Here’s what everyone has said to discredit their opponents in the Bukit Batok by-election

With just three short days left for campaigning in Bukit Batok, People’s Action Party (PAP) candidate Murali Pillai and Singapore Democratic Party’s  (SDP) Dr Chee Soon Juan have been busy waging a war of words over the past couple of days.

Or rather, Murali’s circle of powerful PAP friends have been showering round after round of barbs and aspersions on Dr Chee. As usual, mounds of mud have been slung on either side by both political parties — but it’s pretty clear that PAP’s standard machinations of character assassination have been effective in causing headlines in mainstream media.

So far, it’s been pretty imba with the likes of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and other reputable politicians joining Murali on the Bukit Batok ground, in an overkill of support for a by-election that was brought about by one of their very own. In case you haven’t been able to follow the proceedings over the past couple of days, here’s a summary of verbal projectiles thrown by politicians so far in the fight for Bukit Batok.


Grace Fu / Minister for Culture, Community and Youth

Photo: Facebook

Questioning Dr Chee’s plans to be a full-time Member of Parliament and his lack of work experience:

“He wants to be a full-time MP. As far as I know he’s not held a full-time job for a long time.”

“Let me be clear – I’m not criticising his decision to not hold a full-time job for so long. No, that is his personal choice. But the work experience, or the lack of it, is a relevant fact when we consider the credentials of the candidate.”

Halimah Yacob / Speaker of Parliament

Photo: YouTube screengrab

On her shocking encounter with Dr Chee in Jurong GRC when he was branch activist:

“Mr Goh Chok Tong was the prime minister at that time and he shouted at Mr Goh Chok Tong, I was shocked at a new candidate standing for election, to see a candidate behaving in that manner.”

“So you see, you make gloss over it and say well — that is not important but I never forgot. Particularly we are Asians, we are Singaporeans, we respect our elders, people who hold important positions, leaders, we still respect them regardless of the party that they are in. So that in my view was very sad. So it is not just a candidate with the right qualifications and the right skills you need to ask what are the values of the candidate, equally important.”

Goh Chok Tong / Emeritus Senior Minister

Photo: Facebook

On the incident where Dr Chee shouted at him:

Since my name is mentioned in the Bukit Batok by-election, I say: don’t kick up a fuss over CSJ rudely shouting at me in Jurong. Words or actions do not define a person; character is not important for a would be MP, so say SDP.

And the fox to the farmer, “Hire me to look after your hen house. I have the perfect plan”.

Lee Hsien Loong / Prime Minister

Photo: MCI Photo by Terence Tan / Facebook

On Dr Chee’s proven track record and character:

“Chee Soon Juan – actually I know him for a long time also. He has not been working full-time, now he says I am going to work full-time for you. It’s easy to say, but what do you bring, which you would be able to contribute and show that you can do for the voters? And it’s partly your record, it’s partly your ability, but it’s also your character.”

“Last night, I was watching the rallies on live streaming, and at the SDP rally, all the speakers fired away at Mr David Ong, and then came Chee Soon Juan at the end, and Chee Soon Juan says: ‘No, you must not hit somebody who is down – that is very bad.’ That is completely hypocritical. You get your guys to say all the bad things, you come along and you look magisterial, and benign and say, no you must not hit somebody, having called all your lieutenants to hit him as hard as they can. But unfortunately, it’s in character.”

“…for somebody who comes along with no record, no basis, but says: ‘I will do a better job’, talk is easy, performance is what counts.”

Insinuating that Dr Chee is using race to his advantage:

“And I think when Murali is here, I see online some comments making this point about race in a quite open way. I hear some rumours going around within the constituency that people say, ‘Just vote for the Chinese, that’s good’. I think that is completely wrong and bad.”

“I see also on Chee Soon Juan’s webpage, his postings and then there are comments, and there are some comments which are along this vein too, and they have not been refuted or taken down.”

“So I have no doubt that somewhere along the way, when pressures heat up, people will feel that well, maybe this is one way you can use race to your advantage.”

Tan Chuan-Jin / Minister for Social and Family Development

Photo: Facebook

On Dr Chee’s way of greeting residents:

Hmm. Mr Chee disdainfully says that we are all hobos. Going round coffee shops just to say “ho boh ho boh?” (好吗 in Hokkien). Don’t see any hobos here as our activists and volunteers do housekeeping to make sure our Meet the People’s session files are in order so that we can better serve, groceries are organised for those who need the extra helping hand. I don’t see any hobos amongst our Grassroots/ People’s Action Party activists/volunteers who follow up and visit families. Every week. Nor are there hobos amongst the various stakeholders who discuss and trouble shoot issues whether municipal or families with difficulties or individuals with mental health concerns etc. Or any hobos amongst those who organize activities to bring the community together. Or any hobos who help go round visiting residents to say hello and gather feedback.

If this is what it means to ‘hobo hobo’…then I’d say that we are ‪#‎proudtobehobo‬ ! ‪#‎itscooltobehobo‬

Heng Swee Keat / Minister for Finance

Photo: Facebook

On SDP’s Dr Paul Tambyah stating that “A person is not defined by his or her actions or words.”:

I read with dismay Prof Paul Tambyah’s statement yesterday claiming that character doesn’t matter.
“A person,” he declared, “is not defined by his or her actions or words.”

