Member of Parliament (MP) Mr Seng Han Thong may have apologised for his remarks made on Blog.Tv, but he might be still wondering why he was the one receiving the back of the Internet whiplash.
After all, as a trained journalist, all Mr Seng Han Thong did was to quote a SMRT Public Relations person that "that some of the staff, because they are Malays, they are Indians, they can't converse in English well enough" during the Blog.Tv episode discussing the recent SMRT breakdown.
Well, Mr Seng, you are no longer an editor. You are a Member of Parliament and your role as Member of Parliament is to represent the people.
It is because you are an MP now, what you say, even as a quote from a source, represents the voice of those you were elected to represent. You incurred the wrath of fellow Singaporeans on the Internet because we do not agree with your representation by publicly parroting the quote by the SMRT Public Relations.
Furthermore, you are a MP, a representative of the people, not of big corporations. You were elected in to office to echo the voice of Singaporeans, not be a loudspeaker for corporations, like SMRT.
Your fellow PAP member, Minister of State for Community Development, Youth and Sports Halimah Yacob, was right to rebuke you parroting of SMRT PR quote to blame the train drivers at the bottom of SMRT organisation for passengers stuck in the trains during the disruption.
You should have taken the opportunity on Blog.Tv to represent Singapore's unhappiness over the incident and highlight what you will be doing, as the deputy chairman of the Government Parliamentary Committee (GPC) for Transport, to prevent MRT disruptions.
Though you are a trained journalist and have years of interviewing people, my experience has taught me that journalists sometimes make the worst interviewees. For your New Year's resolution, please hire a PR agency to help you with media training.
Your fellow PAP MP Mr Baey Yam Keng who manages H&K can provide you some contacts to handle the media and interviews if you find H&K prices too exorbitant.
If you have been media trained, you would have learnt how to have turned this into a media opportunity instead as fuel to fire to further burn the wrath of Singapore netizens.
After all, as a trained journalist, all Mr Seng Han Thong did was to quote a SMRT Public Relations person that "that some of the staff, because they are Malays, they are Indians, they can't converse in English well enough" during the Blog.Tv episode discussing the recent SMRT breakdown.
Well, Mr Seng, you are no longer an editor. You are a Member of Parliament and your role as Member of Parliament is to represent the people.
It is because you are an MP now, what you say, even as a quote from a source, represents the voice of those you were elected to represent. You incurred the wrath of fellow Singaporeans on the Internet because we do not agree with your representation by publicly parroting the quote by the SMRT Public Relations.
Furthermore, you are a MP, a representative of the people, not of big corporations. You were elected in to office to echo the voice of Singaporeans, not be a loudspeaker for corporations, like SMRT.
Your fellow PAP member, Minister of State for Community Development, Youth and Sports Halimah Yacob, was right to rebuke you parroting of SMRT PR quote to blame the train drivers at the bottom of SMRT organisation for passengers stuck in the trains during the disruption.
You should have taken the opportunity on Blog.Tv to represent Singapore's unhappiness over the incident and highlight what you will be doing, as the deputy chairman of the Government Parliamentary Committee (GPC) for Transport, to prevent MRT disruptions.
Though you are a trained journalist and have years of interviewing people, my experience has taught me that journalists sometimes make the worst interviewees. For your New Year's resolution, please hire a PR agency to help you with media training.
Your fellow PAP MP Mr Baey Yam Keng who manages H&K can provide you some contacts to handle the media and interviews if you find H&K prices too exorbitant.
If you have been media trained, you would have learnt how to have turned this into a media opportunity instead as fuel to fire to further burn the wrath of Singapore netizens.
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