New Spore: Singapore grassroots leader mocks old lady at CPF dialogue

Grassroots leader mocks old lady at CPF dialogue

June 15th, 2014 |  Author: Editorial

It was reported that a 76-year-old former teacher was in tears when she spoke at a CPF dialogue session organised by MP Hri Kumar at Thompson Community Centre yesterday (14 Jun) [Link].

The elderly lady was clearly in distress. She said that she was a teacher prior to retirement. She is single and does not have any dependents. She begged that her CPF money be returned to her as she wants to use her money to settle a few matters while she still can.

“What I want is my money back and I want to arrange for my funeral and I want to arrange for my rice and I want to arrange for a nice settlement. Can I have it?” she asked.

The video of her speaking can be seen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cA80X5pHj_o

At the end of her speech, a lady in a white cheongsum was seen gesturing with her hands (at the 5:33 minute mark of the video). The cheongsum lady was seen twirling her fingers in the air around her head.

A TRE reader who wrote in, said, “The cheongsum lady sat in the front row. Her actions seemed to suggest that the old lady is either crazy or a desperado.”

“She has this ‘not my problem, get her to stop talking’ attitude. Reminds me of the ‘get out of my uncaring face’ attitude of Wee Shu Ming, the daughter of ex-PAP MP Wee Siew Kim, who made the insensitive remark against the heartlanders,” the reader added.

The reader cropped out the part of the video to show the cheongsum lady gesturing with the “crazy” sign:

Opposition member, Kenneth Jeyaretnam, was at the dialogue session yesterday. According to Kenneth, the cheongsam lady is a grassroots leader. In fact, Kenneth complained that the cheongsam lady and her friends disrupted him with laughter when he spoke:

From various sources, including CSI work by netizens, the cheongsam lady has been identified as Jean Ang Yee Mei Lin. Indeed, she is a known grassroots leader in the Thomson-Inglewood private estate, part of the Thomson-Toa Payoh ward led by MP Hri Kumar. His ward is, of course, part of Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC.

In a post on the Facebook page of Thomson-Toa Payoh ward [Link], Ms Ang is seen cutting a cake next to MP Hri Kumar at the Thomson-Ingelwood Resident’s (sic) Day [Link] held on 18 May 2014:

Ms Ang works in NTUC Income as a financial consultant [Link].

The TRE reader continued, “Sadly, if she is a grassroots leader, it is damn disrespectful to do a ‘crazy’ sign to a resident. I know grassroots leaders do many thankless work, but you have to educate the residents, not look down on them and think they are nuts, especially when they come to you with their problems.”

“Mocking an old lady is really unbecoming of a grassroots leader. A total disgrace!” he added.

Interestingly, Ms Ang appears to have deleted her Facebook page:https://www.facebook.com/jean.yeemeilin. It is not known why. However, a cache copy is still available on the internet [Link]:

Not surprisingly, she listed the following Facebook pages as among her favorites:

NTUC Income

Tan Suee Chieh (CEO of NTUC Enterprise, overseeing NTUC Income)

People’s Action Party

Singapore Airlines

Feng Tianwei

Dr Tony Tan for President

Dr Tony Tan

联合晚报

The TRE reader said:

The elderly auntie’s woes is real feedback from the ground and they just tried to brush her off with lame reasons. Can they really blame the citizens for thinking that PAP does not listen?

The retiree who worked hard all her life and trusted the government to guard her retirement fund, now just wants her money back to retire comfortably and without worries. Yet, the ones she voted for and trusted, have shifted the CPF goalpost… she has the right to be angry!

Can the PAP blame us when we want to revamp the system and to vote in more oppositions to correct the wrong and to take back what is rightfully ours?