MY FELLOW SINGAPOREANS, I TOLD YOU SO

Call me a pseudo-intellectual, conceited, arrogant, patronizing, pretentious, full of hubris, under.Dunning-Kruger effect or ignoramus conspiracy theory addict, for the many blogs that I penned. I am driven by civic-mindedness and a social obligation to speak up on areas of concern. The value that I want to bring to the discussion is to present ideas, opinions, or sharing views that I feel have not been brought up in the public square. In the areas as it concern Singapore, my beloved homeland, I have raised several issues which, pardon the humility, are eye-openers. It saddens me that voluminous discourse in the social media are skewed toward the nitty gritty and the mundane.

I do believe I have raised quite a few critical points and issues but they have gained little traction. Do not get me wrong. I am not here for the accolades or to accumulate a million 'likes'. I would have loved some other more qualified people, those keen on public interest, or better governance, to pick up and bring the discussion to a higher and more meaningful level. I do have a small following who appreciates my out-of-the-box approach to examining a topic, but my outreach is puny and ineffective. And very sadly, I have been told my website can no longer be accessed in networks in some learning institutions. That's the unfortunate cause-and-effect when inconvenient issues are raised.
A look back at the various blogs to humbly re-state my points :

1. Retail electricity
I raised the point in 2019 the retail pricing system is not sustainable. The Singapore electricity system was operating under the unrealistic status of the short run marginal cost curve below the long run marginal cost curve. The SRMC at some time was running in excess of 30% below the LRMC. This gap allowed the retailers to price at huge discounts to tariff. In a more perfect market, that is, no massive excess capacity, this gap disappears and the retail pricing collapses because the inability to price below tariff makes retailers almost redundant. This was exactly what happened in the aftermath of the massive jump in gas prices end 2020.

On high tariffs, there is nothing the government can do to control the energy composition which is predominantly exogenous forces at work. I have stressed it is only in the regulated part of the electricity system that one can scrutinise to extract relief. And this is the grid operation. The use-of-system rate at S$0.0594 per kWh before GST seems disproportionately high which contributes to almost 50% of SP profits. Unless this revenue is in a sinking fund for future infra developments, it is up for debate for a reduction.

The status of SRMC significantly lower than the LRMC has been very pronounced since 2013. This is brought about by massive over capacity. The situation creates negative spark spreads. Spark spread is the power generation cost (USEP) less fuel cost. A negative spark spread makes it impossible for gencos to turn a profit. This is not sustainable for the country's economy in the long run. It was an albatross on the neck of the Singapore electricity system for years.

After the 2020 gas price increase, the SRMC skyrocketed. The USEP increased substantially and thus wholesale prices were driven up, moving the spark spread into positive territory. This happened with only a slight decrease in the supply cushion. The extreme elasticity to a small downward movement in supply cushion indicates high possibility of price fixing or collusion in the auction market. I have written about profiteering which the EMA is not paying attention. This financial year, watch out for gencos' bumper net profits in the billions.

(Read here). 

Let's stop whining : Each time tariff goes up, we cuss about SP's billion $ profits. As I explained, SP sales to non-contestable consumers are all fully hedged, meaning they make zero profits. SP profits are from overseas and operating the Singapore grid.


2, SMRT
The SMRT as operator, relies on revenue from farebox collection, augmented by some rental and advertising income. The operator has no means to subsidise fares in inflationary cost movements. The heart of the weakness in our system as compared to the most efficient system in the world, the Hong Kong MRT, is SMRT has no benefit of Land Value Capture. This critical opportunity for revenue is loss as the government rejects delayed gratification opting instead for immediate national reserves build up by selling land in the vicinity of the train stations to private commercial developers. I brought this up 4 years ago.

(Read here).

Let's stop whining : Each time there is a fare increase, we cuss at SAF generals and SMRT making huge profits. It's a structural problem. Note technical issues and management competency is not my major concern.

3. AIM Saga
Regarding the sale of the computer system of the 16 town councils, I highlighted 3 years ago 2 serious points. (1) It was a lie. The town councils had no ownership of the software Oracle Financial 11. They have merely licensing right to use, not ownership. (2) Khaw said in parliament that PAP owned the consultancy firm AIM. Either he lied (PAP never owns AIM) or PAP has breached the rule of parbus (no political parties in business) under pain of being struck off the Register of Societies.

(Read here and here).

Let's stop whining : The brickbats have all been political and sympathies to the opposition taking over the Aljunied GRC ward. The 2 core matters I pointed out are astounding serious revelation that need closure..

