Joseph Schooling failed to get into the finals of the 100m butterfly in Tokyo Olympics and will not be able to defend his world record won in 2016 Rio Olympics. We are disappointed as much as him, but remain proud and appreciative of the effort and sacrifice he put in representing Singapore. He is still a Son of Singapore, and Our boy. In earlier years, government had no trust in him, parents persevered, and he got his gold in Rio.
As ordinary parents, we send our children to school with high hopes. We certainly never expect an Einstein, but we never put failures in their path. As young adults going into the world, we wish them well and to take on challenges as to how far they can go, knowing full well it's unlikely we have a Steve Job or a Jack Ma in our midst.
When China was emerging from the shadows of the dark ages of Maoism, the crafty Deng Shiao Ping laid the path for modernisation on one simple foundation stone. Send one million Chinese out to foreign universities all over the world. For when they return, they will change the country. And indeed, they miraculously changed their motherland within one generation. When Singapore walked out of Malaysia in 1965, Lee Kuan Yew expounded the economic ideology that Singapore has only one resource, it's people. The First Generation leadership placed trust and faith on the people and education was national prime focus and societal leveller. In the 80s, with neighbouring countries catching up, the government pivoted to a high end economy. Once again, the trust was placed on Singaporeans to undertake a structural change that required refocus of education towards the STEM curriculum. And by jolly, we did it.
Today, under the Third Gen leadership, Singaporeans are told we are not good enough for the jobs required for the new smart city economy. If you have lost your jobs, go upskill yourself. Go use the various government subsidised retraining courses. If there were special skills required, what has the leadership been doing in the last 15 years? Is there an acknowledgement the Education Ministers have not identified the needs of a new economy and prepared the labour force? It's been 15 years in the making and the government is still singing the same song.
One can be forgiven to take the view the government seems intend on a normalisation of the inadequacy of Singaporeans to take on many jobs in the market. It has taken on psychological significance as children watch their graduate parents transit to taxi driving, food delivery and security jobs. Gosh the average Singaporeans must really be degenerating. Your dads and moms are reporting to foreign supervisors and middle managers.
Let me make this loud and clear to all Singaporeans. THE GOVERNMENT IS LYING ABOUT THE JOB SITUATION AND YOUR CAPABILITIES. It has never been like this. Let me share my personal experiences. Bear with my narration and I'll explain my point eventually..
I was in banking since late 1970s. The computer age was just beginning. An IBM personal computer costs about S$16,000 and we were using mainframes on punch card technology. IT was in its nascent stage and started taking off when IBM compatibles hit the market. For that, we really have to thank an idiot IBM executive who, in his ignorance, allowed Bill Gate's Microsoft ownership of DOS. I was directly involved in a lot of IT projects. I identified endogenous applications, initiated project development, and provided the specifications. I can't code, but my knowledge of how systems work. the business, the accounting, tax, risk management, the laws, process flows, etc , basically my all-rounder background, was a tremendous help. I never used the top end names in the business like Arthur Anderson, but worked with a lone freelancer. Let's call him Hardeep.
Hardeep and I, just the 2 of us, developed a non-delivery foreign exchange system, and a frontend trading system for the dealing room. Both were sort of cutting edge at the time. It was on dBase platform, a client-server technology that supported 24x7 trading, and interfaced host banking system running on IBM midframes. We also developed a MAS reporting app that downloaded data from the mainframe to generate reports in 15 minutes that previously took 2 loan administrators one week to prepare. The same app was reconfigured and used in our London office for Bank of England reporting. The FX and front end trading systems were used in several banks in Indonesia that my offshore banking office had dealings with.
I moonshined a bit, working my full time job as operations manager in a bank, and tried to expand on systems development on the side, out of interest of IT work. We took on a Canadian banking client which used the FX and frontend system in its HK office. We developed a great app for Chartered Industries for their equipment calibration service. Its an app that allowed their equipment to transfer test data into a PC which generates calibration reports. I had to read up on statistics and learnt all about the x-bar charts and 3-sigmas. Hardeep was able to code that inverted bell shape that always approach but never touch the x-axis. Of course today, algorithms are one a dime. But back then, Hardeep had to manually code it. So we actually coded a statistical algorithm!
Long long before there was Facebook and technology with business models of free usage for subscribers and make money from advertising, I actually pre-dated that idea. That was in late 70s. Later, on my own, I sold an idea to someone who held the franchise for a popular Malaysian corporate brand card. Few people want to invest in tech at the time. So I offered free development, but the right to solicit their vendors. My idea of providing his card holders free access to a branded platform to seek deals from accredited vendors, to exchange ideas, have a subscriber database the company can reach out to, etc, sounded positive to him. Only he did'nt dare commit a development fund. He was all for the free app. I delivered on the app within 6 months. My project did'nt pan out because the Malaysian holding company folded shortly.
