Connect and Collaborate

Thomas L. Friedman in The Flat World emphasizes and re-emphasizes: in today's world, we must adopt a connect and collaborate system instead of the traditional command and control. Yet our leaders in Singapore are slow to implement, or even realise this. For the past few years, there has been rising discontent among the populace due to a series of unpopular policies, where the government is perceived to have lost touch with the ground. A series of ERP hikes, public transport hikes, electricity prices hikes, and then the ministers' insistence that they deserve high salaries: all has been force-fed into the citizen. In cyberspace, vitriol and abuse is not uncommon, with many labelling politicians as "elitists" and "living in their ivory towers".

I have a theory why our leaders are so apathetic to citizens' concerns.

Because we have the SAF. Every male citizen is sold into National Slavery at the age of 19 and for 2 years, are inducted with the concept of COMMAND and CONTROL.

Don't want to listen? Good. I CHARGE YOU.
Don't want to obey? Good. I CHARGE YOU.
Don't want to follow instructions? Good. I CHARGE YOU.

We can certainly blame a lot of things on the SAF.

Many of the ministers in the government are former SAF officers. Their word is the authority back then, so why should it be any different now? In the SAF, only Command and Control is recognised as a sign of a good leader. Connect and Collaborate simply does not exist.