PM Goh tells U.S. to stay out of S'pore politics

PM Goh tells U.S. to stay out of S'pore politics

SINGAPORE (AFP): Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong angrily told Washington yesterday to stay out of Singapore's election campaign after a U.S. official criticized his linking voter support to housing redevelopment.

The 55-year-old Goh said he had been "astonished and furious" when he heard news of the U.S. comment Wednesday night, adding Singapore had to respond officially, a Channel Five television report said.

He said the polls here were a "local election and the U.S. government should not get into the act."

Although Singapore is small, its people have to stand up to such comment, Goh was quoted as saying during a visit yesterday to an electoral ward.

A U.S. official reportedly criticized Goh's statement that constituencies which elect opposition candidates in Jan. 2 polls may get left behind in highly coveted housing upgrading programs.

A U.S. State Department official reportedly said Wednesday that voters "everywhere should be able to vote without fear of repercussions from the government."

"First, I think foreign countries shouldn't interfere in the domestic politics of another country," Goh, 55, said in remarks published yesterday by The New Paper daily.

"U.S. is a big country. U.S. likes to make statements all over the world so may be it is expected of the U.S," he said.

"But they have not understood," he said. "They have offered their own health care plans to the population, they have offered other programs. Completely all right," he said referring to President Bill Clinton's election campaign.

"Likewise, what I am doing is to offer all these programs to the people, " the premier said.

The ruling People's Action Party (PAP) has offered voters a program of community development ranging from improved kindergartens to upgrading old public-built flats, whose values could soar on redevelopment.

The opposition has criticized the PAP, saying the ruling party was using a program financed by taxpayers' money to win votes. Minister of Information and the Arts George Yeo said he was surprised by the U.S. criticism.

"I am quite surprised that the Americans should raise an issue about how we run democratic politics in Singapore when their pork-barrel politics is something of a long tradition," Yeo was quoted as saying.

The PAP, which has ruled Singapore since 1959, is already assured of another term in government with the opposition deciding not to contest 47 of the 83 parliament seats in the election.

Opposition parties hope voters secure in the knowledge that the PAP is back in power would send more opposition candidates into parliament to act as a check on the government.

When asked how he thought 200,000 first-timers would vote, Goh said the choice was stark: vote for an opposition voice or for the PAP's programs.

"If you don't give them the choices in stark terms, they may think quite unwisely, quite naively, that PAP is already in government so why not vote in the opposition and squeeze more from the PAP.

"We are telling them, we not giving you the luxury of a choice.

"Think carefully where does your interest lie, where does the interest of your parents lie. If you go on that basis... you will vote the right people into parliament... and of course, vote PAP," Goh said.