Death penalty: a tale of two countries
A few things to get out of the way first:
- Governments mount appeals on behalf of their citizens who are facing impending death or prosecution all the time. This is protocol.
- This does not mean that one government is trying to dictate to another how to run things.
- Intelligent ppl should be able to discern the difference between official government statements and jingoism
- There are bigots on both sides but they do not represent the official views of the governments or the majority of the citizens
There’s no big underlying motive or issue here: racial, religion, nationalism or otherwise. So don’t play it up as if there was.
Accusations of neo-colonialism by proud Singaporeans are a knee-jerk reaction and points to an unjustified inferiority complex. Singapore is the only country in SE Asia to be considered “first world” – you have nothing left to prove.
The thrust of the argument was never “us vs. them” either way. It’s about one government (Australia) appealing to another (Singapore) to spare the life of one of its citizens, based on one government’s strong belief against capital punishment. It was never about condescension or patronisation on the part of the Australians.
To some of the ppl commenting on this thread on Tomorrow.sg and to op-ed writers like this one from The Sydney Morning Herald: your simplistic and inflammatory arguments are most unhelpful. I’m however glad to see some intelligent comments amongst the ignorant ones in both cases.
15 Responses to “Death penalty: a tale of two countries”
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What can we do eh Encik Mooi? Wrong place, wrong time, wrong country. I do agree tho if Nguyen succeeded in clemancy, then other ppl, be it locals or not, when it comes to drug cases… the whole law and order will be imbalance.
I firmly believe that one should respect the laws of another country. And I also firmly believe that governments should appeal on behalf of their citizens. There’s no contradiction in those beliefs.
The simple truth is: Australia can appeal to the last minute but Singapore will still hang him. And I’m neutral in my feelings about it.
That said, I agree with you – Singapore cannot grant him clemency without sending the wrong message to would-be drug traffickers, especially foreigners outside of Singapore.
Besides, the Australian Government has to go through all possible avenues of appeal so then when he does get executed, the Australian Government can say to the family that they tried all avenues of appeal.
Although after reading the discussions, I’m wondering if Singapore are going to turn their cannons from instead of pointing into Malaysia, so that they’re pointing to Australia. I like Malaysia though.
We should start building underground cities and be all Matrix-like.
christina: ahahhha…..I see you are hip with the nuances of the r’ship between Singapore and Malaysia.
Live underground? And get away from the sun and water and fresh air? Never!
Encik Mooi : I agree with what you firmly believed in.
True, Australia can appeal to the last minute, but SG will never accept it. If they do (in miracle sense), what and how can they answer to the families of deceased who were hanged of the same crime?
Susah. For those who are involved. One way or another.
Between MY and SG, that will forever go on, but, as the Malay peribahasa says… Air di cincang tidak akan putus.
Mana tahu, it applies the same for us.
kynne: well said.
as for MY and SG – yes it will forever be intertwined.
email is mooiness at gmail dot com. You could have seen this in my profile lah! Heh. email me there.
HANGHANGHANGDIEDIEDIE
ally: wah lau. you so evil. you are the COKE of evil (not just diet coke).
Yes, it was something my ex always bragged about, how they had multiple cannons and all sorts of military equipment pointed and ready to fire into Malaysia. It was like he was proud of it or something, wouldn’t stfu about it. Made me sad though, Malaysia is cool and I only visited a small part.
We shall have artificial sun, water and air, you’ll never be able to tell the difference! Lol imagine if we were living underground right now, we’d seriously never know! Maybe space is the dirt…
Mooi : Alah, jangan lah puji, malu saya. Ahahahaha! Got your email at profile ah? Either I forgot or I’m just potek (cannot see cos I’m a high-degree four-eyed).
Christina : SG has multiple cannons? Ready to point to MY? No lah, I don’t think we’re that evil. Afterall, we were part of Malaysia once. SG is rich, filthy rich. All of our hard-earned money dey! But, we’re also a very small country. Who is going to help us should we be attacked (I pray we don’t) for any reasons whatsoever? That’s why the “garhmern” bought a lot of these “wearpons”.
I think aside from being a “fine city” and “work more, have less sex”, we’ve been taught to always be prepared. To which many taxi drivers say….
“If you’re sick hor, better die, don’t go hospital, vely expensive!”
christina: one word … WOAH. Hahahaha. Yeah we would never know, like in Truman’s World. Or this could be all be a dream. Or a stupendously infinite MMORPG ala Matrix.
kynne: hehhe. Short-sighted? Woi, you still have glasses and contacts kan?
hmpf. is it considered evil is the person i want to hang is the scum of all society????
ally: no lah. just the way you said it
Kynne: I don’t know if cannons is the right word to describe it, I think it might have been missiles or something along the lines of that. My ex was in the army and he’s seen them. I don’t know if he was supposed to tell me or not, but he sure did talk about it a lot.
Mooi: I’d be pretty ecstatic if it was like Matrix. But then when real!me finds out that we’re probably doomed, that would suck
I am ex-singaporean and I have served my national service. Through our national education program for officer, we will always want to be friend with MY. Goegraphically, we will not want an enemy like MY which place a gun in Johor and able to cover the whole Singapore. I do not believe that SG has guns pointing to MY. It is definitely a misconception.