As I recall this Malaysian card project, CECA seems like a dejavu of sorts. Long before we had CECA, I brought in 6 coders from India. They were housed in an apartment somewhere in Geylang (the cheapiest I could find). Project-based, they worked under the radar on social visit passes. I resorted to use these coders from South Asia because we had full employment in the late 70s/80s and no Singaporean will work short term for me.
Today as I look back at those systems, I am kicking myself real hard. Those were envelope-pushing ideas at the time. I could have pushed the FX and frontend, the loan reporting, equipment calibration, and branded card systems to a big wide open virgin market. But I was young, my full-time job was too cosy a comfort zone, and I had poor business sense. The way my son put it, "dad you did'nt follow your dreams".
My academics is nothing to be proud of. I never go university. The same with Hardeep. He is not a graduate. He was a SAF diver. who went on to commercial diving with those oil rigs. He later studied coding on his own. By the way, he is a Singapore Indian. We both shared something similar. All that we ever knew were self-taught. And you have to appreciate it was not easy to teach yourself back then. There was no internet to click and learn stuff.
The purpose of my narration is this. WHEN THE GOVERNMENT SAYS THERE ARE LOTS OF JOBS THAT SINGAPOREANS CANNOT HANDLE, THEY ARE LYING. Hardeep and I are living testaments. We were able to think out and develop apps that achieved its objectives. No one taught us anything. There are surely thousands of Singapore graduates who are better than us, technical knowledge wise, and competent enough, to deliver if given the opportunity. Of that I am absolutely certain. SINGAPOREANS ARE NOT DUMB.
Years ago, Hardeep popped out of the blue to offer me the opportunity to partner him in banking application development based in Indonesia and funded by a bank. We arranged a 2 week stay for me in Jakarta to get a feel before making up my mind. I spent time in IT, front and back offices of some banks. Eventually I did'nt take up the offer. I am mentioning just to share this. I was taken by surprise to find so many Singaporeans working in the front offices and some at high levels in banks in Jakarta. A well-known Singapore statesman was an advisor in one of the banks. I never checked, but very sure Singaporean expertise in banking, and probably other areas, have been sought out by our neighbours. We were exporting talent back then. A friend of mine, for example, takes assignments from the World Bank to help establish procedural controls in central banks in less developed countries.
Our CECA policy will hollow out the Singapore talent base. Today, a lot of the C-suites are gone. The CEO, COO, CFO, CIO etc. Without its lieutenants, captains, sargeant majors and regimental majors, etc, an army cannot function. We have actually gone down the rabbit hole. Supervisory and middle line managers are also getting displaced. If this situation is not reversed soon, irreparable damage will be done to the country.
WHEN THE GOVERNMENT SAYS THERE ARE LOTS OF JOBS THAT SINGAPOREANS CANNOT HANDLE, THEY ARE LYING. I can't stress this enough. When a small country has only a few universities and which are high in world rankings, and the government set policies that favour graduates from a country whose universities are hardly ranked, policy makers need to have their brains examined.
We should stop using the term FOREIGN TALENT. This is one of the government's methodology to normalise the policy. It drills into your brains. They are talents, you are idiots. Granted foreign companies that set up base here want to bring in a pool of their specialists. These are the expertise in their particular fields. And what we want to welcome are the deal makers, the visionaires, the risk takers, those with high networks in high places, the knowledge drivers in their field, such as those in the cutting edge technologies. We understand this, and support them as host country, we want them to succeed just as much.
Under CECA arrangement, we all know there has been an invasion of PMEs from India. The government's argument that these are FTs are blatant lies. A simple check at Linkedin is all it takes to call out the government. Why do we need foreign admin managers, facility managers, HR managers, etc. I won't be surprised that companies here will be advised to ban their foreign Indian employees from registering with Linkedin. Information suppression is a new old-fashioned government control protocol.
If hollowing out Singapore talent is a dangerous path, why are'nt Singaporean elites calling this out? Where is the NTUC chief? Where are our industry leaders? Where are the Kweks, the Ongs, the Jumaboys? The business class are sleeping with the governing elites to enrich at the expense of a depressed wage market forced by the huge supply of foreign Indian PMEs. Not a single soul has stood up to say "Singaporeans are suffering. Singaporeans helped us to make our billions. It's time we stand up with Singaporeans, never mind that higher wages mean we make a little less."
Listening to Minister Ong say in parliament recently, that Singapore's success created it's own problem, made me puke. In his scholastic view, many companies locate here, we have high employment, but there is not enough Singaporeans. CECA helped alleviate the problem. The reality is the government policy helped companies lower cost on the backs of cheaper South Asians and at the expense of Singaporeans. Their message to attract FDIs is come here, we have a cheap labour force. 15 long ye.ars of the easy way out of building GDP on depressed wages have made it impossible for policy makers to realise that companies chose to base in Singapore not for the low wage advantage. For if that were so, there are a hundred much cheaper other countries they can relocate to.
!st gen leadership told us we Singaporeans are valuable and trusted. Rolled up your sleeves, get educated, we can make it together. 3rd gen leaders are telling us we are idiots, be good and either work under 3rd world supervisors, or go and be a graduate Grab driver.
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