Post for 17th of February

Topic for 17th February Task 4: How should Singaporeans respond to the recent spat between her neighbours and her?

I believe that Singapore instead of retaliating, should remain silent or issue a public statement to clarify things as a whole once and for all. I feel that we should let the public see the truth for themselves as time will solve all problems.

Take for example, the accusation by Tun Mahathia Mohammed, alleging that the land reclamation projects in Singapore was the root for Johor's flooding problem. However in the annual environment report of the world, it was obvious that the rise in water levels, which contributed to the floods in low lying areas, is due to the 1degree Celsius rise in global temperature, causing the melting of the polar icecaps. If after reading this report, people still choose to rouse up nationalistic feelings, then regardless of anything we do to try and clarify things, it would all be fruitless effort on our part.

Another thing is the spat between Thailand and Singapore over the sale of ShinSat, a Thai national asset, to Temasek Holdings, a Singapore company. This buy over is caused fury among Thai nationals and they have demanded the recovery of ShinSat. The Thai military had also pointed an accusatory finger at Singapore for listening and monitoring their military communications. However apparently, in the Newpaper of the Saturday, 24th of February, a group of Thais, probably from ShinCorp, the mother company of ShinSat, clarified that the military communications is not routed through the satellites of ShinSat and thus is impossible to be monitored by Singapore.

Therefore, similarly for the sudden ban of sand trade between Singapore and Indonesia, I feel that Singapore should remain silent and stay in a neutral position, so as to maintain our relationships with neighbouring countries as positive as possible. Besides due to the size of our country, we cannot afford to offend our greater neighbouring countries, lest they launch an attack on us; one which we may not be able to defend against.