the day free speech was killed, well actually here its been dead for a long time.
I just came across this article a few days ago on a local forum which i shall not name. the article: courtesy of AFP.
it was an account by the sister of a local political dissident about a peaceful, non-violent protest calling for more governmental transparency in seemingly "democratic" Singapore. a peaceful display by 4 people donning t-shirts and signboards which was broken by up a squadron of fully armed RIOT POLICE. yes i mean fully armed, gear and all. it was never really mentioned in the local media, just a tiny column with a vague discription in the pro-government papers. but in actual fact, somehow locals got the news and soon it was actively being discussed all over the net by concerned and of course, passive, ignorant citizens totally uninterested in politics and the future.
A protest in sunny Singapore
Chee Siok Chin
12 Aug 05
It would have been an activity of little significance in most parts Asia, save for perhaps Burma. A group of four citizens had donned on similar T-shirts and created quite a stir in the Central Business District area yesterday by calling for transparency and accountability from the government. One of them was me.
We had come together to make a statement – we want the PAP government to be accountable to the citizens. We want to know how our money is being invested or used by the GIC and CPF Board.
In our over-sized T-shirts that had messages asking for transparency and accountability, the four of us walked up to the entrance of the CPF Building at 12.30pm. We were greeted by a host of photographers and reporters. We took our positions and stood along the kerb. The cameras zeroed in on us and the messages we had on our Tees. The reporters also began to ask our spokesperson, Monica Kumar, a host of questions.
After answering all the questions, the four of us were left to our peaceful and quiet protest, with the reporters milling around. We were calm, unoffensive and relatively passive.
Suddenly a dozen or so riot policemen turned up in four riot vans (someone said that it was probably for one van for each of us). They were dressed in “warrior†garb, complete with darth-vader-looking helmets, truncheons and shields. Two more troops of regular uniformed male and female officers swarmed around us. All this on two female and two male activists who were were armed only with transparencies and silent? One reporter told us that this “drama†by the police was unnecessary. Thank you.
It was a ridiculous sight when one of the officers started shrieking: “Those of you not involved, move away from here!†It was as if 9/11 had happened in Singapore, except that the only “terrorists†were four of us armed with only two transparency signs. (I guess from the PAP's standpoint, signs calling for transparency in the GIC and CPF were potential explosives.)
A senior police officer by the name of Dominic Baptist told us to disperse or we would be arrested. But on what grounds? He said someone had called to say that we were a public nuisance. Public nuisance? You mean the police always send in the riot squad in response to public nuisance complaints? And besides, the four of us were standing still and keeping very quiet. Mr Baptist muttered something which we didn't quite understand and repeated that we were a nuisance and that our actions were an offence. Watch out, moms and dads! The next time your kids get a little too rowdy, you could be negotiating with the riot squad.
The group had agreed that we would do a 45-minute protest and it was about three minutes before we were going to disperse anyway. So one of us told the officer that we would go in three minutes, which we did when the three minutes were up.
We then walked to back of the building to wait for our transport. Perhaps feeling that they didn’t “win†this battle, Officer Baptist, accompanied by some junior officers and plain-clothes policemen approached us. By this time we had taken off our Tees. Then, like an after-thought or having taken instructions from someone who felt that it was insufficient that we had dispersed, he asked for our Identity Cards. They took down our particulars and demanded that we handed them our signs and T-shirts “for investigationâ€. I wonder what they'll do with our sweaty Tees. CSI fans, what’s your guess?
But jokes aside, we want our T-shirts back as they are priceless. Priceless because they will always remind us of the day the four of us found our courage and stood up to demand accountability and transparency from the Singapore government. Riot police break up demonstration of four people in Singapore
AFP
11 Aug 05
Riot police Thursday broke up a rare demonstration by four people demanding greater transparency and accountability in Singapore's state-managed pension fund and other government-linked agencies.
A dozen anti-riot police wearing helmets and knee-high protective gear and carrying shields and batons formed a phalanx outside the offices of the Central Provident Fund (CPF) as a commanding officer approached the demonstrators.
"You are committing an offence of public nuisance. If you don't disperse you will be arrested," the officer told the protesters as business people and employees watched in the central business district.
The four protesters, among them an office administrator and the sister of an opposition leader, Chee Soon Juan, voluntarily dispersed. They denied being part of any political group.
Police later asked them to hand over their protest materials -
T-shirts and placards - as part of an investigation to determine whether they had violated any laws.
The two men and two women assembled at lunchtime outside the CPF building in the business district. They said they did not need a permit and staged their protest for about an hour.
Under the law, any public protest of at least five people without a police permit is deemed illegal. The protest took place as Singapore was in the midst of official celebrations of its 40th anniversary of independence.
The protesters hoisted placards calling for greater openness in how the government handles public funds used for retirement pensions, overseas investments and the
building of subsidized high-rise apartments.
A police officer said they had received a telephone call from a "member of the public" about the protest, prompting them to send in the riot police.
Monica Kumar, 45, one of the protesters, said they had been inspired by public outrage that followed revelations last month that the chief executive of Singapore's biggest charity, the National Kidney Foundation (NKF), was being paid 350,000 US dollars annually.
The scandal sparked an online petition signed by more than 40,000 people and forced the NKF chief executive, T.T. Durai, and the entire board to resign.
"In reality, the NKF is reflective of the entire system in Singapore where public matters are run in a non-transparent and non-accountable manner," the protesters said in a statement.
The statement called on the Housing Development Board and the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation (GIC) to open their books for public scrutiny.
my question is: do you really need to break up a group of 4 harmless protestors with such a show of force? what are they going to send if they had 100 protestors? the army? why are records of our tax money not being revealed to us? where exactly are they and what is being done with them at this very moment? is terrorism an excuse for governmental intrusion into the lives of the people?
just some food for thought from an average joe.