For years, political parties in Singapore have been complaining
about the apathy of Singaporeans. This complain is mostly true because we
Singaporeans most of the time have no interest in politics.
So it’s came to me with some surprise when I read that
around 4,000 people showed up at a protest at Hong Lim Park Singapore
government.
Now I have written before on how unpopular the White Paper
is but even I am surprised by the number of people who turned up at the
protest. To be fair to myself, even the organizers of the protest did not
expect so many people to turn up. I read that one organizer thought that around
300 people would turn up; in the end, the exact number of people who showed up
was 10 times more than expected!
I have to say this proves that the White Paper has hit a raw
nerve among ordinary Singaporeans. The crowd at Hong Lim Park
All in all, the White Paper has been nothing but trouble for
the Singapore
government. Not only are ordinary Singaporeans dead set against it, the
opposition parties in Singapore
have quietly and effectively hopped on the bandwagon. Their presence in the debate has made the situation into a political crisis for the ruling People's Action Party (PAP).
The protest at Hong Lim is almost unheard of in Singapore
and it present a new set of challenges for the PAP. It
would be interesting to see how they response to the political millstone The White
Paper had become. The ball is now in their court.
2 comments:
I was there. The crowd was 5k to
7k.
Unfortunately even the organizers of the protest did not give a direct headcount, so the size of the crowd is in dispute. However, whether it's 3k, 4k, or 7k frankly doesn't really matter. I think its more important that thousands of people showed up in the rain to protest against the White Paper. The act itself was important, not the size of the crowd.
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