Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Daddy Big Bucks

Daddy's civil service salary is paying for all this
Court records in Manhattan Supreme Court show that Melissa Chin, a scholar in molecular biology at Boston University, and IT consultant husband Steve Choi have dropped their case against David Tutera, U.S. celebrity wedding planner for her US$300,000 over-the-top bash at Singapore's 5-star Shangri-La Hotel on 22 Aug 2010.

“Chin herself asked for publicity but requested that the dollar amount her family spent was not made public in respect to her father’s political position,” said Tutera, detailing that he bailed because Chin's dad griped about the bloated budget when he called about a missed payment. "There is no more money," the dad supposedly said. "Don't get on the plane." Tutera was promised a US$100,000 deposit, 4 round-trip tickets from New York plus 6 six nights at the Shangri-La.

The civil servant in the affair presumably was reminded of the brickbats Permanent Secretary Tan Yong Soon received for bragging about his S$45,000 holiday, cooking pastries with wife and kid at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. His boss had to apologize for his political insensitivity, "Taking 5 weeks' leave from work is not as difficult as one thinks." Even MP Charles Chong was mired in the crossfire with his own odious remark, "Maybe it made lesser mortals envious and they thought he was a little boastful." Lesser mortals at Joo Chiat please take note. Outgoing MP Chan Soo Sen's fan base at Ho San Kong Hoey clan may need help with the translation.

The unidentified civil probably was not in danger of being bankrupted by David Tutera's final bill, not unless he was planning to out spend Burma's Senior General Than Shwe in the 2006 ostentatious wedding for his daughter, Thandar Shwe. A recent Forum letter writer from Colorado penned, "We have had a government ranked among the highest for being corruption-free." There is certainly no need to grease any wheels in Singapore to get things done, not when the grease comes ready packaged with the job appointment. One can almost see the rehash of an old Italian joke in the works. How do you get a free oil change and a grease job? Answer: run over a fat Singapore civil servant.

Sadly, the joke is ultimately on us. The back page of today's ST is listing top salaries in the private sector. Which means the greedy buggers are already hinting that they are underpaid, never mind if they are cost centers and the bankers are profit centers.

10 comments:

  1. "The unidentified civil ('servant') probably was not in danger of being bankrupted by David Tutera's final bill".

    No, definitely not, given his salary scale and the fact that he is getting at least 8 months bonus this year.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Looks like another round of huge disgusting salary increases for ministers are definitely on the cards after GE. Probably in the region of 26% increase, similar to president's pay that was recently announced. Is this going to be a regular feature now? Giving themselves a huge ass money windfall after every GE?? So also looks like GST will also be increased to either 9% or 10% soon, just like after the 2006 GE.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Tattler,
    the greedy PAP buggers probably believe they are similar to bankers and can outperform them as profit centres.

    seriously, which banker can come up with a scheme that can generate profits like our COE?
    or persuade an entire workforce to deposit their fixed savings with a bank like CPF?
    or enjoy monopoly of profits as the biggest property developer like HDB?

    the civil servant involved in the 'Tutera' fiasco should have hired David Gan as wedding planner for his beloved daughter.

    David Gan would have cost a lot cheaper and probably generous enough to throw in a free haircut for Melissa Chin and hubby.
    what the fish was this civil servant thinking? with PM Lee and HC attending plus Lucas Chow as well, his daughter would have been 'spoilt' for choice selecting celebrities from parliament and media corpse to grace her wedding reception.
    ps: they could have hired me as wedding singer and let me earn a few bucks too.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Extract from http://weddingpros.wordpress.com/2010/02/02/wedding-guru-david-tutera-sued-for-200k/

    "As for the couple, what exactly were you thinking? 90% of people have no idea who David Tutera even is and you were planning on paying him almost a quarter of a million dollars, paying expenses for his entire visit and commissioning to have an orchid named after him? "

    An orchid named after him ?
    At the Botanical Gardens ?
    Just like the Burmese General ?

    Isn't this kind of interesting just like the shit thrown out by Susan Lim at SMC ?

    ReplyDelete
  5. At $75-80m per year of ministerials salaries, we're looking at 320m over a 4 year period, not including the adjusted inflation they decided for themselves on their whim. And what do we get for our profit in exchange for this top heavy cost center? Growth dividends of $800 per pax once every 4yrs & a stagnant and declining CPF.

    And after making big bucks, all other wrong bugs also stop with them. When MP screwed up on job, they just have to say "Is honest mistake, let's move on". That my friend, is what they mean by singaporeans paying an "honest" price for its leaders. Wow..black can also become white, TinTong also become TipTop. How's that working out so far for everyone?

    All i know is this - we're paying top dollars for them to sit on their butts cushioned by designer chairs. And singaporeans are still asking "But...but..but.."

    ReplyDelete
  6. I propose a treasure hunt to find out who is the mysterious civil servant. Must be someone called "Chin" of course!

    ReplyDelete

  7. Thanks for sharing, I will bookmark and be back again...


    Bloatedness

    ReplyDelete
  8. Just in case you didn't already know, Melissa Chin and Steve Choi ended up getting divorced! She changed her name to Melissa Chen on facebook, apparently now she's part of some Global Secular Humanist Movement still living in the US. Looks like she married him for the green card LOL

    ReplyDelete
  9. Yup. Melissa Chen the bridezilla, now divorcee & Alex Yee supporter. Changing her name to hide her past just makes me wonder if there's something more that we don't already know.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Yup. Melissa Chen the bridezilla, now divorcee & AMOS YEE supporter. Changing her name to hide her past just makes me wonder if there's something more that we don't already know.

    ReplyDelete