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Phillip Ang - Population White Paper & PAP’s Half-Truths. GE Topic!
An honorable member of the Coffee Shop Has Just Posted the Following:
http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/08/08...s-half-truths/ Population White Paper – the whole truth and nothing but PAP’s half-truths August 8th, 2015 | Author: Contributions PAP has always been a one trick pony – it has been creating paper wealth by increasing the population density. Rest assured, the one-trick pony will need to increase the population beyond 6.9 million. Soon. From 1990 to 2000, PAP increased the population by 980,000 followed by 1.049 million during the following decade. It is a fact that our country needs a certain number of foreigners but PAP has been increasing their numbers excessively to create additional (pseudo) demand. If the foreigner population had been reduced by, say, 500,000 during the last 2 decades, PAP could not have ‘enhanced’ our HDB assets until they have become unaffordable. GDP figures would of course not be as rosy and PAP could not have punched above its weight on the world stage. In the run-up to GE 2015, Singaporeans had better wake up to PAP’s half-truths to justify its 6.9 million population target before we are forced to migrate to lower-cost countries where our new citizens emigrated from. Whichever estate you are living in, you would have experienced a surge in the number of residents during the past 2 decades. This was engineered by PAP and the resultant increase in the value of your ‘enhanced’ asset is proportional to the increase in the resident population. I’ll illustrate with 2 estates that I have lived in – Simei and Pasir Ris. Simei estate 20 years ago, the price of a 5-room flat was less than $300,000. It has since almost doubled, corresponding to the surge in the resident population. Real estate prices have increased due to the additional demand from PRs, new citizens and ‘FTs’. After 1994, the government added 1 EC, 9 condos and more than 20 blocks of HDB flats including a DBSS project on the same plot of land. Together with the opening of Changi Hospital with foreigner nursing staff requiring rental HDB units, housing prices shot up. (Contrary to PAP’s wild claim of creating good jobs, wages of nurses have been depressed.) Simei estate in 1995, crossed out developments did not exist. The real objective of the PWP is to increase the GDP by increasing the population density. This will create a vicious circle of price increases and the only way to put an end to this is to vote wisely. Pasir Ris The increase in PD mirrors the increase in other estates. The objective of the PWP has little to do with the issue of ageing population. By 2017, more than 30 condominiums and smaller private housing projects will have been completed. In addition to these private developments are 5 blocks of poorly-designed DBSS, one EC and about 30 HDB blocks. These could have easily increased the resident population by 50,000 since 1995. PAP guarantees perpetual price increase for our HDB flats: ASSET ENHANCEMENT = POPULATION DENSITY INCREASE Statistics are of course available but only misleading ones (below) are published. According to the HDB, 108,500 residents (citizens and PRs) were housed in HDB flats as at 31 March 2006. 8 years later, the resident population increased to 110,600, an unbelievable increase of only 2,100. Anyone would have been misled by HDB’s selective disclosure in not stating the total number of residents which includes foreigners. Pasir Ris estate is home to at least 20,000 foreigners, probably more, working in mostly government-linked companies such as SIA Engineering, SATS, SIA, Changi Airport, etc. Even my town council has housed a number of its cleaners in our estate. What is HDB’s objective in not disclosing the relevant data to the public? Can any citizen trust PAP when it discloses data selectively? Singaporeans live in self-contained towns and spend most of our time in the same environment. The PD pertaining to our estate therefore matters most to us, not the average PD of Singapore. By using a national average figure, the PD of public housing estates could be as high as 50,000 while in private estates where Lau Goh lives could be as low as 5000, maybe even lower. Again, the PWP benefits the elites at ordinary Singaporeans’ expense. Back to Pasir Ris where within a 1 kilometre radius of my home, 4 condominiums, 1 poorly-designed DBSS project and 20 blocks of HDB flats were completed during the last 4 years. But amenities have not increased despite the increase of more than 10,000 residents! So what’s going to happen during peak hours at Pasir Ris MRT station where a 15-minute train delay will create safety issues on the platform? Increase train frequency until the mother of all breakdowns paralyses the entire public transportation system? In order to estimate the PD of Pasir Ris, we need to know the land area and total population including foreigners. According to HDB, the total land area of Pasir Ris is 601 hectares or 6.01 square km. A very conservative estimate of the number of Pasir Ris residents is 200,000. (could the authorities please dispute this figure) The PD of Pasir Ris estate is therefore 33,277 (200,000 divide by 6.01 square km), much higher than the figure for Singapore. No wonder people are more stressed and short fused. And PAP claims our lives will improve when the population is increased to 6.9 million! According to the UN Population Division, Singapore’s PD of 7618 takes third spot, followed by Hong Kong’s 6571. But DPM Teo claims Hong Kong’s population density is actually and even if we hit 6.9 million, ours will still be only 13,000. To DPM Teo, every parcel of land in Hong Kong which is unsuitable for housing construction should be excluded from PD calculation. Can my MP, a DPM, suka suka override the UN Population Division and use his own PD formula to shove the PWP down our throats? What do you think? Khaw, a laughing stock as he has proven himself to be, could not resist outdoing Teo: “You can have a higher, seemingly highly dense rebuilt city but considered as highly liveable… The key is good planning, good infrastructure”. Did Khaw consider underestimating demand for public housing, public healthcare and public transportation by miles “good planning” and a broken down MRT system “good infrastructure”? The above are PAP’s half-truths. PAP has a history of fighting its own fires and long-term planning means leaving our future to chance. When PAP planned for a population of 4 million between 2030 and 2040, it achieved this in 2000. Hopefully Singaporeans will have a better understanding why our MRT system has been breaking down regularly and will break down more often in future. If PAP could be overwhelmed by events despite having total control over all public resources, can any sane citizen trust PAP’s PWP? PAP had targeted a 4 million population between 2030 and 2040. After misplanning, PAP suka suka revised the 4 million figure as if there had been no planning. It continued playing SIM City and increased the projected population figure to 5.5 million between 2040 and 2050. Well, we have already achieved this target a few months back, decades ahead of PAP’s plan! When PAP can’t even plan properly for a smaller population of 4 or 5.5 million, its failure is a certainty even before 2030. Citizens are right to suspect the 6.9 million target will be hit much earlier as this has been confirmed by history. From articles suggesting a 10 million population target published by the sycophantic nation building press, you can bet your last dollar our one-trick pony must continue to perform the only act it knows. To sum up: The PWP is an extension of PAP’s growth shortcut, ie increasing the population density to generate economic growth. PAP’s only long-term plan is to fight its own fires. There is no logical argument to support the PWP. With a parliamentary majority, a few PAP ministers have managed to shove the PWP down citizens’ throats with their nonsensical justifications and half-truths. Phillip Ang * The writer blogs at https://likedatosocanmeh.wordpress.com Click here to view the whole thread at www.sammyboy.com. |
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