Monday, September 05, 2016

Elected President Singapore

There are ample talks about EP. While the panel's article has not been published, PM and others already gone online about it. There are a few points which I think it may not be fair.

1. Group representation. One term is 6 years. Assuming each person takes one year. There should be 6 person. Are they going to be 3 Chinese, 1 Malay, 1 Indian and 1 other minority? In any configuration, there will be a majority. In any event, will the other 5 influence the presiding president? Can the reining president then be considered independent minded?

2. The word "from time to time" and "4, 5 or 6 terms" by PM is disturbing. Who is supposed to determine when to have a minority president? The government? Will it be used as a tool to bypass certain candidate (as some suggested)?

3. The qualifying criteria has been raised. How many minority race CEO are there in Singapore that meets the criteria except appointed government ministers? How many minority race CEO actually wants to be president? How many minority race actually submits a nomination form in the previous elections?

4. Will it still be democratic if the government decides which minority race will be next president?

5. The first president is Yusuf Ishak (1959-1970). Benjamin Shears took over (1971-1981). Devan Nair is the thard (1981-1985). They are all appointed president and are all minority president. Some alluded that a Malay should be the next elected minority president. The 4th president Wee Kim Wee (1985-1993) was the last appointed president cum first "elected" president.  The fifth Ong Teng Cheong (1993-1999) is Chinese. SR Nathan (1999-2011) is actually a un-opposed minority race President. Current president Tony Tan is also Chinese. Therefore, it is probably true that the election is race based. Open election on race basis is possibly biased. We are simply not that open minded yet. America took few hundred years to have a first minority race president (John Hanson was arguably the first black president).

Looking at the situation above, There are a few options available so that it will be all fair. I can only think of two.

1. A cyclic selection of 4 races regardless of majority or minor race. It will be flawed if there is no nomination for the particular minority race term. Who then should the next president? An open election will probably be race based again.

2. Only minority race could be president.  After all Chinese have been holding PM post since independence. I really don't see a PM of other race in the foreseeable future (based on the race based bias). Even if a minority race PM is elected due to overwhelming popularity, the parliament is still filled with majority race MPs. This is the fairest option at the moment.



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