His first class
honours in Maths in Trinity
College seems of little help
in sharpening his logical thinking. Lee Hsien Loong again plays the blame game.
According to his logic, a lot of our current housing woes are caused by broken
families. [Link]
His solution is: “…ultimately the family members have to work
things out themselves, and ideally avoid breaking up in the first place.”
But we do not live
in an ideal world. He seems to forget about that.
By his understanding,
to avoid housing problems, all Singaporeans have to by hook or by crook
maintain their family structure. Such twisted logic sheds some light to the rationale
behind the housing policy on singles where they are prohibited from purchasing
new HDB flats because of their “defiance” to the traditional family structure. Therefore,
singles are supposed to marry someone of the opposite gender to gain access to
new HDB flats, well, by hook or by crook. With that policy in place for decades,
the number of singles is still persistently on the rise.
Mr Lee doesn’t
seem to realize that no one breaks up a family for past time leisure. For many, that has to
be the last resort. And when family has to be broken up, whether due to third
party, financial pressure or terminal illness, housing policy should not ostracize
these already unfortunate people. Or put it the other way round, housing policy
should not be the reason for a family to stay together, and neither should it
be the reason for a single to marry the next person who comes along in the
street. Sometimes, it is a healthier option to break up a family than to endure
the mental torture and misery of keeping it which might in turn lead to more
disastrous consequence. Moreover, policy should serve to facilitate the people,
to benefit the people and not employed as a social engineering tool that does
little to achieve the intended objective in the first place.
Whether a
divorcee, a widow/er or a single, they should have the rights to the access of
cheaper new HDB flats and not to be further penalized for their circumstances,
whether it is a choice or not. We are not talking about entitling them with free
housing over here. These people are paying for their abodes but why should they
be discriminated and subject to higher price tag for a roof over their heads?
Breaking up families is mentally, emotionally and financially stressful for all individuals
involved. The housing policy only further rubs chilli into the wounds and
creates further wreckages, especially for families with children involved. And
given such stringent housing policy, there is still a significant number of
people who “choose” to break up their families and “choose” to deal with imminent
homelessness than to live together, it is an evidence to prove that some things
are beyond any hope of remedy. And precisely it is the very last choice to be
taken, housing policy should avoid further exacerbating their plights.
The most amazing
thing is, being the PM of our country, being the leader of our country and
people, instead of re-looking at the unrealistic, uncompassionate and out-dated
housing policy and feeding in with more humanity and compassion, LHL swiftly
blames his citizens for causing him problems. His lack of logic is one thing
(that could be trained), his lack of compassion, empathy and breadth of mind as
the head of our country piques me the most.
Yes, if only everything
in this world is perfect, then his job would be easy. But there again, we won’t
need him in the first place. And to pay him an astronomical salary to keep him
there.
The only possible explanation
for LHL’s twisted logic, being such a clever man as he is, is that he cannot
think of a better means to hide the truth. The truth being, he and his gang will
not solve our housing problems as that would be detrimental to their own deep
pockets.
