Let sleeping dogs lie?
Well, there is no doubt that Liew Mum Leong at 74 has contributed much to and for Singapore. From building army camps when he graduated with a degree in civil engineering from then University of Singapore in 1970 to being the handmaiden in the merger of Pidemco Land and DBS Land to form CapitaLand and to being the chairman of CAG in 2009, of Surbana in 2013, and also a senior international business adviser appointed by Temasek.
This is a man who has led with a firm hand, a strong mind and a passionate heart. “Those who know me, will know I am passionate about the roles and missions of these organisations,” he said.
But Liew has yesterday made the public announcement of bringing forward his retirement. This is quite unexpected as to the timing, but it is, I guess, a matter of time since he has passed the normal retirement age at 74.
Why then retire?
Well, he said he did so because “he did not wish his current situation to be a distraction to the respective boards, management and staff, amidst their many critical priorities.”
At the current moment, he and his family may (or may not)be under investigation arising from the decision of the high court judge who opined that there is “reason to believe that the Liew family, upon realising (their maid, Parti’s) unhappiness, took the pre-emptive first step to terminate her employment suddenly without giving her sufficient time for her to pack, in the hope that Parti would not use the time to make a complaint to MOM.” That is the distraction Liew is desirous of shielding the organisations from.
In fact, going back to Liew, there is no short of praises and appreciation for him in his decades of public and civil services.
For example, the CAG chief executive Lee Seow Hiang said: “Mr Liew’s vision and passion for Changi was an inspiration to the people of CAG and the airport community to always strive for excellence to deliver an exceptional Changi experience. The result has been Changi Airport being recognised as the world’s most awarded airport.”
Even MOF said: “Under his leadership, CAG has completed Terminal 4 and Jewel, and Changi Airport has won multiple awards as one of the best airports in the world.”
At this juncture, I am reminded of a saying, “a chain is only as strong as its weakest link.” In colloquial urban lingo, you can translate that to this: “you are only as good as your last screw up.”
Unfortunately, that can happen to anyone, but more so for the rich and famous, the powerful and idolised, because of the publicity worthliness that can be extracted should they stumble and/or fall. And in Liew’s case, it was a constellation-like fall from the heavenlies of exalted leadership and contribution.
Even more unfortunate, this practically sums up how the majority in society sees the minority relishing at the top especially in a society that is blighted by social and income inequality, where the gap has become increasingly widened. If you want to extrapolate further on this, I supposed it is safe to say that that is why WP won Sengkang by a surprised margin because many saw the status quo as elitist, aloof and self-enriching, if not self-serving.
In fact, if you google up the meaning of elitist or an elite group, you get this definition - “a group or class of persons enjoying superior intellectual or social or economic status.” Underscore superior.
No doubt it is society’s norm that an elitist be congratulated for his/her many contributions to the country or organisation. That norm dictates that credit due ought to be credit duly given.
Mind you, their influence and impact can translate into one’s dad being able to bring food home to the family, or allowing one’s mom to pay for her child’s school fees, or even granting a senior citizen work opportunities to save for his retirement.
Whatever they do, the vision they put into action, and through their industry and passion, those at the base of the hierarchical pyramid will benefit to varying degree.
But the thing about an unequal society, by social or meritocratic engineering, whether deliberate or unintentional, is that the widening gap exacerbates the problem, and with each added income/social inch of separation between the rich and the poor, you risk compounding the situation by turning the inevitable income gap into an irreconcilable resentment gap.
Excessiveness indeed begets excessiveness, and if a metaphor helps, I am reminded of the feisty exchange between Jesus and the Canaanite woman when she knelt before him for help. Jesus said, “it is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.” She replied, “yes Lord, but even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
Now, I want to be clear that that passage talks about the tenacity of faith, but if you stretch it a little and apply it to an unequal society like ours, you can sense the desperation of the poor crying for help in their scarcity and the tossing attitude of the rich enjoying their wealth, in their abundance or excesses.
That is what I call the resentment gap, not because the poor are perpetually pissed off, though that is inevitable for some, but because the rich enjoying, and for some, flaunting their so-called “superior intellectual or social or economic status” has become, not only unfair, but oppressive, to many.
Seen from that master’s table perspective, it is inevitable that many will see the crumbs tossed from their banquet table (or the many economic contributions made and charity established by them) as a stop-gap measure (pun unintended), which sadly only widens the gap further via perceived Trojan-horse-like means.
But is it their fault then for the accumulation or excesses?
Well, human nature will do what human nature will do. It takes a class, in particular, an elitist class, to shore up a parallel-running system of collateral entitlements and privileges that widens the income/social gap, and people like Liew falls under that pioneering meritorious class.
This is not to discount his contributions, and sacrifices, but to remind us all that we are very much the authors and also victims of the system we have created for ourselves. In emergent-properties lingo, the sum is insidiously greater than its parts, and some parts at the top reaps the most of it. As a result, the cause-and-effect of such system has its benefit and backlash, and such effect/backlash is often blind.
In any event, concerning the lodging of the police report, Liew said this: “I genuinely believed that if there were suspicions of wrongdoings, it is our civic duty to report the matter to the police and let the authorities investigate accordingly.”
Alas, now that the High Court judge has spoken, and mind you, he did say that he has “faith in our legal system and respect the decision of the High Court”, will he then continue with that same civic duty to come down from his banquet table and offer more than crumbs to Parti to make up for what she has to endure for the last 4 years?
Let me end with a peculiar exchange at trial between Parti’s lawyer, Anil, and Liew in 2018. Here is the relevant extract.
“My point is that most of the time something is missing, you will blame Parti,” charged Mr Balchandani.
Mr Liew objected strongly: “Not true. This is rubbish.”
He also denied he was accusing Parti of stealing to “fix” her.
“There is no motivation for a person like me to go against a maid. I am trying to avoid (her coming back to steal things) for the good of Singapore.”
True, I believe Liew. There is no motivation for people like him to go against the maid. His aim, as he had said then, was to try to avoid her from coming back to steal for the good of Singapore. It was the good of Singapore that people like him had in mind. It was a Singapore he and many others have built up.
And it unfortunately comes with a system that has its own assortment of class, privilege and entitlement. It is an assortment that needed protection from. In other words, it is that good of Singapore that needed protection. That is, a protection that those at the top stands ready, and always, to uphold, sustain and perpetuate.
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