This has to be one of the most astounding statements ever made in the history of Singapore politics.
This means a person can lie, cheat or betray someone with impunity.

Prof Tambyah and his colleagues believe character doesn’t matter, a person’s words are irrelevant, and we should ignore their actions. They believe they should be allowed to do or say anything and not be held responsible for their actions or words.

How are voters to believe what such politicians say, or hold them accountable for their actions if they were running a town council?

K Shanmugam / Minister of Home Affairs and Law

Photo: Facebook

On Dr Chee’s comments about the need to tighten immigration laws following detention of radicalised Bangladeshi workers:

“Dr Chee either does not understand the problem, or is playing politics.

Radicalisation is sweeping through the world. Hundreds have been arrested in Malaysia, including special forces, military officers and police officers. About a thousand have gone from Malaysia and Indonesia to fight with ISIS in the Middle East. We have also detained Singaporeans who had been radicalised.

As for immigration vetting of foreign workers – how would that pick up people who only become radicalised after they come here? And even those who have some radical leanings before they come in – how would we know what is in their minds, unless they had gone public with those ideas?

We have tens of thousands of Bangladeshi workers in Singapore, doing tough jobs in the construction and marine industries, and in other areas, including our Town Councils. The vast majority are peaceful, here to work hard. We send them back – who will do their jobs ?

What is Dr Chee suggesting – that we ban all foreign workers ? Or that we ban all Muslim foreign workers ?

These are serious security issues. Affects the country, all Singaporeans. Dr Chee should not play politics with our national security.”

Tharman Shanmugaratnam / Deputy Prime Minister

Photo: Facebook

Dr Chee Soon Juan / SDP chief

Photo:  Facebook

On all the comments made against him by various PAP ministers:

“Now I am getting very confused, I don’t know who my opponent is. I thought it was Mr Murali. It is turning up to be everyone else except for him. He is not saying anything and everyone else is saying it.”

Questioning PAP’s welfare programmes in Bukit Batok:

“If PAP keeps talking about People’s Association, and involving the RCs and so on and so forth, then no, I don’t think they have done a very good job.”

“In the past four weeks, we probably have two suicides here in Bukit Batok itself . However how many years PAP have been running this estate and talking about elderly and poor and then you wait until by-election and then you say you want to take care of the elderly and poor? What happen to the work that you have been putting in?”

On PM Lee’s public fight with his sister:

“Up until now, I have never, never brought up the issue about what his sister, Lee Wei Ling said about him. You can search for it online or anywhere else. But you won’t find anything I said about the incident because I never made any. I had ample opportunity to attack him on this. But I did not. And it would have been a very potent attack because this is not your political opponent saying it. It is your own flesh and blood making these statements about you.”

“Now, I want you all to imagine. If it had been my sister saying these things about me, what do you think would have happened? Do you think the PAP would have gone to town with this? Do you think that all the newspapers, channel 5, channel 8, Channel NewsAsia would all have running this news with the reporters camped outside my house – camped outside my sister’s house – for days and weeks, trying to add fuel to the fire. And then interviewed SDP members, interviewed my friends, interviewed my former classmates, interviewed my teachers to prolong the saga. And make sure that every man and woman, and boy and girl in Singapore knew about the matter.”

“And even though I did not attack Mr Lee, he has no hesitation in continuing to disparage me. I may not agree with his policies or his political ideas, but I would not attack him on such a personal level.”

On allegations of racism:

“Do a search on the Internet and tell us if we have said anything racist. And yet Grace Fu, without feeling even a bit paiseh (embarrassed), ignored her own party’s racist statements.”

Dr Paul Tambyah / SDP central executive member

Photo: Facebook

On PAP backtracking on agreement to keep mud-slinging out:

“On Nomination Day, DPM Tharman met me and we both agreed that we would keep the campaign clean and fair and focused on issues. What has happened thus far? There has been very little constructive debate on the issues and instead, the PAP has been launching venomous attacks on the person of Dr Chee based on distorted accounts from 15-20 years ago.”

Questioning Grace Fu’s own track record:

“Ms Grace Fu also made some puzzling comments about Dr Chee’s career as a politician and author. I am puzzled by those comments especially as she is the Minister for Culture, Community and Youth. She does not seem to believe that someone can make a living from doing academic research for international institutions of higher learning and publishing books for which people queue up for hours to get him to sign.”

“Perhaps that is the reason why the National Arts Council Singapore which is under her own ministry withdrew its support from the only Singaporean book ever to make it to the best seller lists of both the New York Times and Amazon – Sonny Liew’s book the art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye. Perhaps to her, being an author, or a politician, is not a real job. If that is the case, I am a little worried about the future of the arts in Singapore under her ministry.”

On mainstream media’s misleading reports:

“To be fair, the PM and Ms Grace Fu may have been misled by the Wan Bao headline in her rally speech. Wan Bao has since responded and amended their online version of the report but refused to apologise! The Straits Times has also come up with the ridiculous statement that character does not matter. We have asked them for a correction but I am not optimistic.”

On PM Lee’s allegations of racism:

“The Prime Minister also made some puzzling allegations about racism based on some comments made by anonymous posters on a SDP facebook page. He did not provide any evidence to back up his claim so perhaps this was another mistake – this time from the Zao Bao reporter who may have mistaken some of the comments of provocateurs for official SDP postings.”

 

We’ll update with more quotes as they come.



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