4. CECA
I highlighted the dangers of CECA in ways no one spoke about. These were - (1) we are importing geo-politics, bringing with this a cultural-homogenity shock. Amongst these issues, I raised one particular point which some whisperers said in the week the blog was published, the cabinet held a meeting to discuss. I am sure it was just a coincidence. The specific point was the influx of Hindu Indians are encroaching into the space of our local born true blue Singaporean Tamils. (2) I wrote about the hollowing out of our knowledge base as local PMETs get replaced in significant numbers.

(Read here).

Let's stop whining : All the noises in social media are centred on locals getting displaced. It is a huge problem the government refuses to acknowledge. It is a political time bomb. I appreciate people have been hurt and families suffered. But for me, far more important is the long term national interest impaired by the 2 issues I wrote about. Subsequent to my blog I have noticed several others have written and touched on more or less similar language I used for the 2 issues. I'm not taking credit. It's just a good coincidence.

5. National reserves
Social media discussion has been fragmented in terms of definition and quantification. I have written extensively on this and tried to wrap the idea around Singaporean heads the simple meaning of 'national reserves' grounded on ownership. This is in line with a careful reading of the constitution where it references past reserves. It should be what we own collectively. To this extent, so-call reserves funded by debt do not belong to us. Recognising this differentiation means accepting the hard cold fact that the actual national reserves are never to be anywhere near what several local pundits have consistently indicated, nor what foreign financial data points tell us. I have consistently stressed all those massive figures put out there by various parties are way out of wack.

(Read here and here).

Let's stop whining : Stop the incessant barrage about cheating and money disappearing. Try to understand what is and what is not our national reserves. For example, so many have this erroneous  idea MAS forex reserves are part of our national reserves. We have not defined and identified them, how can we even try quantify.

6. A compliant court
The suggestion of corruption or a court that is compliant to the ruling party is not helpful. It is in fact a  dangerous treading on defamation if one has no evidence. I have explained that in every country, the judiciary has an ideological base on whether its persuasion is on the red light or green light theory. Those that lean to Red light feel the courts should check the powers of the Executive (government) and they tend to be confrontational.. The US and Philippines are two examples The green light takes a more constructive approach.  UK and most commonwealth countries are examples. There is no right or wrong. It is an ideological divide. Singapore court has tended to be green light theorists with the underlying belief that the government knows best what it is doing.  Chief Justice Chan SK basically laid out in 2010 the message not to seek the courts to change bad laws - do that through the ballot. Put it another way, do not seek redress for bad government via the courts, do that through legal political process. Judiciary review is thus very rare. It is only done when the court is convinced the government's action is 'irrational' as to have 'Wednesbury unreasonableness', or extreme bias. 

My opinion is, the only platform for active debate by concerned citizens is the establishment of some mechanism to allow an independent body to trigger judicial reviews. If I were an opposition figure, I would want to own this platform.

(Read here).

Stop the whining : Stop the outcry about political bias each time we see a court decision we don't like.

7. HDB prices
Leaseholds are wasting assets that are written off to zero value. There is nothing to argue. As to affordability, I show 2 survey reports that indicate the widely held perception of non-affordability is perhaps misplaced. More importantly, I suggested 2 revolutionary ideas that HDB might consider to manage both the supply and demand side to insert some means of 'just pricing' to lower prices. These are (1) HDB assumes the dictates of a market-maker and (2) the setting up of a resale HDB market for permanent residents.

(Read here).

Let's stop whining : Stop chanting leaseholds run out to zero and HDB flats returning to government, CPF running out. Encourage debate on ideas that can better manage prices and improve affordability.

8 Hyflux
The demise of Hyflux was due to the failure of it's Tuaspring power generation plant. What happened at Tuas does not seem to have been adequately explained. Its management seemed to put blame on the increase in oil prices. The actual reason is Tuaspring opened for business in 2016 and ran smack into an industry facing massive over capacity since 2013. This over capacity has depressed generation prices from 2013 to current times. The spark spread has been in negative territory for years making profitability impossible. It is fair comment that Hyflux moved out of its core competency of water technology into a commodity market and at the start of a learning curve, not cognisant of the complexity of the power generation situation when Tuaspring came onstream.

In my opinion, relief for investors of the perpetual bond issue lies on pinning accountability on the issue manager (DBS?) on inadequacy in explaining the risk exposure in the Offer Information Statement.

(Read here).

Let's stop whining : Retail investors got burnt. A bad investments is what it is. Stop blaming the government for poor economic forecast upon which Hyfly made its investment decision.


Conclusion

I have other fun blogs. The above are serious ones where I shared views not raised by others in the social media, at least not the online media and other platforms I visit. I would think not even in academia. In the common interest of our nation, my humble wish is more debate to expand on the issues and ideas I outlined above. The least we should do, is to wise up and avoid whining on nitty gritties, which unfortunately persists to this day. Let's not miss the wood for the trees.

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