Last month, Singapore’s Prime Minister mentioned that Southwest District mayor while investigating why a walkway in the district had not been cleaned, found out that three different agencies managed three different parts of the walkway.
A fishball stick had fallen on the roadside to the right, which was cleaned every two days.
The stick was left there for two days and the poor mayor was driven from pillar to post trying to fix the problem!
So to avoid further such fiascos, a Municipal Services Office will be set up to get different public agencies to work more closely together, the Prime Minister announced.
He welcomed the setting up of such a central office, which he saw as a “cockpit” from which to ensure that nothing falls through the gaps.
All well and good.
My question, however, is “Since the fishball stick fell on a busy thoroughfare, and though just a little stick, it was obviously noticed by passerbys – at least one had actually bothered to contact the authorities to have it removed – why didn’t somebody just pick it up and throw it into the rubbish bin?”
It is important to have interagency efficiency and whilst it may be the government’s métier to continue to bloat its bureaucracy is the solution now to create yet another agency?
How about putting more efforts to educate the public to develop a better sense of civic mindedness?
It is important to make the most important thing the most important thing!
Isn’t picking up the stick and throwing it away a whole lot easier than picking up the phone and trying to get the mayor to contact various government bodies to request them to remove the stick?
The government should not spoil citizens by creating agency after agency to do their bidding.