Mother's Day: a time for spending!

Today. A fine sunny rainy Sunday. Forteen of May. Two oh oh six. Afternoon. Mother's Day.

It's mother's day, the day when we filial children dig into our pockets to shower our beloved mothers with gifts of love. While we sob for our empty pockets, our mothers glow with pride and the irritating retailing and dining stores laugh their way to the counters.

Argh.

I am deeply ashamed to say that I have never ever bought a Mother's day gift for my mother. Apart from a card I made with my sister in Primary one (two?), I have never give anything for mother to boost about to her friends. This year my mother had enough. She came home on this friday with a new handbag and pointed at me, "Thank you for your Mother's day present. Thirty dollar please."

-_____-|||

My intelligent mother then proceed to give vague warnings to my two sisters, using her new handbag (and me) as an example. I must confess that we switched the topics immediately.

To make sure that my sisters (and I to give her the thirty dollars) cannot forget today, she dangled her new handbag in front of us the past two days and announced that she will not cook on Sunday nor do chores.

Her tactics worked. My eldest sister decided to bring her out for a late mother's day lunch next week while I took my precious thirty dollar out of my poor purse and sacrificed myself for those chores. My second sister has decided to go into hiding. Doubtless she will return when she finds the cheapest acceptable thing to give to my mother. (just kidding!)

Of course my mother is filled with pride now and is busily boasting to all her firends how filial her children are.

Oh my poor wallet. Curse those retailing stores for having discounts now.

PAP comes a week late

The PAP team finally came today to make people grovel at their almighty power thank the residents. I noticed that no one was waving back. Warning sign to take note of?

They went to the market/hawker side to give flowers for Mother's day. How sweet. I wonder how much all those flowers cost and if it can be better used on other matters like upgrading for Hougang and Potong Pasir.

My Mother, Polling Agent

My mother is a polling agent. A polling agent crosses out the name on the Register once the name of the voter is called.

As corrected by Thea:

"the role of the polling agent is actually to make sure that the electorial process is unbias (eg. The election agents do not try to influence anyone to vote for either parties) during the voting day. Not soley to cross out names. In fact... only the PAP polling agents were busy crossing out names. I still cannot comprehend why they need to cross out people names when the election agents have already done so in their own register."

There you go.

As a polling agent from the PAP (my mother is a helper for some weird thing connected to PAP), my mother disappeared from our house early in the morning. She returned at 1 pm, grumbling about how boring it is. Polling agents are not allowed to talk to anyone. They can only smile. Although I heard that an opposition polling agent was so bored that he kept talking to the PAP polling agent.

So yes, that's the job of a polling agent. Unlike those poor teachers who have to work from 6am to 10pm. Polling agent aside, do you know that there is a serial number on the little slip of paper you cast your vote? My mother was complaining how she could have won 4D if she brought the number yesterday. Or so she claimed. Extra Progress Package!

Technically speaking, who you vote for can be traced through the serial numbers. Hence, we have people who want to vote for opposition but are afraid. These are the people who hold jobs either in the government (unlikely that they will want to vote for opposition) or jobs related to the government (quite possible). The votes are also kept for 6 months. This information (as in the 6 month and number thingie) is confirmed by the here. These people may have thought it's better to play safe.

Makes one wonder how many percent these people make up of.

WP says Thank You

More specifically, Sylvia Lim was saying thank you. People started waving at them from their windows when they drove by.

All the WP posters have disappeared while PAP's remain. Maybe it's because PAP have far too many posters to take down? The PAP people has yet to come by to thank the people. I am anticipating them.

Edit: PAP people did not come. Oh well. I heard cheers and whistles when LTK came to say thank you though.

The Rejected Votes and Sweating

Summary: Rejected Votes, Chiam See Tong, Eric Low and Aljunied


Table and notes on rejected votes and election in general.

**Please look at the table before reading this post

Election was yesterday.

By now, everyone (who bothers) should have known the result. This year, the election is more exciting from the previous. All the parties involved this time round achieved more than 22%. Even Ang Mo Kio, the constituency where I predicted would get more than 12.5% and less than 20%, got more than 30% of the votes. But what is most interesting about the election is not the higher percentage of votes the opposition gathered but the number of rejected votes.

I am not too sure about the last election but in this year's election, there seemed to be too many rejected votes. I made a table on the number of votes considered void. (see top photo) From the statistics, it appeared that the two constituency where the SDP contested have the highest number of rejected votes with 893 and 5487 respectively. SDA ranked second with its high number of invalid votes in the contested areas as compared to those by WP.

Likely reasons for this phenomenon:

1. 'Kiasi' Singaporeans. They do not want to vote for PAP but are afraid to offend them. This group of people have jobs or relations to the government. They don't want to take a risk. See My Mother, Polling Agent for more details.
   
2. They made a mistake. Very likely. Some of the elderly may have circled or ticked instead of crossed. Everyone makes stupid mistakes.
   
3. SDA's poster. A picture of a box ticked not crossed. (see second photo, taken from wiki) I was laughing when I saw the posters. Even my sister got confused as to whether it's a tick or a cross for the actual thing. It sure accounts for the high rates of rejected votes they have apart from Potong Pasir.
   
