In the latest General Election (GE), the Workers' Party (WP) did the unexpected by wrestling the Aljunied GRC from the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP). 3 months after the GE, the win is still causing problems for various government bodies.
The latest agency caught in the political firing line is the Housing and Development Board (HDB). The WP has accused the HDB of abusing its power by refusing to allow the party to hold activities at strategic sites with the GRC. According to the WP, it was only after repeated queries from their town council that the HDB finally “clarified” last month that the sites had been “leased” to the People's Association (PA) in May and June 2011. A “clarification” that score brownie points for the WP!
This latest saga came after WP MP Chen Show Mao posted a note on his Facebook page last week saying that residents had to withdraw their invitation to him to attend a dinner because the Paya Lebar citizen consultative committee told organisers that they could not invite their MP as a condition to getting approval for the venue.
A dinner in the estate and they could NOT invite their MP! Of course the PA denied the whole thing saying that they are a non-political entity. Of course no one believed them but this latest spat between the WP and HDB proves what everyone already knows; that the WP are having obstacles placed in front of them to stop them from running the GRC properly.
You know what this means? This means that the WP will have a ready made excuse in the next GE if they failed to run Aljunied GRC as well as the previous PAP team. Not only that, they have proof that they had obstructions placed by PAP-run bodies!
Talk about a political and PR coup for the WP! The WP should really thank the HDB for giving them this gift from the heavens.
3 comments:
HDB conspire with PA to score brownie points for the boss but end up scoring own goal.
I think it's high time for PAP come clean about using unscrupulous and dirty political tricks in manipulating all these public agencies to its advantage and then try to act innocent when caught red handed in the act.
Why is PAP so panaroid of public agencies & community centres getting involved in politics when in reality they are the main culprit behind all these so called 'non-political' activities ?
Are they not the greatest hypocrites to begin with ?
Well the good news is that after the public furor, PA issued a media release on Tuesday allowing residents to invite whoever they want to events on public sites leased by the association.
Bad news is that they also say this is "provided the activities are non-political and oragnised by non-grassroots organisations".
One step forward, one step back!
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