the unfaithful footballer having the affair. Ironically, the very action of trying to protect his privacy was the one that made the story go viral overnight. Talk about bad PR, talk about 弄巧反拙 - this latest lawsuit by LHL may do far more in making the AIM affair go viral, which really, is the last thing you'd think he wants right now.

Poor Alex Au is probably in a terrible state right now and my heart goes out to him - he's never shied away from controversy but he may have bitten off just a little bit more than he can chew this time. You see, one never quite knows when one crosses the unwritten line in the sand - Au has been critical of the government on his blog for so many years and yet this is the time time he is getting sued by the government?

The desired effect on other bloggers is fear, to get them thinking "oh dear, where is the line that Alex Au has crossed? I must not cross it and retreat so far into safety and just blog about food, shopping, fashion, travel and music instead and stay well away from politics if I don't wanna end up like Alex Au!" Ironically, I do blog about food, shopping, fashion, travel and music as well - but I find the idea of this kind of censorship rather draconian and distasteful. I know my mother would beg me to take down my blog the moment she reads about Alex Au in the news (not a chance mum, no way I am taking down my precious blog, no way.) 

Maybe I've been living in Europe for too long, but I do believe in politicians actually charming the electorate and winning them over - rather than just silencing them with threats of lawsuits, fines, bankruptcy and jail time. The PAP has made some efforts in recent years to try to engage with the electorate - but geez, they seriously need a PR guru to help them improve their image. Their current brand image seriously needs a marketing revamp if they want to appeal to the younger generation - but then again, who is going to tell that to the old men in charge? Like seriously, if I had that job, man, I have a long to-do list for them for their brand identity.

As this is still a developing story, I shall reserve judgement for now and see what happens next. I find it impossible to believe that the PAP know exactly what they're doing and I can recommend a bloody good PR firm if you need one to help guide you through this PR omnishambles - seriously, you guys will need good PR guidance the moment this story goes international and the rules of media are very different outside Singapore. Any thoughts, ideas, comments - you know the drill, I am busy working in Belgium this coming week and won't be posting much over the next few days but will be reading your comments. Tot ziens!

What will this episode do for LHL's reputation?