4. Singaporeans who do not want to vote for PAP but do not want to vote for the opposition either. (see SDP's performance on void votes, applicable to other parties) Another likely reason. SDP's high mumber of rejected votes could be due to internal conflicts that they have kindly broadcasted on national TV and papers. SDA has the Ah Beng image and WP has the Gomez issue.
   
5. People counting the votes are stringent. Possible but not necessary. I am more inclined to think that they are more lenient.
   

Continued from today morning:
After a good night (morning?) rest, I continued my research. Despite my best efforts, I am unable to find the statistics for spoil votes in 2001 and before. Hence we do not know if this high number of rejected votes is indeed extraordinary as compared to the previous elections. It will be interesting to discover though.

Apart from the rejected votes, one of the unexpected situation in the election is Potong Pasir. That Chiam See Tong is actually able to retain Potong Pasir in the 15th general election is highly astonishing. Many people I knew, including me, thought that Potong Pasir is going to lose. Instead, Chiam See Tong created a miracle and won it yet again. In any case, it would do him some good to savor his victory while it lasts. It is close to impossible that he will be able to win again in the 16th general election. Unless Chiam See Tong is able to produce the money for the much needed upgrading in the Potong Pasir, the probablity that he will lose is extremely high. Even then, if PAP begin now to woo the residents, it is likely that they will change camp. Potong Pasir is in a really bad fix. Between Hougang and Potong Pasir, Hougang is definitely much better.

People must be wondering why Hougang embraces the opposition. You really have to pity Eric Low, the PAP MP for Hougang. He is a poor sacrificial lamb. As Low Thiang Khiang achieved his best result ever, Eric Low has done his worst. It is quite sad considering the amount of work he poured into Hougang. He works at Town Council for free and spends many mornings walking around and talking to the residents. Despite all these, the residents are not impressed. They prefer "heaven got eyes" Low Thiang Khiang. Had PAP won Potong Pasir, Eric Low will have to make way for a better canditate since PAP will focus all their energy In Hougang. If PAP really want to win Hougang, they could have fielded in a much better candidate than Eric Low. Then again they have good candidates for Aljunied and looked what happen.

PAP must be sweating now. The Workers' Party achieved a 43.92% in Aljunied despite the James Gomez issue. But has Gomez really affected the results? Swing votes generally account for 10-15%. Let's say that the Gomez issue annoyed these people and they voted for PAP. Therefore the Workers' Party should have won. Bullshit. In my opinion, Gomez really didn't make that much of a difference. He may have have accounted for 5-6% but nothing more. If anything, PAP overdid the Gomez issue. Quite a number of people are rather unhappy about PAP (see article at yawningbread) and resulted in sympathy votes instead. Whichever is the case, PAP must be sweating now. It is entirely possible that the Aljunied residents will be wooed with lots of carrots for the next 5 years. It is also possible that Aljunied may find itself reduced in size.

The 15th General Election has been an exciting ride. The oppositions have improved their percentage of votes and Workers' Party becomes the single greatest threat to the PAP. One must note that the 15th election is very different from the one conducted in 2001. In 2001, the 911 incident happened two months before the election and there were fears of job loss and economic instability. It is not difficult to see why they did not do well. However, oppositions are unlikely to go beyond the results of this election. PAP is very likely to maintain their high 60% overall unless there is a radical change in attitude in the citizens.

Election is now over and I have to get back to my assignments and mugging for tests.

If I have any spelling/grammar mistakes, please comment!

the car parks are almost empty

You know when a PAP rally is going on. Just look at the car parks.

Today, they are really empty.

Just like Monday's.

Banned?!

I saw two interesting website URLs in the newspaper (those who read ST should know which two websites they are). I tried to visit them using school computers, only to find out that they are banned! What in the world is going on?! Students are not allowed to visit any sites with any unsavory news? Mrbrown.com is also banned. Does that mean that any sites with a hint of political content is going to be banned to keep students away from alternative views protect the innocence of the students?

Tsk, tsk.

Actually I think I know why. The websites have youtube videos which unfortunately is greatly frown upon by the higher powers of the school. They probably auto-ban any website that has youtube content. >_>

When enough is enough

There is a point where you have to stop or you will overdo it. PAP has crossed that line. Heard of James Gomez? It was not until a few days ago that I actually heard of him. Right now, I am sick and tired of him and wished that the media could just stop reporting on him. The issue is outdated. Look, the guy has apologised. Can we move on? Of course not. Our DPM Wong has decided to go even further. He is questioning why there is such a wonderfully crafted apology.

Now, I understand what the PAP is trying to do. However, what they are doing now is just digging themselves a bigger hole. If they could just let go when Gomez said sorry, I, along with everyone else would have thought that the PAP is very gracious and generous. Yet, they chose not to. This is a classic case of the PAP doing themselves in. Even my mother, a PAP supporter, is wondering why the PAP is making such a big fuss. "It's just a small matter isn't it?" she puzzled.

Yes, mother. It is a small issue. It has proven that James Gomez is not the best choice. I would not have want to vote for such a man. Nevertheless, the PAP need to stop overreacting. This issue had confirmed what people, who are doubtful of PAP, have been thinking. As someone who respect PAP, I sincerely hoped that they can stop now before the people's opinions get even worse.