Monday, July 19, 2010

It Never Rains, But It Pours

It must be one of the busier weekends for Minister for Information, Communications and the Arts Lui Tuck Yew. He had his Media Deveopment Authority arrest British citizen Alan Shadrake for contempt of court. Author of the book, "Once A Jolly Hangman", yanked from the shelves of bookstore Kinokuniya, faces charges of alleged "criminal defamation, among other things". Not sure if Foreign Minister George Yeo welcomes the potential diplomatic row with the United Kingdom, especially when the Ionescu affair is yet to be settled. The frequent flyer has been travelling everywhere, but never to Romania, and still depends on AP for development updates. Besides, he really needs to gets busy in Aljunied, fast looming as the mother of all electoral battlefields.

On Saturday morning, Lui's car had to reverse direction twice when leaving his Telok Kurau house because "the water is too high". The irony that a former Rear Admiral is deterred by the sight of so much water is not easily missed. Not for him the Robert Duvall line, "I love the smell of water in the morning. It smells like.. it smells like... victory." Baying for blood, he "would like PUB to meet affected residents to explain the situation". Parts of his constituency, Cambridge Road and Dorset Road were, he said, "worse than the two previous occasions."

Not that PUB Koh Teng Chye has to worry about his day job. Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has said that it is pointless to spend money on the drainage system, plus it takes up precious land which could be sold to the foreigners. According to him, Marina Bay has "attracted $20 bilion of private sector investment in real estate." Betterer, as Minister Lim Swee Say would phrase it, to splurge another $200 million for the non-event Youth Olympics, for expenditures like weird markings on the public roadways. Swiss grafitti artist Oliver Fricker could have done it for free, in exchange for not defacing his buttocks.

Meanwhile residents of The Tessarina condo in Bukit Timah reported that the car of Home Affairs Minister Wong Kan Seng's son was drowned in the basement carpark. No wonder Lianhe Wanbao photojournalist Shafie Goh (Wu Qing Shun) was handcuffed by police for being taking shots of submerged cars. Admiral Lui wouldn't be of much assistance, the guy hates water, remember?

13 comments:

  1. I fear you will be Mr Brown No 2. While you speak out the mind of many "small" people like us, I certainly dun want to see you receiving the backlash from the mighty MICA/

    sincerely yours, Ang Sar Lee

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  2. Objectivity and logic are definitely not in your limited vacabulary. Sad.

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  3. If the warship can pick him up at his doorstep, the former admiral will not have to travel to the jetty to board.

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  4. Enlightening to read :)

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  5. Can you smell the hubris?

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  6. Moe Gan Thai7/19/2010 1:34 PM

    Wah our Sinkapur everything number 1,many good ppl BG and Admiral in gahmen.let us prey Aug. no rain if not YOG lane can not be used, wasted the gahmen effort.Let us prey all ministers and big ppl, their cars won't drown in water,small ppl car drown neber mine.

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  7. Must be the only country in the world where a Rear Adm fears water...

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  8. I love you. i love your blog. ALL of my friends do.

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  9. This must be one of your longer breaks between blogs. I was missing it already!

    No idea how you get all these 'inside' information about the ministers (or is it even true?!) but its always insightful and enjoyable to read them.

    Keep on blogging...

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  10. I think Singaporeans have to stop whining and complaining and trying to blame the Government. Minister Yacob Ibrahim is not an expert in civil engineering or flooding and cannot be expected to have all the answers. I imagine the Minister is paid much less than say the CEO of a civil engineering company.

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  11. Singaporeans are NOT whiners. Nor are we always complaining and pinning the blame on the government! It is a fact that our ministers are overpaid and over-hyped!!!!!

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  12. It is irresponsible to proclaim that floods are unavoidable in SIN before studies are made for preventive measures. Many ideas have floated in the Local Blogs into the possible causes and remedies which the Authority could look into.

    Brushing away all possible means with just an irresponsible remark is taking the matter too lightly when there were millions of SINDollars damages.

    patriot

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  13. @@I imagine the Minister is paid much less than say the CEO of a civil engineering company.@@

    I don't see anyone stopping him from being one.

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